Before coming to Swarthmore, I was born and raised in a large city, a metropolis with nearly 30 million people. As much as I loved the hustle and bustle of city life and called myself a city person, I enjoyed spending time in the nature, whether the tree-shaded little paths in between apartment buildings or the city park right across my neighborhood. When I first came to Swarthmore, a campus with under 1,700 students nestled in a small town, however different it is from home, I still felt very much delighted – by the abundance of trees.

Words cannot fully capture the sense of awe I experienced the first time walking across lawns, through bushes, and into woods at Swarthmore. The trees here are so tall and giant, I thought to myself, and if those trees ever feel familiar to me, it’s because they resemble the ones I saw in some seventeenth century landscape paintings.

Nature in different places presents itself differently. Yet as I settled into my new life and spent more time walking around campus, I discovered plants that are in fact quite familiar to me: gingko and peony under the bell tower, wintersweet in Kohlberg courtyard, and various types of magnolias scattered around campus. While Swarthmore has been like my second home, it’s always a delight to see plants that are, to me, markers of the home faraway. Thanks to the temperate climate in southeast Pennsylvania, our arboretum campus sustains over 4,000 species of plants. Many plants from afar thrive here along with the majority of collections native to the area.

I love strolling around places. It offers the right pace at which you can truly attend to the environment around you. At Swarthmore, walking is the best way to breathe in the beauty of our arboretum campus, where all plants have name tags of their own. It is only when I stroll can I take my time to read the tags. I love reading plant labels because it feels like a way of making friends with those lovely creatures – you would always like to call your friends by their names. Quite often, I learn plant names that make me chuckle. The most recent ones are “snow day surprise pearl bush,” “ground hug chokeberry,” and “dream catcher,” a type of flowering cherry.

There is something unique about every tree at Swarthmore: their locations, shapes, the way they grow. Each of them is wise and inspiring in different ways. Those outside of McCabe Library are the most calming as they are the first to soothe one’s stress; on the dance studio floor inside LPAC (Lang Performing Arts Center), the shadow of trees dance with moving bodies; plants along Magill Walk remind people that time flows no matter what. Crocuses herald the coming of spring; then daffodils poke their heads out; tulips add more colors to the spring blossom; dandelions soon take over Parrish Beach as we bid farewell to spring; summer is for hydrangeas and lilies.