A Significant Milestone

Do anything in this life long enough and milestones will be reached, a significant anniversary or numerical marker. For The Tempest today is such an occasion, this being its 2,500th post. It took 10 years and 10 months to get here. For those keeping score, that means that I have churned out 19 of these things every month for almost eleven years. That seems like an awful lot to me, too much, almost embarrassing. How could one person possibly have that much to say? Even more confounding to me is the question…why do you people keep reading?

This milestone carries a bit of pressure. What should be the topic of someone’s 2,500th blog post? Today is Election Day. Should I write about politics? Tonight is game six of the World Series. Should I write about baseball? Donald Trump’s PAC just announced that they are giving away iconic Christmas wrapping paper for a minimum contribution of $35…

I mean, that one would practically write itself. 

When the pressure is on, I usually default to the familiar. So, for number 2,500, I’m going with this:

There was an old man who lived beside a great forest. As he grew older and older, he started losing his hair, until one day, on his deathbed, he was completely bald. That day, he called all of his children together for a meeting…

He said, “Look at my hair. It used to be so magnificent, but it’s completely gone now. My hair can’t be saved. But look outside at that beautiful forest. It’s such a lovely forest with so many trees, but sooner or later they’ll all be cut down to make way for more and more people and this great forest will look as bald as my head.”

“What I want you all to do”, the old man continued, “Is every time someone cuts down a tree or a tree dies, plant a new one in my memory. Tell your descendants to do the same. It shall be our family’s duty to keep this forest beautiful forever.”

So they did.

Each time the forest lost a tree, the children replanted one, and so did their children and their children’s children, and their children after them. And for centuries, the forest remained as lush and beautiful as it once was, all because of one man…

…and his re-seeding heirline.