Tetherd Cow Ahead

Now it’s two years since my beautiful Kate died, and I still miss her every day. Kisses to you buddy, wherever you are.

xxx

This is a leaf from a small plant in a pot in my backyard. It’s a tree. An apple tree in fact, and not just any apple tree. It’s an identical copy of perhaps the most famous apple tree in the history of humankind (I exclude mythical apple trees).

Let me tell you its story.

My friend Rod is a cider maker. In Australia it’s pretty hard to make good cider unless you grow your own apples, because cider is not just made from your average garden-variety apple tree. As a consequence, Rod has become fairly knowedgeable about apple trees, and especially interested in apple trees that might have a little bit of heritage.

Some years ago, Rod’s partner Michelle was in Parkes, in western NSW, on holiday with their children. Parkes is the home of one of Australia’s most famous scientific landmarks, the Parkes Radio Telescope,* which was a stop on their itinerary. While they were there, Michelle noticed an old apple tree in the grounds. A small plaque on the neglected tree told visitors that it was a descendant of the tree under which Isaac Newton sat while formulating his hypotheses on the nature of the force of gravity. Rod travelled to Parkes and asked the management at the telescope if he might take some cuttings. It worked out well – the old tree got a much-needed prune, and Rod got a number of cuttings, or scions.

Rod tells me that his research has uncovered the information that the variety of the tree is called ‘Flower of Kent’ and the original tree was growing in Newton’s mother’s garden at Woolsthorpe Manor, near Grantham in Lincolnshire. Newton had gone there to escape the plague which was rife in London at the time, and stayed there from 1665-1666 while he was consolidating his ideas on gravitation.

Apple trees are usually propagated clonally, that is, cuttings from one tree are grafted onto a sturdy rootstock to grow into maturity. This means that the descendants of the Newton tree are genetically identical to their parent tree. Clones of the Newton tree have been circulated to various scientific institutions across the globe. Parkes Radio Telescope was one of the destinations to which a Newton apple made its way. Rod made several new clones from the parent, one of which went back to the telescope grounds to be re-established in a suitable place at the visitor centre.

Rod also very kindly gave me one of the new little trees. I am not really sure he knew exactly how much it meant to me, but it is one of the most wonderful gifts I have ever received. I really wish I had a garden in which I could plant it. My tiny inner city house has nowhere at all for me to put it as it starts to grow. I’m now on the lookout for its new home. My intention is to plant it this winter with the ashes of my beloved Kate. I know she would like that.

*The Parkes Radio Telescope played an important part in the Apollo 11 moon landing.

I’ve just sold my beautiful place in the mountains, the Treehouse. I feel sadness, and loss, and inexplicable loneliness because it’s like I have cut the last tangible link to my lovely Kate. Treehouse was our dream, the place we made together and the place where we both thought we would grow old together.

It is pointless me keeping it. I thought I might be OK with it at one time, but I’ve realised that I simply can’t go there without feeling a powerful melancholy and longing for the things that will no longer make up my future. It is not the same place any longer.

We owned it for nearly eight years. Those years were made up of black starry skies with shooting stars that Kate always somehow missed seeing. Ferocious August winds. Rain on our iron roof that brought sleep like no other. Possums on the verandah, and bats in the bedroom. Rosellas on the fishpond and the stocky little Sacred Kingfisher on the Viewing Tree. Campari and blood orange in tall glasses in summer. Ardbeg and dark chocolate by the fire in winter. The scent of lemon gums, of woodsmoke, of eucalyptus, of wattle. The sounds of cicadas and frogs and currawongs and windswept casuarinas. Full moons. April Fool’s jokes. Day long barbecues. Mahjongg and jigsaw puzzles. And friends. Many lovely, loyal and fabulous friends.

We planted over one and a half thousand trees there. I promised I would plant one more for Kate, with her ashes. But when we talked about that she never thought I’d sell the Treehouse because she knew how much I loved it. And now I don’t want to leave her with strangers.

It’s time for bed now, and another night of restless sleep.

Cover of an LP discovered in a box of records in an auction house.

Now, I can accept that Love might be a violin or a string quartet, a sultry sax maybe, a sad country guitar, a sassy-but-suave cocktail piano or even at a long and ungainly stretch, a musical saw. But I’m afraid that for me, a piano accordion just does not cut the mustard.

The makers of this record might conceivably have pulled off a kind of tongue-in-cheek kitsch with this idea, but unless they are of a scale of genius that few reach, we are observing here one of the great tragedies of The Vinyl Age.

Here at The Cow we pride ourselves in bringing to light memories that history has tried hard to bury.

Other instruments that Love is not:

¬♥:Bagpipes
¬♥:A tuba
¬♥:An Andean nose flute
¬♥:A Fire Organ
¬♥:A banjo

#2 In the Urban Romance Collection…

Pennyroyal sent me a link to an online Personals with this wonderful ‘Ideal Partner’ description. I don’t like to publicly ridicule simple ordinary folk (except to maybe point out that they come from South Carolina) so I won’t link it on, but the excerpt says it all… (it was serious, I can assure you).

I’ve travelled through South Carolina. It doesn’t surprise me.

[thanks N.]