Baobabs

DID YOU KNOW

that baobabs (called other things depending on where you be at) are found in Madagascar, India, Australia and Africa, and DO NOT GROW TREE RINGS??!?? Plus, one of the largest measured was about...get this...

52 FEET

In diameter.

Some people even built a pub in the trunk of one somewhere, I read.

A pub, though? Inside of something as majestic as an enormous, old tree? Something about it seems almost undignified, like when you're supposed to be babysitting your kid nephew and you let your guard down one second and are horrified to discover him peeing on a statue of Rosa Parks in the middle of a crowded square the next.

Something about inexplicably big trees really comforts me, though. It makes life seem more like a fairytale, where people fade into the background for a minute, or suddenly shrink to a miniscule size for no reason at all. Like there is something somehow inexplicable about life. Something that can't be contained, that has to sprout and grab as much sky as the earth will allow.

Baobabs. It even tickles my tongue to say the word...try it.

What can be quite as mysterious, as somber, as inviting as something that has seen hundreds and hundreds of years pass under its branches? What has it seen?? Can I come see as well?

I grew up with the story of The Little Prince, who is a boy from a planet far away. He is simultaniously put off by and frightened of baobabs, because if given the chance to take root and grow, they would literally tear apart whole planets, devouring them whole. Therefore, the thought of baobabs always sparked a moment of trepidation in my chest, an unreasonable amount of panic.

Maybe I'm older and less wise now, but after facing my fear of baobabs full-on, I think I love them for being so intrusive, so in-your-face. For providing a vantage point for imagination, and maybe just for having that childhood fascination of being impossibly huge.

Plus, let's face it, that word is just too much fun to be afraid of anyway.