STOP!

So, I live in an apartment complex called Campus Court which is located right next to the Lawson Ice Arena. Every day I walk to class on the same route, up the same stairs, through the same parking lot, over the same bridge, and it is always the same – UNTIL recently when I walked by one morning and the Western Landscape Service workers were cutting down tree after tree after tree. I can now see the parking lot that is beyond the ice rink when I am walking home, and that makes me want to cry.

It’s kind of like the Olmsted essay we read for class the other day about Central Park. The sentence where Olmsted states that Central Park in his eyes was created to “secure an antithesis of objects of vision to those of the streets and houses which should act remedially, by impressions on the mind and suggestions to the imagination” (pp. 121-22) really hit home when I thought about the cutting down of the trees. As we discussed this passage in class, I was reluctant to agree to his position, merely because of the place I was raised, which is plentiful in the nature department. Kalamazoo, on the other hand, doesn’t have as much nature to offer in plain view, and that small thicket of trees by my apartment complex served as my antithesis to the hustle and bustle of college life in Kalamazoo. Just as the people of New York can imagine there are mountains beyond the rock structures that line Central Park, I was able (until now) to look at those trees and imagine a forest or waterfall behind them. Instead, I am now forced to look at stumps and a parking lot when I walk home.

Overall, this cutting down of trees and reading Olmsted’s article really made me realize that there are two sides to every issue in nature. Even though I am from a nature-plenty area, I am still able to appreciate small patches of nature, even if they seemingly cannot compare to my home.  Also, I am sure there is a good reason for the workers of Landscape Services to cut down these trees, I just really wish someone would tell me why so I don’t have to wonder why all the beautiful trees are disappearing right before my eyes.