As my boots crunched and sunk into the snow, the trees were shedding bits of snow that littered their branches, dispatched by the wind. In my attempts to avoid getting showered by falling snow, I found myself walking among scattered giants. Standing next to the old eastern hemlock, staring up at the towering trunk, I began to feel very small as I imagined what this tree has lived through and the things that they have seen. How many generations of songbirds have nested in their branches, or found food in their cones? How many generations of deer, bears, wolves, and other wildlife have they seen treading beneath their branches? How have they seen us change, and do they like what they see? How have they watched the world change around them, as they stand rooted in place?

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