What is it to be a tree in Harvard Yard?
What is it to be a tree in Harvard Yard? Generations of graduates have paraded across the turf, so lovingly created anew each year out of the mud flats that remain after commencement. Speeches here, by George Marshall and others, have made history. To the red oak trees that tower in front of Widener Library, these events have been mere instants, noticed if at all for their tendency to compact the soil. How many graduates of Tercentenary Theater know that most of the wood in these trees is captured CO2, a bit of alchemy that turns air into substance. Not just any bit of alchemy, but the chemical reaction that made life possible.
The tourists come and go. They are invariably foreigners, speaking German or Japanese or the friendly French of the Quebecois, which makes me worry about the American children who aren’t here. The tourists rush to take pictures on the stone steps of buildings that match some stereotype of what an old university should look like, barely noticing the trees except when they relax in their shade. And me, after hours in a windowless office supposedly studying ecology, I am just grateful to hear the wind in their leaves.
