This past July a tornado wreaked havoc on my parents' property in rural Minnesota. It wasn't a big tornado and with their land so far removed from town it didn't make the news. The only evidence was the photos my mother took the next day, scenes filled with so much broken greenery it was difficult to decipher the destruction. The vertical lines of the woods had given way to jagged abstractions and profuse chaos. It remained that way for the rest of the summer, the starved leaves slowly dying on their broken branches.
Come autumn, the leaves have fallen and all that remains is the skeleton of the storm. Walking the paths takes some navigating, ducking under branches and scaling trunks. Some of the trees will become firewood for the sauna, stacked along the house and left to age until dry enough to burn. The rest will remain in the woods, hollowing and crumbling into detritus.
The best thing about nature is that even when it's broken it is beautiful. Then again, perhaps these are not scenes of brokenness but of forces so much bigger than us.
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| A swamp once named the most beautiful place on earth in a fit of youthful naturophlilia |
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| Forgive the poor lighting but I think those roots are huge. Apparently the tornado did not. |
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| Note that the tree trunk split entirely to the base |
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| Homegrown happiness |
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