BY ROBERT CATTO
It’s funny - I hadn’t intended to write a companion piece to my last essay; but, here we are.
I was back in New Zealand last week, driving down the west coast of the South Island; and what struck me after a few years in Australia wasn’t just the colour - though the variation in shades of green are certainly striking - but the interconnectedness.
It’s a very wet place, the coast, and there’s a dark lushness to the forests; especially compared to the areas of New South Wales where I spend most of my time these days.
There’s no forest floor crackling with dried bark, fallen from nearby trees; everything is fresh and sprouting, on every surface. Mosses erupt from tree stumps, tiny vines dangle from branches, tree trunks glisten with fresh growth across their surfaces, and even the signs nearby get a coating of lichen.
But, really - isn’t that just how life works?
We all build on and with one another; we dangle our ideas from a nearby branch, to see if they might come to life; our own lives sprout from the side of trees that were planted and grown by our parents, our friends, our families.
Everything grows out of everything else.
