The Little Sapling (Prompt 22)

Whenever someone asked who my hero was, or who I aspired to be, I always used to say, ‘I want to be the little sapling that grows in our garden.’ 

It was a tiny little thing, with a weak stem, standing about one feet tall. Leaves sprouted out of it in the shape of a flower, but I had seen stronger plants than it perished when the conditions worsened. It had no odds of survival.

I was six, when my father handed me the responsibility to care for the sapling. I was distraught. I knew it was a test. My father loved giving me tests. In my heart I knew I would fail and then my father, as the storyteller he was, would teach me the moral. He could get cocky. I hated that. I was determined not to give him that chance, not this time.

With that mindset, I started caring for the plant. I watered the plant every day. I checked upon its health regularly. Once I found a squirrel attacking the plant. I kicked it away. I wondered how to protect this sapling. It doesn’t have legs like me, to defend itself. I ran to my father.

‘Papa,’ I asked. ‘How do I protect the little sapling? Rodents are attacking it. It is unable to defend itself.’

My father smiled. There was a sparkle in his eyes, which I had rarely seen. Instead of shooing me away, he handed me a cage.

‘Put it around the sapling,’ he said.

‘But won’t it hinder its growth, Papa?’ I asked, wondering how an experienced gardener like him could be so naïve.

My father nodded. ‘When it does, be sure to come and tell me. I will replace the cage.’

I shrugged. I was pretty sure that in a few months, we would have to find another alternative. I covered the sapling with the cage and for now it was protected from the dangers of the wild.

As time passed, I realized the plant hardly grew. It had been three years since I had started to care for the plant and it had grown only another couple feet. The cage was still there, to my disappointment.

I asked my father, ‘Papa, is everything alright with the plant? It doesn’t seem to grow.’

My father smiled. He replied, ‘Just because we can’t perceive something, doesn’t mean it’s not happening.’

I scratched my head in confusion. He went back to reading the paper. I did not press him further.

That year I spent most of the time pulling out the deeply grounded weeds from around my charge on my father’s instruction. 

The plant still didn’t grow much. It stood three feet above the ground. Considering it as a vain assignment, I started to lax in my duties. Unbeknownst to me, my father covered my neglect.

One day, as I was readying to go play out with friends, he came to me carrying a wire fence.

‘Gaurav,’ he said, ‘why don’t you replace the cage with these fences around our little friend?’

Without taking the fence, I rushed out, expecting to see the plant a bit taller. I was wrong.

I asked my father, ‘The plant hasn’t grown in the last four years. It won’t grow further. Why the fence?’

‘You are still learning, son. Do as I say.’

Grudgingly, I removed the cage we had set four years ago, and covered the tiny plant with wire fences.

Voila! After the rains that year, the tree grew exponentially, growing even taller than me. Branches had sprouted out of it and where there were only a handful of leaves, now had dozens and dozens of leaves.

That night my father sat me down and taught me a lesson which I remember till this day. 

‘As parents,’ he referred to himself, ‘our job is to nurture our child.’ He pointed at me. ‘A child requires food, protection and support to grow. In the initial stages, you build the foundation, the roots. Just as our friend. For the world, it seemed, the plant was a lost cause, because it was not growing. But underneath the ground, its roots were building a strong base. Did you never wonder how a tiny plant survived in the strong winds of winters and in the torrid heat of summers?’

I shrugged, but looked at him thoughtfully.

‘Foundation is the priority. And it takes time. A foundation built hastily will weaken the plant, will weaken the child. Whereas a strong foundation will help you grow much faster and stronger in the later years.’

He smiled at me.

It took me some years and some horrid experiences of my own to truly understand his point.

Today, twenty years later, as I sit in my garden and look at the magnanimous tree, providing its shade to all those around him, I am taken back to those young days, when I was just a kid and this mighty King Oak was only a little sapling.