Eamonn Donnelly

When I was born, my parents planted a tree in our tiny front yard. On hot summer days they would take me outside and we would sit underneath it, relaxing in the cool shade. As I got older and could do a few things on my own, I would climb its branches, seeing how far up it would take me.

My family decided to move when I was still fairly young, and although I was uprooted and taken to a new place to grow, the tree was not. Time passed and my memory of the tree faded, until one night I happened to be near my old neighborhood. Feeling a bit nostalgic, I decided to take a quick look at my family’s old house. It seemed to be the same as I remember it, but the tree my parents had planted for me was no longer there. It had been cut down. I drove away in silence, and couldn’t help but feel like the part of my life that I had spent with it had been cut down as well.

This piece is an attempt to picture what the tree might look like if it were alive today. I recreated the tree purely from memory, with no reference involved. The picture you see here shows a tree that never had the chance to really grow. It never had a chance for its roots to dig into the earth as far as they could. It never had a chance to make tree rings for all the seasons it would have experienced.

Location: Area C | Mt. Royal Ave.