Jim: I see your point, but it's a tough thing for a lot of
people to do. It
doesn't matter so much that our bonsai don't purr or wag their
tails or get all
excited to see us. For many of us, the sentiment comes from
our personal investment
into the bonsai. This is not so different from the
uncomfortable feelings one has
wen selling a home and listening to the prospective buyers talk
about how they want
to change something that you really worked on and made the
house special to you.
Some of us are sentimental, and others are not. Vive
la difference!

Yeah. On occasion, Jackie would put me in the "not" camp, I'm
sure.

As for homes . . . it's all in what you call them, I guess --
homes or houses. I have lived in 37 towns in 8 countries, went
to 14 schools before I graduated from high school -- in Tokyo. I
can part with a home/house as easily as I can part from a bonsai
(but not the bonsai's "home" -- its pot ;-).

Dogs and wives are a totally different thing. I've had scores of
dogs and deeply mourned each of them as they left us; I've had
one wife for 43 years now, and hope I don't have to mourn her for
a good number of years!

And Khaimraj, I'm sorry if I surprised or disappointed you, but
what are you grieving about when a tree dies? The Tree? Or all
the "wasted" effort you put into it for . . . in other words,
are you grieving for yourself?

Now, I'd be a very unhappy (and even grumpier) person without
bonsai in my life, but while I may regret when a tree I thought
was pretty dies, I don't go into mourning; I'll look at the
roots and break a limb or two in an attempt to discover what
might have been the cause, then toss the carcass into the woods.
(And yes, I'll cuss at it if it was one I'd spent a lot of time
over.) I've just gone through an exercise where I've tossed out
a couple of dozen putative bonsai that I finally saw weren't
gonna ever make it as bonsai. They had their chance. No
regrets -- on either part.

Jim Lewis - - Tallahassee, FL - Our life is
frittered away by detail . . . . Simplify! Simplify. -- Henry
David Thoreau - Walden

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