by George Buehler

2006 is almost over, and it is time to reflect on what we did or didn't do, how our bonsai progressed, and what we need to do next year. Although we put our bonsai away for the winter, are we ever really not "doing" bonsai?

It always amazes me when I look back at my bonsai "to do" list how much I did or didn't get done. One thing I did do this year was to get rid of some of my "stuff". For those who don't know about "stuff", this comes from an article by Mary Miller (Oct 2005) that talks about collecting plant material that will never be good bonsai. I looked over some of my collection and realized that several fit into this category, so I disposed of them. Of course, like any committed bonsai enthusiast I replaced them, so my total bonsai count remained about the same – maybe even increased slightly but don't tell my wife. Maybe in 2007 I can bring myself to dispose of several more and not get any additional.

Dave Bogan, editor of the Evansville club and a frequently featured author in this journal, recently decided to reduce his collection. Dave had about two hundred or so trees, some that he has been working on for over 20 years. He decided that he couldn't properly care for such a large collection with his work schedule, and he much prefers to do the initial design work of new material rather than the routine maintenance work of finished trees. When Dave decided to reduce his collection, he just couldn't put a for sale sign on any one tree. So he decided to put the whole collection up for sale and when the collection was reduced by 50%, he would take the collection off the market. This is a rather drastic way to reduce a bonsai inventory, but you have to know Dave's collection to understand his reasoning. I would be hard pressed if I had such a collection, to decide which tree to dispose of.

The point here is that sometimes we need to make the hard decision to lessen our tree inventory in order to spend more quality time with the ones left. Getting rid of the Mary Miller "stuff" is easy, but sometimes we even need to take a hard look at our total collection and decide if we should keep it. Over the winter, I plan on taking this hard look at the rest of my trees and decide if it would be better to donate them to another member or simply dispose of them.

On a more positive side, at our holiday party we will have our annual election. For the last four years, we have been fortunate to have Earl Ekman as our president. Although a number of us tried to convince him otherwise, Earl has decided to give up the presidency and devote more of his time to his trees, his new love – Koi, and his wife. That doesn't mean that he won't be just as active in club events and workshops, but he won't have to be responsible for gathering supplies, making sure we have a meeting place, calling people for help, etc. One other thing that Earl won't have to do for the club when he retires is write something for this newsletter each month (Just don't think that I am going to let him off the hook completely).

Not only has Earl served as president, he has also served as Vice President, club librarian, and show chairman, and has always been ready to lend a helping hand.

Earl has always had a positive attitude toward the GLBS and is quick to help other members with trees or "almost" anything else if asked. His positive attitude has helped a number of us over the years.

I think we all should give Earl our thanks for the years of service and wish him well in his "retirement".

Over the few years I have been writing this newsletter, I have learned a lot about bonsai from doing the reading needed to write the articles, to performing some quick research projects on my trees to fill in blank spots in other articles. I hope that our members have also learned things from reading this newsletter. I often use this editorial spot to put out my random thoughts, or to put out statements that would generate some discussion. Perhaps we should call this 'Bits and Pieces' rather than an editorial.

I hope you and your family have a happy holiday season!