The Leaves and Me

  

"Autumn us a second spring when every leaf is a flower."

Albert Camus

Ahh, Camus. As I write this, I wish my feelings were as optimistic, and my spirit was able to go with the flow of Seasons, as we knew them. But my emotions now are flying off in every direction the wind blows, scattering like dry leaves.

Covid  narrowed our times of travel, theater, visits with family & friends, excursions to museums, public gardens, and left us  far less stimulations that normally filled our lives.  During the lockdowns, and darker days, our domestic life of all meals at home with each other provided comfort. 

Despite discussions of relentless bad news caused by the disease, a tanking economy,  thousands living on the streets, and a vicious mad man and his willing accomplices, hindering instead of helping, our own Nature scene outdoors, and the assurance that Seasons bringing change, freed my spirit. I’d gaze out at birds coming to our feeders, and at the barren branches of our trees. I loved the evergreen of the Hollytree next door; the tall Italian cypresses, and the beautiful cranberry colors of the red twigs.  I’d sit at the kitchen table with my coffee eagerly anticipating buds on the trees in our back garden. 

 

Then there they were! Every day, Paul laughed as I gave the Leaf Report. Oh, Honey, look! The Oak Leaf has some buds now! I watched the Pretty Girl Maple, the Curly Willow, and never failed to thrill with each new bud on the varieties of trees. They all eventually, front and back, leafed out. Our  Daphne Odoras blossomed a month early with the most heady fragrance I know. I was so grateful. 

But there lurked the ominous. I heard warnings about our low snow pack, melting glaciers and threats of the worst wild fires we might ever have,  because of  climate change. And like all the other things that were made worse, by the current person occupying the Whitehouse, and his willing greed-mongers, climate change due to human causes, without good science heeded, we now experience massive storms, floods, and fire and ice disasters. The predictions of drought and wildfires were spot on.  And so it has gone. Still, I believe we have a lesson of hope with every season.

Another Leaf Report

During the worst of our smoke filled days, during the fires, something happened to the small leaves filling the Maple tree adjacent to our deck; they are a glorious dark green. A great many of them literally turned an ugly greyish-black, edged in brown.  These were apocolyptically the antithesis of our vision of glorious falling leaves. They cringed, shrivelled, and dropped dead covering our deck and little Japanese garden. They were the color of what it felt like to be confined twice over. We were locked into insularity by covid-19, and by air quality described by the the index as so bad, it was the worst on the planet! 

In front or our home,  the  large Katsura fills our view from the windows, as it stands in the parking strip. Ordinarily in more “normal’ years,  I thrill seeing the beauty of golden leaves gleaming in sunlight, and enlightening fog, or rain-darkened days, well into October. Early this October, it was November bare.

And yet…the maple retained most of the beautiful dark green leaves, our paper bark maple, oak leaf maple and vine maples are beginning to redden and  make a show of the colors we love. These trees exemplify resilience. Last Spring every morning was a thrill, and hope-giving. As Winter pends, so does another wave of Covid. The President wants us to be like a herd of cows. He lies to the Nation about immunity, cures, and we will be gazing from out windows at barren branches, hoping the rains will extinguish the fires. And Spring will bring the buds and flowers. And November will bring a new President. A new leaf.