I am in California for the Wine Country Optics Expo in Sonoma. Since the maker of the new digiscoping adapter for ZEISS lives near Sacramento, it provided an opportunity to film an instructional video.  We needed a place that was relatively quiet (no interstate or heavy traffic noise…which is more of problem in the bay area than you might think…or might not…depending on whether you have spent much time there :-). We drove up through Sonoma to Jack London State Park. I had been there once years ago, and had memories of a quiet, relatively secluded spot. It worked out fine. The raw footage for the instructional video is, as they say, in the can…now we just have the editing.

Jack London State Park is, of course, the homestead of the famous writer. There are a number of historic houses and barns on the property, as well as vineyards, many huge eucalyptus trees, and groves of second growth Redwoods. It is, all in all, a lovely place to spend a day. After the videography, we took a walk up to the lake, a small pond Jack London built high on the hill above his house, mostly for bathing. The path goes through those second growth Redwoods.

You can tell they are second growth, and that the hillside was logged a century or more ago, by the many Redwood rings…stands of trees all of an age and size in a perfect circle, sometimes 20-30 feet across. The rings from around the stump of huge Redwoods when they are cut near the ground. The roots live on, and send up the ring of saplings. At Jack London State Park, these saplings have grown into tall trees, though, clearly, from the size of the rings alone, they are not a patch on the giants that grew there before the saw came.

Still, who could resist walking into the center of the largest rings, where the remnants of the stump have long turned to loam, and looking up? Who, with a camera in hand, could resist taking a few shots of the symmetrical trees rising into the sky? Not I!

Samsung Smart Camera WB800F in Rich Tone mode (in-camera HDR). Processed in Snapseed on the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 2014.

And for the Sunday Thought: The scientific name of the Coastal Redwoods includes sempervirens which can be translated as evergreen, or as ever living. Seeing the huge rings of trees rising from the roots of even greater trees at Jack London State Park makes me think that the ever living translation…in the sense of eternal…is not far off the mark. The trees that were cut on that hillside had to be close to 2000 years old. The trees that are growing from the roots have at least a chance to live as long. (All that would be required is some moderation on our part, and some healing in the atmosphere. There is at least some hope for that.) That is 4000 years for a single living thing, and, compared to our brief four score and twenty, 4000 years certainly looks like forever.

The rings of Redwoods are a testament to the tenacity of life…in the larger sense of all things that live. They only increase the sense of awe I feel in the presence of these giants. They are, in fact, what gives me hope that there is hope for moderation on our part and a healing in the atmosphere. I suspect that somewhere deep inside what makes us who we are, there is a respect, a reverence for life, a will to live that will compel us, somewhere short of irreparable damage, to make sure that those Redwoods, and our decendents, have at least the chance for a another 2000 years.

I believe that we are alive with the ever living spirit of all that lives…with the same sprit that animates the Redwoods…and that it is as eternal in us as it is them. I believe that that spirit that moves us, and that life will go on.

And that is easier to believe, standing in a ring of tall Redwoods at Jack London State Park.