On the day when Tom was one month old, his mom and grandpa went to the Rutgers Nursery to shop for a baby tree for Tom. We've always thought it would be a great idea that when we have a baby, we plant a tree for him/her, so that they can grow together. When the baby gets bigger, he will be happy to see that the tree is also becoming taller. When he/she is old enough to leave the family, we will still have the tree to be with us, to comfort our loving but lonely hearts.

The tree does not have to be very big, because after all when we move, we want to move it with us. The tree does have to be good looking just like our baby though. :-) So it took Jessie some hard work in the nursery to find a good candidate. 

When I was in college, I saw in my botany textbook that there is a type of tree named ilex  which in Chinese is called "green in the winter (冬青)". It bears small red berries in the winter and has very pretty leaves. At that time, I did not realize that ilex is actually holly, which became famous due to the Hollywood in Los Angeles. But anyways, I liked it so much that I named myself "Ilex" which turned into "Alex" because rarely anyone could spell Ilex right.

So I suggested that Jessie take a look at ilex but grandpa said shrubs might not be good candidate because they do not look neat. I agreed. After a thorough search and some discussion with the gardeners, we decided to buy a baby spruce for Tom, and that was a good decision. A few days later on the weekend, all of us worked together to plant the tree in our backyard and it looked really great. It was a beautiful sunny day of the late autumn. However, Tom was quite reluctant to show any enthusiasm towards his buddy tree. We wanted to take a picture of him with the tree but he just did not care to open his eyes. :-)

Another week passed by and finally we saw the sunny sky again, and this time,  Tom was quite happy to come to the backyard to take a look at HIS tree. See, he is smiling, bingo! 

Okay, may our baby and his tree grow together happily and healthily!

p.s. I talked to Leo about it after Jessie bought the tree. Leo said I should make sure Tom would not bring his ax to the backyard to recreate the George Washington story. I thought that was a good suggestion. :-) Also he suggested naming the tree "the friendship tree" manifesting Tom and Kyle's everlasting friendship and I think this suggestion also has true merit and it is so named!

Gallery - Tom and his friendship tree

Comments

谢谢 Written by LS on 2006-11-20 13:51:45 回头带小K去参拜。

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