The Parable of Plants
Society fails us all the time. Plants don’t.
We human beings pride ourselves as complex creatures capable of thought. We took toolmaking to new heights and learned to manipulate fire and energy. We formed organized society — calling it civilized. Yet somehow, the bullies, predators, and tyrants seem to always be holding the upper hand. That dreamy sonnet of human harmony and equality is whispered, but unfinished and struggling to be heard throughout the land.
Plants persevere — in balance with their place in the world. Left to their own devices, they mesh with the flow of water, nutrients, and sunlight around them, fulfilling their role in that patch of dirt or body of water. Growing. Stretching. Getting nibbled on.
But they do so in concert with other life around them. Consider the mesmerizing, unseen city of microorganisms we call the rhizosphere inhabiting the root system of each plant. This constantly interacting society of bacteria, fungi, and other lifeforms shapes the local soil chemistry and improves available nutrients, possibly helping the plant weather more drastic changes. Or consider the mystery of crown shyness, where plants growing closely together manage to avoid touching each other’s leaves — a phenomenon which, when seen in tree tops, reveals a geometric lacework of blue sky peeking through. Hypotheses abound: as plants branch out and sense one another’s proximity, perhaps they keep apart so as to avoid breaking each other’s tendrils in stormy weather, or so as to ensure that enough sunlight reaches through to genetically related neighbors — their kin.
I’m not saying that plants are perfect citizens. Different plant species will still jostle with each other, sending out mild toxins called allelochemicals that inhibit the growth of invaders encroaching on their turf. Other plants, like the mistletoe, are parasites that latch onto larger plants and milk them of their nutrients, sometimes to the point of death. And many plants have become uncontrollable, invasive pests when taken out of their place of origin, like the Bromus grasses of Western Europe that have completely terrorized the wildfire patterns of California and the Great Basin, literally fueling the raging flames and entirely upsetting the existing ecology. (European colonists brought these grasses here, of course.)
I feel a yearning to romanticize and exalt the lessons of plants because our lives so emulate their rooted nature right now. As communities of humans refuse to cooperate with one another during a global pandemic, we are forced to lock-down in our homes and spaces — no longer mobile creatures. Anchored in place, we simultaneously face the danger of the spreading virus itself, as well as the danger of encroachers spreading political, capitalistic, and ideological toxins.
We have a choice — we can cooperate with our neighbors and cultivate our own root-community of mutual support and benefit. We can respect our kin by not hording supplies and foods, taking a little and giving a little. We can give each other respect and space, so we can weather our present storm in unison. (Unless you enjoy being the parasite or invader, of course.)
Like plants, maybe we can persevere.
