My Apple Tree

"Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree."

- Martin Luther King Jr.


We live in a world that seems to have gone to pieces.  But then, perhaps every generation feels that way.  And yet, the global scale and the enormity of the problems facing the world feel daunting and often utterly unfixable.  But when I think of the world that Martin Luther King walked, a world where he and his race were only marginal citizens at best, I feel humbled.  He believed in a world where brother and sisterly love would reign.  Where the lion would lay down with the lamb.  Against all odds, he planted apple trees.

I hope that as I walk forward I will carry with me the seeds of hope and faith and charity, even in the face of great skepticism.  I hope that I will scatter them into the wind as I smile at a stranger even when I am tired and weary, that  I will hold my tongue against unkind words even when unkindness abides in me, that I will open my heart to forgiveness even when forgiveness feels out of reach, that I will hold my precious piece of the world close to my heart, even when the world breaks it apart, even when my own actions break it apart.  Even as the world goes to pieces.

I will plant my apple tree.

xo
Suki