Arbor Day & The Giving Tree

the giving tree shel silverstein arbor day National Arbor Day is this week in the U.S. According to the Arbor Day website, Arbor Day has its seeds in the work of J. Sterling Morton.  He was a Nebraska journalist and later Nebraska territory secretary who advocated for the planting of trees.

After Nebraska made the day an official holiday in the late 1800’s, the state eventually selected April 22 as the date because it was Morton’s birthday. Other states also began celebrating Arbor Day in the 1870s.

Today, National Arbor Day always falls on the last Friday of April.  But some states celebrate Arbor Day on different dates depending on the planting season. Meanwhile, the holiday celebrating the planting of trees has spread around the world.

The Giving Tree

Planting trees is a nice thing to do for the earth for several reasons.  And we humans benefit from trees in numerous ways too. Perhaps the best illustration of our love and destruction of trees is in Shel Silverstein‘s great children’s book, The Giving Tree.

In the 1973 animated video below, Silverstein narrates the book for viewers.

The late Shel Silverstein is also known for many other works, including books and songs recorded by Johnny Cash. Yet, he may be most famous for The Giving Tree, a book that many children grew up reading.  For some reason, The Giving Tree was not a book in my childhood home so I came to it many years later as an adult.

I always find it interesting how different people react to the story. Some have very fond memories of the story and see it as a story of a loving tree who gives away everything it has.  But others get angry when they think of the tale, seeing it as a story about a selfish boy taking everything from the tree.

Is it a story of love and charity? Or is it a story of selfishness and domination? What does the last line — “And the tree was happy” — signify? One may come up with several theories about the book’s meaning, but the ambiguity is why the book has become a classic.  The book allows each of us to see different things, perhaps even understanding the story differently at different stages of our own lives.

No matter what you think of The Giving Tree, let’s take a moment to thank all of our tree friends this Arbor Day.

What do you think is the message of The Giving Tree? Leave your two cents in the comments.

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    RIP Chris Ethridge of the Flying Burrito Brothers

    gilded palace of sin flying burrito brothers chris ethridge
    Chris Ethridge is standing on the left.

    Chris Ethridge, bassist and founding member of the Flying Burrito Brothers passed away earlier this week in Mississippi. Ethridge was a long-time collaborator with Gram Parsons, also playing with Parsons in the International Submarine Band and co-writing some of Parson’s solo songs. While with the Flying Burrito Brothers, Ethridge played on Gilded Palace of Sin (1969), an album Rolling Stone magazine lists as one of the top 200 albums of all time. He also co-wrote “Hot Burrito #1 (I’m Your Toy),” a song we previously discussed on Chimesfreedom. In this performance of “Christine’s Tune (Devil in Disguise),” you may see Ethridge playing bass in the background (with a black beard wearing a Nudie suit).

    Ethridge also played as a session musician later in his career, playing with such artists as Ry Cooder, Randy Newman, Linda Ronstadt, The Byrds, and Jackson Browne. He also toured with Willie Nelson for eight years. Ethridge learned he had pancreatic cancer in September. He was 65. RIP.

    What is your favorite Flying Burrito Brother song? Leave your two cents in the comments.

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    Connecticut’s Hangman and Johnny Cash’s Last Song

    hangman With Governor Dannel Malloy’s signature in April 2012, Connecticut became the fifth state in five years to abolish the death penalty. Connecticut makes seventeen states that do not have capital punishment, along with the District of Columbia, as more states are realizing that the death penalty is expensive, unfair, arbitrary, unnecessary, and risks executing the innocent.

    Similarly, recently the man who wrote California’s death penalty law and the man who led the drive for that state to adopt capital punishment have changed their position and said that life without parole is a better option than the death penalty. For various reasons, the civilizing trend around the country is leading to more states abolishing the death penalty.

    Capital punishment is still used as a political issue, though. Even as Connecticut abolished the death penalty for future cases, it did not overturn the death sentences of the few people currently on death row in the state.

    Johnny Cash’s Last Song: “Hangman”

    Speaking of executioners, in this video, Marty Stuart tells about his final meeting with Johnny Cash.  Stuart recalls how Cash helped him write the song, “Hangman.”

    Stuart was inspired to start writing the song after visiting Folsom Prison and seeing where Cash had performed for the inmates. While working on the song, he told Cash about the song, and Cash gave Stuart some help.

    As Stuart explains before he performs the song in the video below, it was probably the last song Cash helped write.  Four days after they worked on “Hangman,” Cash passed away on September 12, 2003.

    “Hangman” later appeared on Stuart’s album, Ghost Train: The Studio B Sessions (2010).

    The song begins with the singer talking about killing another man: “I’ve lost count at thirty, and I’ve grown too numb to grieve.” After he tells how alcohol and dope helps him get by, the chorus comes in to reveal the twist. The song is not about a serial killer but the hangman.

    Martyh Stuart Ghost Train Hangman Hangman, Hangman,
    That’s my stock and trade.
    Hangman, Hangman,
    Sending bad men to their grave.
    But who killed who? I ask myself,
    Time and time again.
    God have mercy on the soul,
    Of this Hangman.

    In the video, Stuart tells how Johnny Cash helped him with the chorus and the poetic line, “But who killed who? I ask myself.” The line, and the song evoke the concerns of the Connecticut legislature.

    Both the legislature and Gov. Malloy realized that the death penalty is not about what we do to convicted murderers. Capital punishment is about what it does to us when our government kills people already in prison for the rest of their lives. Connecticut is saving the hangman, not the prisoners.

    What do you think of “Hangman”? Leave your two cents in the comments.

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    Pres. Obama Slow Jams the News with Jimmy Fallon

    Last night, Pres. Barack Obama joined Jimmy Fallon to slow jam the news on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. In the periodic segment on the show, someone reads the news while Fallon and his band The Roots riff on the straight news. So for our funny video of the week, check out Pres. Obama, Jimmy Fallon, and The Roots slow jammin’ the news.

    For the most part Pres. Obama played it straight delivering campaign lines addressed to the college crowd at the show’s taping at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. Still, “the Preezy of the United Steezy” was a good sport for participating in the funny segment. “Oh yeah.”

    What did you think of the President going on the late night talk show? Leave your two cents in the comments.

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    Marty Stuart’s “Nashville, Vol. 1: Tear the Woodpile Down”

    Marty Stuart Nashville Vol 1 Sugar Hill Records has made available a stream of Marty Stuart’s upcoming album, Nashville, Vol. 1: Tear the Woodpile Down. In the new album, Stuart and his band the Fabulous Superlatives present songs with a traditional country sound, with most of the songs written by Stuart. If the sound of the album is not enough to show its country roots, the last two songs bring the point home. Lorrie Carter Bennett of The Carter Family sings on “A Song of Sadness,” and Hank Williams III joins Stuart on Hank Williams Sr.’s “Picture from Life’s Other Side.”

    On Stuart’s website, you may also get a free download of “Tear The Woodpile Down” (“Taxpayer dollar ain’t worth a dime / Government’s got us in a bind”) by providing your email address.

    Check it out.

    What do you think of Marty Stuart’s new album? Leave your two cents in the comments.

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