“The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing which stands in their way.” – William Blake
Since 1993, one of my families’ favorite places in the whole world to vacation is in the beautiful islands of Hawaii. Our destination of choice is a stone’s throw from the historic town of Koloa on the island of Kauai.
When I am home in the State of Washington in the beautiful Pacific Northwest, I often dream of being in Kauai, particularly during endless weeks when local weather forecasters in my area attempt to outdo each other with euphemisms like “cloudy with intermittent showers” to describe the local weather.
On those days, all I have to do in order to transport myself to more sunny climes is close my eyes and imagine cruising down the highway from Lihue, turning left at the tree tunnel and heading down the two lane road toward Koloa Town past the road sign warning of potholes, the old cemetery and finally emerging - in Paradise, as the unique and distinctive monkeypod tree canopy that lines the main street retail corridor rises over the horizon with a special aloha.
“No town can fail of beauty, though its walks were gutters and its houses hovels, if venerable trees make magnificent colonnades along its streets.” – Henry Ward Beecher, Proverbs, 1887
However, it now appears this repeat tourist must severely edit this particular dream after January 2, 2008 due to the imminent destruction of these very trees as written under Rachel Gehrlein's byline in an article entitled "Community rallies to save monkeypod trees in Koloa" in The Garden Island newspaper on Thursday, December 13, 2007.
The reason? Development pressures from economic interests motivated as always by visions of ever higher piles of cold hard cash. In short - Koloa’s green trees are scheduled to fall in favor of greenbacks.
Back home in my area, a good friend and neighbor has spent hours with other concerned community members to save the last available significant stand of mature forest in Northeast Tacoma, WA, a former Boy Scout campground no less, for the area’s current youth and unborn generations from eternal desecration by similarly motivated forces.
“I willingly confess so great a partiality for trees as tempts me to respect a man in exact proportion to his respect for them.” – James Russell Lowell
Every town and community has a right and responsibility to look out for the economic interests of their own people. Trees have been mowed down with impunity all over the globe. Is anything new? Certainly not.
It may be more likely that patient development interests in Koloa have salivated over the years watching colleagues in other areas on the island reap golden rewards, biding their time until the winds of promise looked more favorable. Perhaps this is just that time…
So while the predicted demise of the trees of Koloa Town is alas, not a new story, it’s ironic in the new and emerging climate of green friendly capital ventures area developers appear to be chained by mainland patterns of economic development which clearly in hindsight have not worked for the greater good.
“Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky. We fell them down and turn them into paper that we may record our emptiness.” – Kahlil Gilbran
For more details about local development and destruction of trees on Koloa, Kauai go to the following link: http://www.kauaiworld.com/articles/2007/12/14/news/news02.txt Quotes in this blog taken from the following website: www.quotegarden.com
(Note: This blog has also been simultaneously posted at a reader generated section on the internet site of The News Tribune, a daily newspaper in Tacoma, WA at the following website: http://blogs.thenewstribune.com/neighborhood/2007.)
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