New Beginnings

Yesterday, I spent a good part of the morning on the phone attending, by speaker phone, a meeting of the Executive Committee of the RCPA during which we updated our new Executive Director on issues facing the Adirondack Park. One thing that was reviewed was the Press Release announcing our hiring of the new ED. Michael Washburn has a Ph D. in Forestry from Univ. of Penn.

One of the main focuses of the RCPA is the Unit Management Planning process. This is a good thing and something very related to helping protect the HPWF. It is interesting to me to note that so much of what I do almost everyday is related to the place where I live.

In that spirit, I spent much of the afternoon reading about Tu B'Shvat which is the Jewish new year of the trees. It is an environmental holiday, as are many of the Jewish holidays which are rooted in the yearly agricultural cycles of the middle eastern Mediterranean climate. This particular holiday also uses the tree as a spiritual metaphor for human beings and of spiritual guidance. In Jewish tradition, the tree is a symbol of the Torah the ultimate guide for life.

In Israel, the holiday is a kind of Jewish Arbor Day during which school children go out into the fields and plant trees.

The day is seen as the day that the new year's life force begins again deep in the roots of the tree. It is also the time of the first budding of trees in the Mediterranean wet season after the first winter rains. So, it is a kind of rebirth of the land.

Even in our climate in the Adirondacks, this season is a time when one can begin to prune the trees because they have entered the lowest point of activity before the new growth begins in the Spring. The Sap has dropped about as far into the roots as it is going to go, before it begins to flow again.

It is a good time for a new beginning for the RCPA with a new executive director.