Each weekday morning I pass a tree that gives me pause. It is an old maple, thick in branch and deep in root – its limbs extend across a street that probably didn’t exist before the tree did. The tree engenders a kind of woeful awe, for its aged austerity bears the mark of human callousness: a full third of its leafy reach has been carved away to allow power lines free passage.

This morning walk takes me to the train, which takes me to the city, where my walk continues on to the advertising agency that I began working six months ago. It feels longer than six months; advertising feels worlds apart from college. In theory, the transition from studying English and Economics to working in advertising seems relatively seamless. In reality, it’s been a process of intellectual grappling.

Advertising. It’s a dirty word to most of us sensitive to language, to art, to community and life. It reeks of consumerism and manipulation.

In the midst of coming to understand this kind of work, its proper place and limits and, therefore, possibilities, I’ve found evidence that advertising, at its best, can become art. Art that celebrates life, people, that acts as an agent for creative change in the world. The Puma Social campaign. The Zimbabwean’s Trillion Dollar Campaign. Bing’s Decode Jay-Z. Each of these invite us to see differently, to live more fully. They leave us wonderstruck and awake.

I walked past the maple tree a few days ago, and it was on fire: sunlit yellow and orange sails catching a brisk wind. Beauty overreaching the ugliness of necessity.

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