The birch is the first tree to appear growing on poor sandy soils. At the heart of a landscape of fields, a valley and a brook, my parents built their house on a small piece of sandy land. Close to the house, a birch lane ran towards a group of farms. These birches, these white stripes, are hallucinating. Every birch takes me back to my roots, my childhood, my parents and my grandparents in Aarle-Rixtel, close to Eindhoven.