taken for granted

Ok, this one requires a bit of background. The conference rooms on our floor at work are all named after trees. Each floor has a different theme and my colleagues voted on trees. It isn't especially exciting, but it beats some of the floors. One has some sort of sci-fi names and no one can ever pronounce them. Then, there is the planet floor, which always makes my inner adolescent laugh. (You just have to go through the list of planets and apply the scenario of telling people where the meeting is to understand why I snicker: "We are having the meeting in...." Of course, they left that planet out.)

Back to the trees. They've just built out a new conference room on the floor and it will be in need of a name. I was in a meeting with about nine other people and, in an excited voice, I exclaimed: "We can name it jacaranda. That would be so cool!" Everyone in the room swiveled around and looked at me like I was insane. Not one person in the room had heard of a jacaranda tree. I had a quick conversation inside my head: "Am I crazy?" "No, not crazy." "Well, not crazy, except that I am talking to myself inside my head and nine people are staring at me."

I returned to my desk and of course, looked up the illusive jacaranda tree online, and sent the Wikipedia link to the entry on jacaranda trees around to my colleagues. I soon learned that jacaranda trees are quite common in South Africa and Australia...and in Southern California. They are in Southern California, where I was raised, largely due to the efforts of botanist Kate Sessions. I lived on a jacaranda-lined street, thanks to her, and remember the purple blossoms and the smeary stain they left on the sidewalks.

I suspect the conference room will bear another name, but it's still a great tree. Thanks, Kate.