by Joseph Simpkins
On Friday the 1st of August I journeyed out into the morning rain with an umbrella and a plastic box. My destination was St. Ann’s Square, only a short walk away from where I live in Manchester. When I arrived, I found an agreeable spot within the square that wasn’t too central, where I slapped my box down. I then hesitated, questioned whether this is really what I wished to do with my day before stepping into the box. Once inside I remained there until the late afternoon. For that day, I was locked into one plot of land. For that day, I learnt what it was like to be a tree.
My first observation was that the square I was in really ought to be renamed ‘St. Ann’s Oblong’, as it was more rectangular than square. The long sides of the oblong were lined with various shops all topped with anti-pigeon spikes that gave their brightly coloured exteriors a slight menacing feel. At the top of St. Ann’s Oblong was an old Victorian church with a clock tower and at its bottom a strange array of giant stone balls that marked out where the oblong began and where it met a high street. I had planted myself not far from its central fountain which was shaped like the bulb of a tulip.
I was not the only tree in the square. I was accompanied by four large chestnut trees, one of which was providing shelter from the rain for a gaggle of Deliveroo cyclists. I wondered whether, like other trees in public spaces, I would provide some form of service during my time in the square. Unfortunately, my umbrella was too small to shelter people. And, as I was only a gormless looking 22 year old in a plastic box, it was unlikely people were going to marvel at my beauty the same way they do a tree. Up to that point, whilst it was still raining and I had only just arrived, the only person who had eyed me up was a security guard in a nearby jewellery shop who was nervously peering out of the window. I tried to wave at him, but instead of returning the wave he simply straightened his posture, crossed his arms and tried to look intimidating.
Because it was early in the morning and raining, apart from myself, the delivery cyclists and the security guard, the only other visible person to me was a construction worker. He was stood under some scaffolding swinging his fists into the air. It took me a few minutes to realise he was trying to punch the rain. A fight he unsurprisingly lost.
Twenty-minutes after the construction worker had accepted defeat, the rain ceased. And it didn’t take long for a passer-by to come up to me.
“What are you doing in a bucket?” she asked.
“I’m pretending to be a tree,” I replied.
“Why?”
“I was curious.”
At this point she laughs, before saying:
“That’s the craziest thing I’ve seen all morning.”
“Have you seen many crazy things this morning?”
“Yes,” she said, before walking off and giving no further elaboration.
This was a common theme of the day. Often, quite frustratingly, conversation would end up being about me and what I was doing in a plastic box rather than about the people who approached me. As a tree, someone who’s sole pleasure came from observing the goings on of St Ann’s Oblong, I was eager to learn more about its inhabitants. Being stuck in one place I yearned to know about things going on elsewhere from people who were not rooted to the ground.
One example of this was an interaction I had with an Australian gentleman. After a few moments talking about my situation and how I ended up pretending to be a tree, the Aussie I was talking with admitted that he’d just landed in the UK and needed help finding where he was staying. He was an older guy with a big backpack and a suitcase, but he didn’t look too old to not have a mobile phone with google maps on it. Regardless, I said I’d try to get the place up on my phone and give him directions. He told me he was trying to find a homeless shelter that was nearby in Cheetham Hill. I found the place on google maps, gave him the directions and apologised that I couldn’t walk with him. Thankfully, he believed in the cause and understood that a tree could not walk. Before going he turned around and asked me to check that all the zips in his backpack were done up. I adjusted the zips accordingly and bid him good luck and farewell.
And yet, inside I was dying. In just a few moments this man had aroused in me a strong sense of curiosity and wonder. If he was homeless, why had he spent so much money on flights from Australia to the UK? Maybe, he had some distant family here in Britain that could support him more. Or, mayhaps he was actually a gangster who had fallen out of favour with his mafia boss, and had fled Australia suddenly for his safety. The questions in my head were endless. But I suppose some mysteries will never be solved.
A dog tries to urinate up my box, a man sits outside MacDonald’s for twenty-minutes before deciding to go in, some people take photos of the pigeons bathing in the fountain and it isn’t long for an evangelist to find me. The evangelist’s name was Michael, he was wearing skinny jeans and a cap. He approached me with his leaflets somewhat nervously and asked what I was doing. Normally, as a human being, I use my legs as an excuse to avoid such interactions. If I’m asked my opinion about Jesus on the street I tend to walk away and say that I have somewhere to be. But as a tree, I no longer had such a convenient excuse.
Michael and I talked about a range of subjects and I tried to learn as much as possible about the church he was a part of. He told me that the church was mostly run by young people and that ‘lots of Gen Z were turning towards religion’, a fact that I had also heard. I asked him why he thought that was and he gave a convincing answer. He said that our current society, with social media’s emphasis on appearance and the fact we rely on endlessly buying new things to make us happy, is incredibly superficial. And this superficiality in our society leads to younger generations searching for something deeper and more meaningful in their lives. With lots of them finding that religion offers them a sense of purpose.
I could see why. Sometimes I feel so alienated from the world and the people around me that it feels impossibly hopeless. Like I’m just searching for my next hit of dopamine at the end of a card reader. And sometimes when I’m scrolling through social media I don’t even feel like I’m living at all, I feel more like a zombie. But thankfully, being a tree seemed to be the mission I needed. For that day, St. Ann’s Oblong was my higher purpose.
Michael took a photo of me holding his leaflet to put on his church’s whatsapp chat and then he meandered away. I decided that even with the gift of walking I’d try to talk to more people on the street from now on.
Time passed and lots of people asking questions came and went. Often people would ask me “What are you doing this for?” and when I responded with the line “I was just curious” they didn’t believe me.
“Are you filming this?”
“No.”
“Is this for social media?”
“No.”
“What are you selling?”
“Nothing.”
My conversations with people were almost always friendly and humourful. Some visitors even gave me suggestions on how I could pretend to be a tree better. I was told I should hold my arms out more, that I should be wearing green and one man suggested I should have stood in the box entirely naked. When I asked why, he explained that trees are exposed to the elements and they soak everything around them up. So to get the authentic tree experience I would have to be exposed.
Because I was loitering in a square, I inadvertently became a part of the community that also loiters there, most notably the homeless and drug community. All of whom were unreasonably kind, charming and charitable. A man who, by his own admission, was smoking hash chatted to me for an hour or so and bought me a drink from a nearby café.
A homeless man also tried to give me some spare change he had collected for the day, stating that:
“Plants need to be watered, I’m watering you.”
They regaled me with stories about their pet dogs, crack cocaine, love, police violence and things they’d done to entertain themselves when they had worked. One guy described how he had nearly died at his old work because he tried to swallow an entire big mac whole.
Only one of the conversations I had was unfriendly. A bloke marched up to me and with a hint of aggression simply asked me:
“Why?”
I told him I was being a tree for the day and that I did it because I was curious. But that didn’t satisfy him, he wanted to know more. Was it for attention or social media? Why did I need the box? Eventually his interrogation resulted in him asking:
“What’s your ambition in life?”
I tried to dodge the question, but he wouldn’t let me.
“For all you know I could be someone very important, so tell me what your ambition in life is.”
I decided to double down and tell him the truth. The truth was that I used to think my ambition in life was to create art. But for the past two years I’d felt incredibly alienated from it. Doing things for social media or for an ‘art career’ had distanced me from what I used to love about it. Now, art was no longer leisure but work.
“Which is why I enjoy doing stuff like this,” I told my interrogator whilst gesturing at the box, “I’m not doing this for anything but my own pleasure. I’m doing this to learn things and to experiment. I’m doing this to change my perspective on life. Not to produce some artefact that I can be judged on.”
The aggression in the interrogator’s face seemed to fade away, he seemed to appreciate my honesty with him. I myself was shocked by the words that had come from my own mouth. This truth I had uttered to my interrogator was new to me as well.
My interrogator and I talked for a moment more rather pleasantly, then he fist bumped me goodbye and said:
“You don’t need the box though.”
Part of me didn’t want to write this experience down. I had no plans to write down my thoughts and experiences as a tree going into it. I didn’t want this to become anything other than a life experience. And yet, I feel compelled to write it down. Just in one square in Manchester I had such an adventure. When I finally packed up my box and walked home I felt rejuvenated. I was full of so many stories and so many things that I had observed. I felt as though I had gained knowledge from this experience. Even now, after I have written so much I still have so much more I could bore you with. I have learnt so much about my fellow humans. Just by being in one spot in one square for one day I have witnessed so much life.
My time pretending to be a tree has reminded me that revelation is everywhere. Revelation is in the chatter of strangers. Revelation is in every square and street of our cities and towns. Revelation grows out of the dirt. The objects we purchase and consume are distractions. We do not need to pursue a career or fame to have purpose. We don’t even need to be religious to find meaning. We must shed our appearances and status. For revelation is everywhere and the methods to grasp it are endless.