(transition: "dissolve")+(t8n-time: 2s)[#The Rogue Tree
=><=
*a story by WahlBuilder*
(link-goto: "March", "Mars: The Meeting")]
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(event: when time > 2s)[Daily total…]
(event: when time > 3s)[Top regions…]
(event: when time > 5s)[Experts disagree…]
(event: when time > 3s)[New evidence…]
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The government has started doing something. Too little, you think, too late. Too late to close borders. Too little to *ask* people to self-isolate. Regions are on their own: in spite of, in accordance with…
Some claim they are special. They are protected. They will not die.
The tally grows.
|==|
(link: "Write to your friends")[==(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[*I'm so angry*]
(event: when time > 7s)[(replace: "H is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[Got into a fight with my parents today. They don't understand…
Take care.]]]*H is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
(event: when time > 9s)[(replace: "O is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[I love you. Take care. I think of death.
I love you.]]]*O is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
(link: "Check the twig")[==(t8n: "dissolve")[==The tenacious twig travels: from your desk to your bookshelf and back again. The reason: cats. You watch as the buds become bigger, purple then green, as they unfurl into leaves—though some don't. Some fall apart, showering scales into the water in the mug. You change water every few days. You take photos. You watch.
You notice roots. More on one side than another. They suck in water and the leaves push forward, forward, turning into new delicate shoots. They stretch to the window, to the blazing afternoon sun. Some leaves are smaller than half of your thumbnail—others are bigger than your thumb pad.
It wants to live.
He.
You call it 'he' not only because masculine is the default your native tongue reverts to, but because you associate it with certain fictional characters. You cannot write, lately. You can barely answer work emails. ((font: "Josefin Sans")[*What do we live for, just to answer emails?..*]) But you escape into your favourite fiction—it brings air to your lungs constricted by fear, burnt by anger.
You look at the twig. Him.
(link-goto: "Have an idea", "Avril: What Is Bonsai"){(unless: (passage:)'s tags contains "no-header")[
(append: ?sidebar)[
<small>(link-goto: "Begin anew", "Title")</small>]
]}The world is burning.
(event: when time > 2s)[==(t8n: "dissolve")
[==The world has been burning for a long time, and your awareness of it has been growing lately and you came to understand the pain that flickered over you from time to time as the pain of that heat. It stokes your own burning, your anger.
Lately, it's gotten worse.
You've gone from caution through dismissal to worry. You've gone from listening to dismissals through wild assumptions to quiet unease. You read the news until late into the night and read them when you wake up—an ever-filling well of confusion and horror.
(link: "Write to your friends")[==(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[*I'm angry. I'm scared.*]
(event: when time > 15s)[(replace: "O is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[I'm scared too]]]*O is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
(event: when time > 17s)[(replace: "H is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[me too!
Take care.]]]*H is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
Your government won't act yet, but you know you will be in lockdown, self-imposed or otherwise, soon enough. You have decided. It's not that your job cannot be done from home.
Or that it is in any way important.
(link: "Go for a walk")[==(t8n: "dissolve")[==You run errands. The air is dry and cold, and there are buds on some trees and bushes already, covered with city dust. The air smells like burnt tin—the reek you've come to realise is the city pollution. (The world has been burning for a long time.)
As you walk home, you feel giddy, in love with everything despite the fear, the pain, the anger. Or maybe in spite of all that.
(Maybe it's a start of a manic phase. You don't care.)
It will be your last venture to the outside, you have decided. You try to enjoy it. The world is too much, too loud, but it's alright. It's alright.
(link: "Look around")[==(t8n: "dissolve")[==You look at the trees and bushes, naked like bones, like crumpled paper, lined along the walkway. There are twigs and branches on the ground, in the faded grass of the last year. (It doesn't snow much anymore. The world is burning.)
You notice a two-pronged twig and, glancing around, feeling strangely like a thief, you pick it up. There are tiny buds on it—a promise of life. It has been cut diagonally off of its parent plant—it must have been done in an effort to contain a tree's shape or some bush's sprawl.
(link: "Take it home")[==(t8n: "dissolve")[==You take it home. You wash it lightly, removing the grey city dust. The bark is thin, easy to peel, burst like old skin. The tops of the two prongs are uneven, broken off.
You find a mug, fill it with water you use for your plants, and put it onto your desk.
(link-goto: "April", "Avril: Roots and Leaves")
(link: "Write to your friends")[==(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[*Hey this is stupid. But.
And, you know, I kill plants. I'm not good at this at all. But this stick just wants to live, so I thought maybe. Maybe. You know? I could turn it into a bonsai?*]
(event: when time > 7s)[(replace: "A is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[Go for it!]]]*A is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
(event: when time > 9s)[(replace: "H is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[DO IT]]]*H is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
(event: when time > 9s)[(replace: "O is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[Just do it!]]]*O is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
(link: "Toy with the idea")[==
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You read up a bit. No, that is not right: you spend *hours* in the abyss of research. There are so many misconceptions, it turns out. Bonsai trees are just trees, and as such most of them, with the exception of tropical species being maintained in more temperate zones, need to be outdoor year round. 'Bonsai Seeds' are a scam. Coniferous species aren't very good for beginners. Trees spend years in training before they are transferred into the shallow bonsai pots.
You are overwhelmed. You are intimidated because at first it seems to be an area where one needs a lot of money and time; it seems to be an area dominated by a particular type of men. It is unapproachable.
But—
=||
Deaths confirmed…
WHO declares…
The list of most deadly…
Experts warn that…
This is what to do…
We don't know…
|==|
*Dear citizens and guests…*
You are startled by the megaphoned message coming from the outside, travelling with police cars you cannot see from your window. Bouncing from asphalt and walls, it becomes incomprehensible aside from a few straggler words. Like in a nightmare, causing bursts of heat in your head, in your lungs.
You look at the stick. One of the new shoots is more than 15 cm long. He wants to live.
You wouldn't do it for any competition, right? You wouldn't even share photos of him with anyone but your friends.
(link: "Find a pot")[==You find a suitable pot, and fill it with the last scoops of the potting mix you have. You don't have perlite, you don't have sand, you only have expanded clay to add to the pot. You take the stick out onto the balcony, where a few of your houseplants are lounging for the growing season.
Now, officially, it is a 'potensai'.
That night, you can barely sleep, your mind filled with thoughts about forms and styles and supplies and where to find them and how to wire the tree and—
(link-goto: "May", "Mai: What Are You?")
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(event: when time > 5s)[Daily total…]
(event: when time > 3s)[Fines are being…]
(event: when time > 5s)[*Dear citiz…*]
(event: when time > 3s)[Listen to us, listen, if you can listen…]
=|||=
He lives. He *thrives*.
Everything is green outside, lush—you haven't even noticed until someone pointed it out. You haven't been outside for more than a month.
He lives. He soaks in the blazing afternoon sun, the heat. You go out— no, you *sneak* out, while cats are distracted in the kitchen by treats,—you sneak out and water him. You write down—in a dedicated notebook—weather patterns, temperature, precipitation, wondering at yourself being suddenly as though a gardener. As though you are the real deal.
=|
(event: when time > 7s)[Here are the new hobbies you…]
(event: when time > 3s)[The parents are the worst-off…]
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You think: maybe multiple-trunks? Informal upright? It's too early to say, you know that. It will be years, probably, before you can wire him. You recall what you saw on that clean diagonal cut: three or five rings. He needs more time. He needs thickening, he needs strength—but you do not have access to a garden plot where future bonsai are usually thickened. You think of all the other ingenious ways people do it: using colanders and crates and fabric pots. You have found that it isn't as intimidating as you feared at first, you have found that there need not be a lot of money involved. Just patience and research, patience and research.
(link: "Look through Wikipedia")[==
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(t8n: "dissolve")+(t8n-time: 2s)[*A honeysuckle?*]
(t8n: "dissolve")+(t8n-time: 3s)[*Privet? Do privets grow here?*]
(t8n: "dissolve")+(t8n-time: 5s)[*Somehow, I always thought that birch and beech are the same word?*]
=||||=
You know by now that it's important to determine the species of the potensai.
You spend hours surfing, looking through photos on the Wikipedia, switching between different language versions, trying to figure out which species can possibly grow in your city.
=||
(t8n: "dissolve")+(t8n-time: 2s)[*What's 'lancet' leaves?*]
(t8n: "dissolve")+(t8n-time: 2s)[*Surely, it can't be an apricot, it's too cold… is it?*]
(t8n: "dissolve")+(t8n-time: 5s)[*Definitely not an oak.*]
|==|
You try to recall where you picked him up: was it under a tree? no, no, it was on a clear part with grass… was it? no, wait, it was near a bush growing under a tree?..
You are uncertain. Your mind is boggled by differences in languages and your own (mis)understanding. You are a city creature. You can tell a maple from oak only because their leaves are shaped distinctly.
You look through your window, at the balcony where he lives now. The heat is unbearable and winds are unbearable—you feel like in the last few years the winds have become much worse. (The world is burning.)
He stands there, leaves growing bigger, stronger. You picked a snail off of him a few days ago. You make sure to poke the potting mix with a chopstick so that it doesn't compact too much.
Maybe the twin trunk form? Or literati? You don't like literati. Should you attempt air-layering instead of chopping off one of the main trunks, get yourself two trees? Can it even be air-layered? You need moss for that. You need to wait until the next year anyway before attempting anything like that. You feel like you might mess it up so easily, despite his tenaciousness.
(link: "Write to your friends")[==(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[*What a rogue he is.*]
You need fertiliser. You need perlite and sand and more potting mix, you need that moss. You need to figure out how to not kill him while not having access or money for the fancy stuff everyone else seems to use for bonsai.
You are intimidated again. Overwhelmed.
(link-goto: "Order lots of gardening stuff", "Mai: Delivery")You spent so much money on it, and while you wait for delivery, you rationalise it to yourself.
(event: when time > 3s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[You needed a potting mix for your succulents anyway.]]
(event: when time > 4s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[And expanded clay.]]
(event: when time > 5s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[And pine bark.]]
(event: when time > 6s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[And...]]
(event: when time > 7s)[==(t8n: "dissolve")[==The delivery arrives. You are so excited you can barely nod to the delivery person, and you choke out a 'thank you' and try to get the box inside. It is heavy. You feel guilty for ordering so much stuff and making someone carry it for you—even though they have a car and you don't. They smile from behind the mask and say 'Have a nice day!' and wave at one of your cats.
You dig into your new treasures. One of the bags of perlite has a taped-up hole but it is otherwise intact. Most of these supplies will be used the next year, when you up-pot the potensai (it is important to give the roots room to grow), but for now you top up the mix in his pot with some perlite. You sneeze, the fine dust getting up into your nose, and wonder why you didn't think of putting on a mask for this.
But trees are trees. They are safe, as it is repeated on one of the bonsai discussion boards you look through from time to time.
(link: "Write to your friends")[==(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[*I have stuff! I'm going to mix my own potting… mix (:D). Did you know that bonsai…*]
You write and write and write and don't feel self-conscious about it. Your friends encourage you to tell them more. They send you photos of interesting trees they've found on the internet and while visiting gardens.
You still don't know what species your potensai is.
You spend the afternoon watching his leaves sway.
You still have trouble focusing on anything: job tasks have dried to almost nothing, and you try to write but it isn't always successful. Playing games is impossible: you want to but you just *can't*. There is pain around you, and some days you cannot feel anything but hollowness. The almost constant *meh*-state.
You read that this whole thing can be described as a collective trauma.
But you watch him grow. What a rogue, indeed.
(link: "Write a poem for him")[==(t8n: "dissolve")+(t8n-time: 2s)[==
(text-style: "fade-in-out")[␣␣ ␣ ␣␣␣ ␣␣␣␣ ␣␣␣ ␣␣␣␣␣ ␣␣␣␣ ␣␣␣␣␣␣␣␣␣]
You stare at it for a long time. You can't write.
Yet.
(link-goto: "June", "Juin: Hail")
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(text-style: "blink")+(colour: cyan)[Daily tally…]
(event: when time > 3s)[(text-style: "rumble")[Not enough…]]
(event: when time > 4s)[(text-rotate: 170)+(text-style: "fade-in-out")[*Dear citizens and guests…*]]
=|||=
Pain. So much pain and fear and anger and pain—everywhere.
You wake up each night at three o'clock, at four, at five, and cannot sleep for hours. You think and think and think and think. You think of death. You think of anger.
==|
(event: when time > 3s)[(text-style: "blink")[Unreliable…]]
(event: when time > 4s)[(text-style: "rumble")[I'm not sure we…]]
(event: when time > 2s)[(text-style: "blink")+(text-rotate: 20)[Why can't we…]]
(event: when time > 3s)[(text-style: "blink")+(colour: orange)[Lies, lies lies…]]
|==|
You consider how to ensure that the writing project you've been working on for months is finished or at least published as-is in the event that you perish, either from the virus or on your own. You put it into a step-by-step algorithm that you repeat in your head once every few nights.
(link: "Step One")[==1. Make new archives of the project and of the most important past projects.
(link: "Step Two")[==2. Send them to H and say that O knows how to open those files.
(link: "Step…")[==3.—
(t8n: "rumble")[A hail!]
You rush onto the balcony and, pelted with ice chunks the size of your thumbnail, you grab the potensai and bring him inside. The hail drums over the balcony.
(link: "Inspect the tree anxiously")[==He is undamaged, it appears, and the icy chunks—balls, really, almost perfectly round—are melting already. You wonder whether he will be pleased with this rain water instead of filtered tap water. You wonder whether it is too acidic, too polluted for him.
You bring him out again in an hour, none worse for the wear.
The bruises ache on your forearms.
(link: "Write to your friends")[==(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[*There's been hail just now!! Check the photos, the ice or whatever it's called, it was huge!*]
(event: when time > 15s)[(replace: "O is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[D: Is it okay?]]]*O is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
(event: when time > 17s)[(replace: "A is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[Is everything alright?]]]*A is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
(event: when time > 20s)[(replace: "H is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[Are you alright?]]]*H is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
You are not alright. But, you tell yourself, it doesn't matter.
You've been studying different bonsai-keeping techniques lately. You want to try one of them. You've read that it should be carried out right about now, on deciduous trees.
(link-goto: "Make an attempt", "Juin: Erroneous Partial Defoliation")
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(text-style: "shadow")[Garbage, garbage, (colour: red)[garbage], you are garbage, and you will never be any good, you don't have the skills, the money, the time, you will only *kill* him…]
=|||=
As you read further, you realise you've made the mistake: partial defoliation should be done only on mature trees, after the trunk and branches are developed. Your potensai is too young, too underdeveloped, you should have never attempted cutting off the leaves…
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(text-rotate: 30)[What were you thinking, huh? People start early with this, yea, they start early, they do classes, they have outdoor space—and you have *nothing*.]
|==|
(event: when time > 5s)[==(t8n: "dissolve")[==But, tenacious, he survives. He sprouts out new growth, more leaves. The longest shoot becomes even longer, twisting into a strange cascading shape.
You have a sudden idea: maybe there are apps for figuring out the species? And sure, there are many. You were too stupid to not look for them in the first place. But results are inconclusive: it can be a Japanese honeysuckle, it can be an apricot (apricots? here?), it can be lilac (unlikely? you've never seen lilacs with bark like this—but then, you are a city creature, your head swims from the sweet scent of lilacs that flower near the house, what do you know? lilacs are lovely, though), it can be laurustinus…
He grows. He has leaves that are round, he has leaves with a pointy tip. Big and wide, small and narrow. He doesn't care. He just lives, soaking in the sun and water and everything you give to him.
Who would look after him if you die? Would he wither? Would he grow more, ever tenacious, breaking out of his pot, sending roots all the way down to the ground?
(link: "Recite a poem for him")[==You think you should feel bad for using someone else's words, but they've been on your mind for ages as you watched him.
(font: "Josefin Sans")[*If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain ;
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin
Unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.*]
(link-goto: "July", "Juillet: Broken Pot")You have to do important things a long way away from your place. This will be your first venture out in months. When all this started, life didn't change much for you, aside from not having to commute to work anymore. You didn't go out that often anyway: for want of money and for lack of energy, many issues of an even more personal nature—and because you didn't feel like it. You were content to exchange messages with your friends over the internet, to visit a museum maybe once a month, and to dedicate yourself to writing.
Yet despite the appearances, it feels like everything has changed. You barely notice the news anymore. Some weeks are endless, some days take years to pass. A month breezes by without your noticing. You can't focus on anything. There is no talking of picking a new hobby—you can barely keep anything you've already had. You write to your friends but your heart is not in it. You feel so useless to support them, to make anything better.
(link: "Walk out")[==(t8n: "dissolve")[==The city is both the same and different also. There are fewer people on the streets—but it's still dusty, dirty, baking in another heatwave. There are some people taking off their masks during their commute once they are away from the scrutiny of public transportation workers—yet they earn scalding glances from fellow commuters.
You've been having nightmares in which someone not wearing a mask holds a prominent place. You cannot help but frown at those who touch their covering or move it down to open the nose.
You look at trees as you move through the city. When you notice that you can tell one species from another, you feel a surge of pride.
A city creature, but not so clueless anymore.
(link: "Return home")[==(t8n: "dissolve")[==The heatwave is followed by strong winds. You watch the plants on the balcony warily. Your world has narrowed down to the fog of days blurring into each other: you pick up the planner and stop using it a few days later, you start exercising but forget about it soon enough… Yet each day, you look after your plants and fret over the potensai.
He grows, the rogue that he is, but refuses to flower. You think that flowers might help solve the mystery of his species, but he is content to hide, to play with you.
A gust of wind throws him into the wall.
(link: "To the rescue!")[==You jump to your feet and, quickly closing the door to the room to prevent any feline insurgents from sneaking, dash out onto the balcony. The potting mix is spilt, dark like blood. He lies on the side, on the floor of the balcony.
(link: "Pick him up")[==You carry him inside to inspect the damage. And he is, surprisingly, harmed very little: the spilt potting mix has bared some roots, but no branch is broken, no leaf is out of place or torn. But the pot… There is a crack running right through the wall. A chunk of the plastic is missing from the bottom. It is as though a lightning has struck it, although you think this plastic pot wouldn't have survived such an intense experience.
You add more of the potting mix to cover the roots again and to stabilise the potensai, then slip a rubber band over the pot to keep it together. Strangely, the crack seems to add character to the potensai himself.
(link-goto: "August", "Aout: Sad Leaves")August is a void.
(link: "Write to your friends")[==(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[*Hey, did you know about the 'curse of August'?
Anyway, I'm sick.*]
(event: when time > 5s)[(replace: "O is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[Ugh I don't feel well either]]]*O is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
(event: when time > 7s)[(replace: "A is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[My throat is sore, hope it's not *the* virus.]]]*A is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
(event: when time > 9s)[(replace: "H is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[Emergency garlic and onion and honey are on their way!]]]*H is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
Days are endless. Weeks fly in a flash. Your throat is sore, but that's all.
(link: "Carry on?")[==
||=
(event: when time > 10s)[(text-style: "shudder")[Scared.]]
(text-style: "mirror")[Others have it worse.]
(text-style: "emboss")[I'm selfish.]
=|=
You can't sleep well. Someone you know is at a hospital, choking on uncertainty. Money is getting tight. The rich are getting richer. Propaganda treats people as props.
The world is burning. You are burning.
=||
(text-style: "blink")[I don't want to die like this, when it's not my choice.]
(text-style: "shadow")[I should be grateful, I shouldn't whine, many people are much worse off than I am.]
|==|
Maybe this is the psychological effects of the isolation everyone has been talking about for months—and now they are catching up with you, much later than with others, as usual. Your mental state is fragile, you feel brittle, on the verge of swinging either into depression or a manic state.
You burn with rage that has no outlet. The world is burning, and there are people fuelling that fire, people who treat others like things, the planet like property.
And what are you doing, really? Sulking in the darkness until the sun rises? You useless—
(link: "Check the plants")[==There has been a few days of sudden cold weather and you couldn't force yourself to go out onto the balcony, then heat and the blazing sun returned and you still couldn't force yourself to go out. But now you do.
The potensai's leaves are droopy, some almost shrivelled. The potting mix is very dry and must have been like it for a few days. You burn with guilt. You move him onto a better spot, the spot he seems to like the most, and water him lightly, and apologise.
He will survive—so you hope. When autumn cold comes, you will find a box or a crate to put him into, and stuff it with newspaper and maybe something else to keep him warm through the winter. It is important to not let his roots go too cold or too dry—that means you will have to go out onto the balcony during the winter months also, and to water him carefully. You will watch whether his leaves would change colour—it is another clue to what he is.
You take a few photos of him, run them through the species-checking app, but the results are the same: inconclusive. He doesn't care for attempts at labelling—he just lives, cheerfully roguish and tenacious.
He just is.
And you… You just are. All of you.
For now, maybe it's enough.
(link-goto: "It's enough", "Fin")
=><=
(event: when time > 3s)[(replace: "W is typing…")[(font: "Josefin Sans")+(t8n: "dissolve")[For my friends.
Take care of each other!]]]*W is typing(text-style: "fade-in-out")[…]*
(event: when time > 4s)[(t8n: "dissolve")[(link-goto: "Remember again?", "Title")]]