Naming things

A few posts ago, I claimed to have encountered cherry blossoms on the walk to work. I strolled past the same tree over the weekend, and my girlfriend informed me that it was, in fact, a lilac tree.



But I reckon there are some cherry trees around here! In fact, I think I've found some blossoming up the road in the same garden as the tulips:



It has become increasingly important to me to be able to name things that I see while I am going for walks. These things didn't trouble me much when I was younger. But now, especially given that I like to write about what I see, my poor grasp on these details frustrates me. It still frustrates me that I can't even be sure, one hundred percent, that those trees above are cherry trees. I've even researched this on the Interwebnet! They might be Evans cherry trees, which thrive locally, but I wouldn't put money on it.

It's sad that I can name dozens of cars, and I know the names for all sorts of technological appliances around my home and office, and I can rattle off names of film stars whom I've never seen in the flesh, and yet I can walk outside and see a tree, and 90 per cent of the time, have no idea what to call it.

This detachment from our natural world is, in my opinion, a mild disorder, and one to correct.