Category Archives: Nature

Nature

Brood X, At Peak

The loudest, craziest days of Brood X are behind us now in Northern Virginia.  Peak cicada activity occurred here during the first two weeks of June.  When we left for Rochester over Memorial Day Weekend,  we hadn’t spotted a single cicada in my mother’s back yard. When we returned, even that area was a teeming hotbed of Brood X action. 

The big insects were everywhere. Perched, with plenty of company, on trees, flowers, foliage fences and outdoor furniture. Slogging through the grass in droves. Struggling on their backs, trying to right themselves on every paved surface. And flying, flying, flying. Careening clumsily into people and pets. It was the rare dog walk that didn’t require stopping to detach multiple cicadas from clothing or skin. They dotted car tires. They caused mechanical problems in the airplane that was to fly the White House press corps overseas for President Biden’s first European trip. And oh, the noise, noise, noise. It was especially loud in the heat of bright sunny days. It cascaded in great waves, building to a crescendo, then diminishing. Rising and falling, again and again. The most apt comparison is probably the rapidly pulsing sound made by UFOs in old sci-fi movies. Except instead of one small spindly flying saucer, there were millions. In the midst of the corporate choirs, nearby individual cicadas could also be distinguished.

We oversaw and enjoyed a wide variety of cicada encounters.  My daughter and I watched a cicada face off with a skink atop a pillar in our back yard.  As the striped lizard lay poised and motionless, the insect plodded over with typical Brood X unhurried determination.  Once a hair’s breadth of being nose-to-nose, the two eyed one another with what appeared to be careful consideration. Friend?  Foe?  Prey? Potential sex partner? Perhaps none of these options, the cicada calculated, then made a painstakingly slow three-point turn and proceeded in the opposite direction.  The skink remained perfectly immobile. 

I found one cicada with eyes of golden yellow instead of the usual bright red.  In 2004, a rare blue-eyed fellow dropped by our front porch, but we saw none this year.  A blue eyed cicada is statistically a one-in-a-million occurrence.   However, considering that up to 1.5 million members of Brood X may emerge per acre, encountering a blue-eyed one is more common than it sounds.   

One tree in my mother’s yard, a maple with leaves of greenish purple, hosted a veritable Brood X traffic jam.  During the first week of June, the insects were making their way up the trunk and into the bigger branches.  The next week, they were higher up in the smaller limbs that could be more easily sliced open by the females as they deposited their eggs. 

Our attempt at cicada-proofing the crepe myrtles.

These cicada-made slits at the ends of narrow branches cause them to weaken and break. Mature trees typically suffer no permanent damage, but younger,  smaller trees are more vulnerable.  We were concerned for the health of two crepe myrtles we planted a few years ago by my mother’s back deck.  Before we left for New York, my husband constructed a wooden framework around each tree that could be covered with screening, if needed.  Maybe it wouldn’t be necessary, we reasoned.  But when we returned to see the pronounced cicada activity on the adjacent maple, we proceeded with the screening.  As we see brown patches developing on surrounding trees,  and clumps of maple leaves littering our front yard, we’re glad we did. 

Brood X is still with us, but now in numbers that are drastically decreased.   The roar of the crowd has vanished, but the buzzing of a tardy few can still be heard.  These are the days of the stragglers, the late-bloomers, the procrastinators.  I have a special appreciation for the last of these awkward winged visitors.  After all, they won’t be back again for a long time. 

Community, Family, Nature

Looking at Brood X, Seeing Ourselves

2 Comments

Temperatures are climbing into the 90s here in the DC suburbs , and the cicadas are getting the message:  it’s time. The pace of their emergence is accelerating.  Each morning brings a bigger crowd of Brood Xers in various stages of their short above-ground lives. Yesterday, for the first time, we noticed that their characteristic buzzing could be heard in our neighborhood.  At first, it might be mistaken for the roar of highway traffic a few miles away, or heavy machinery droning in the distance.  Today it’s much louder.  Our daughter could hear the sound over the phone as I stood on the porch talking with her.  We were discussing the logistics of our attending her graduation ceremony tomorrow in Charlottesville at the University of Virginia.  The last appearance of Brood X coincided with her Kindergarten orientation.  Taking stock of one’s life in seventeen-year spans is a daunting exercise, one I may attempt in a future post. 

As our yard fills up with more cicadas, I notice that they seem smaller and more delicate than I remember.  Was it just because in our daughter’s little five-year old hands, the insects looked larger in 2004?  I don’t think so, because I saw them in my full-grown hands, then and now.  Is it that our our memories naturally tend toward exaggeration and hyperbole?  I don’t know.  I only know that I was expecting bulkier, more substantial creatures.  Those I’m seeing now seem almost dainty. 

Today in 2021, I’m struck by their vulnerability.   Maybe I feel this way simply because I’m older.  Or because the covid pandemic has kept reminding me, and all of us, for over a year, of life’s fragility.  I certainly don’t remember encountering so many struggling cicadas.  Repeatedly, I come across those having difficulty emerging from their shells.  They appear to be stuck, not quite in and not quite out.  Did the long spell of cooler-than-usual weather adversely affect their ability to molt?  Others have successfully exited their exoskeletons, but they’re physically challenged in various ways.  A wing is twisted, folded, malformed or too small.  I found one that appeared to be miniature in all aspects except for its head and eyes.  What a cutie it was, with a short body and tiny wings that looked to be edged with frills and coated in golden dust.  And all around, I see cicadas that appear to be perfectly formed, yet having considerable difficulty adjusting to the new life phase.  With every glance at our front porch, I see one or more flipped on its back, legs moving frantically in the air.  I see some that have lost half their body to a predator, yet continue, doggedly, to crawl.  Our lawn teems with nymphs and the newly molted attempting to maneuver through a hostile terrain of grass blades. I avoid walking through the yard, even though I want to check out the cicada action around our silver maples.  My husband debates how best to time his mowing of the lawn.  When will the  massacre it entails be less pronounced?    

A cicada with abbreviated body and wings.

I’m hoping that once the Brood X onslaught is in full force, there will be so many cicadas around that those facing hardship will be less evident.  With temperatures expected in the high 80s over the next week or so, we should soon be entering peak emergence.  Until then, though, I’ll continue to commiserate with all the struggling cicadas I see.  I will attempt to rescue some, just as I occasionally move a worm from the middle of the street.  It’s not that I place such an extraordinarily high value on the lives of these insects.  It’s not that I deem them more important than people.  Quite the opposite.  It’s that, in their struggles and frailties, I see those of humankind. In their vulnerability, as well as in their persistence, I see the human condition.  

This afternoon, on a very slow, hot walk with Kiko, I came across a cicada in the road. It looked healthy. I picked it up, and it buzzed vigorously in my hand. I took the perky little guy to a nearby tree, where he left my finger easily and began walking up the trunk with confidence. I saw, or imagined, a peppy spring in his step. This one would seize his hard-won day in the sun. I returned home feeling optimistic, for Brood X as well as for my human brothers and sisters.

Nature

Cicadas, Slowly but Surely

The cool weather here seems to have slowed our Brood X emergence. Since my initial cicada spottings on Monday, I’ve encountered only a few of the newly hatched insects. Yesterday evening, as I took one last walk in the yard before closing up for the night, I heard a rustling nearby on the silver maple. Two brown exoskeletons were attached to the bark. Just above them, a young, pale yellowish cicada was ever so slowly testing its legs. It bore the hallmark of the recently emerged, the two oblong black spots behind the eyes that suggest sunglasses or a carnival mask. The sound I heard, though, was coming from one of the skins. A closer inspection revealed that another insect was in the process of gradually freeing itself from its exoskeleton. It appeared to be a slow and laborious endeavor. No progress was apparent while I watched.

As the other cicada inched its way up the tree, the scratching sound continued, and the brown shell convulsed.

This morning, both shells were empty, and a newly winged, pale insect was beside them. The temperature is rising. This youngster should be in good company soon.

Community, Nature

And They Emerge! Brood X Sightings Begin

They’ve been underfoot outdoors, all around us here in Northern Virginia, for seventeen years, leisurely sipping the sap from grass and tree roots. Most of that time, they’re in cozy tunnels eight to twelve inches below ground. About a month ago, they moved up closer to the surface, where they wait until the ground temperature feels right. I saw my first representatives of Brood X yesterday morning on my neighbor’s front steps. I spotted several more on our iron fence this afternoon. Today, there will likely be more. I know from past experience that our immediate area will soon be rich, almost beyond imagination, in cicadas.

In the next several weeks, it will become close to impossible to avoid the orange-veined brothers and sisters of Brood X. They’ll be everywhere, looking out onto this bright new world with their bulging red eyes. They’ll be moving slowly, if at all. Their large wings don’t seem to be quite big enough for their lumbering bodies, and their flight is awkward and haphazard. They apparently don’t spend enough time in a winged state to master the art of flying. I’m reminded of a new driver making a first clumsy attempt to drive a car with standard transmission.

Look down in non-grassy areas and you may see the perfectly round, dime-sized holes the cicadas leave when they emerge from their subterranean long-term leases.

You may see some cicada “chimneys,” as well.  These are the domed cylindrical mud towers the insects build atop their holes as protection during wet weather. 

Near dusk, you may see milky white, ghostly cicadas crawling across the ground.  These are the newly emergent nymphs, with as-yet undeveloped wings.

The nymphs find a perch on which to anchor themselves as they gradually shed their exoskeletons. These copper-colored shells will soon be omnipresent on tree trunks and branches. And then they’ll start to pile up around the bases of trees.

For a while, still, we can enjoy our friends from Brood X a few at a time, when they are at their endearing best. Appreciate this early stage. It won’t last long.

Family, Nature

Applause for Spring’s ensemble Cast

As May begins, spring’s high quality production design continues unabated here in Northern Virginia. The season’s talented ensemble cast rarely misses a cue, despite unpredictable working conditions such as drastic shifts in temperature, a sudden hailstorm, and recent wild, gusty winds. The players function together beautifully, keeping the audience amused and all senses invigorated.

The Appalachian redbud by our back porch brought out a striking profusion of bright fuchsia jewel-like buds, just as we’ve come to expect.

Looking a bit like tiny pink chili peppers, the flowers glow with near iridescence in the afternoon sun.

The redbud takes an inventive approach to her adornment, sprouting small bouquets of varying sizes directly from her trunk. 

The little sassafras tree in our front yard was damaged last year by a heavy branch that fell from one of the silver maples. Nevertheless, she produced the annual show of frilly pale yellow flowers. Their lemony scent is subtle yet pervasive.

The camellia tucked into a corner at my mother’s house played her part with exuberance.  Her limbs were gracefully bowed down by an abundance of ruffled, boldly colored blossoms.  

The taller, grander daffodils in our front-yard patch took their time in blooming, letting the miniature Tête-a-têtes set the stage and enjoy their time in the limelight. When the big girls arrived, they were elegantly dressed in their Cinderella ball gowns.

The azaleas, among the season’s dependable stars, are just past peak bloom.  A coral pink variety is luminous in the early morning light. 

As heart-shaped leaves replace the blooms on the redbud, the spent flowers fall onto the creeping phlox below. 

Creeping phlox is known and admired for its carpet-like effect.  Together, the many little flowers, popping out from wiry foliage, can create a lovely cascade over a low wall in a rock garden.  But each bloom in itself is a miniature marvel.  Each flower has five delicate, double-lobed petals and a center resembling a tiny star or snowflake, with a ring of double markings surrounding bright yellow stamens.

And then there are the lilacs, the signature flower and fragrance of mid-spring.  I love lilacs. The petite, perfect, four-petaled blooms remind me of icing flowers my daughter and I used to squeeze out of a pastry bag to decorate cupcakes. I love the way they cluster together to form larger entities.  Each lilac bush is composed of communities of small flowers working together.  I’ve written before about my sentimental appreciation of lilacs.  They carry me back to childhood and my grandparents’ beloved old Kentucky home.  They remind me of living outside Princeton when my husband and I were newly married.  They’re a token of a dear friend, long gone from this world.  To me, they evoke home, happiness, and the warmth of belonging.   When I realized that lilac leaves were sprouting from the long gray stems of a previously unidentified shrub in the front yard of our house twenty years ago, it was another sign that we had moved to the right place.  That old lilac bush has had its ups and downs, and this is a down year.  With luck and a substantial pruning, it may be revitalized, as has happened before.  Two years ago, we planted another lilac in the back yard, and it has flowered beautifully.  A third near our porch is a later blooming variety.  A house surrounded by lilacs is truly home sweet home.

Spring’s final act will soon begin.  All around, the roses are budding, preparing  for their big scenes.  The peonies will follow shortly.  And this year, a special insect guest readies itself for an historic entrance.  For the past seventeen years, Brood X cicadas have been waiting underground in the wings (and for their wings), rehearsing for the literal role of a lifetime.  With each warm day, their emergence draws closer.  The season’s dependable cast of unique characters will take it all in stride.  The show must go on. 

 

For an earlier post on a favorite flower, see Lilacs, Lyric Hall, and June Bliss, May 1, 2012. 

Faith and Spirituality, Nature, Walking the Dog

Out with Kiko, as Morning Breaks

4 Comments

My dog Kiko turns fourteen this summer.  His face is now mostly white, but otherwise his appearance has barely changed since he reached adulthood.  He’s as lean and trim as always, and because of his small size relative to the Labs and Doodles prevalent in our neighborhood, he’s still occasionally mistaken for a puppy.  But recently he’s begun to show his age.  When descending the stairs, his back legs move stiffly, as though tied together with an invisible cord.  On walks, he’s considerably slower, especially on the way home.  Walking with our usual pack means little these days, because we’re quickly out of step and far behind.  Kiko has always set his own pace, paying scant attention to the fellow canines he sees regularly.  He’s a very social animal in that he wants to greet every new dog he meets (or even glimpses at a far distance) but after that initial encounter, he’s off on his own.  For many years he typically led our pack, despite frequent stops for extensive sniffing, but now, more frequently than not, he dawdles and dithers.  He rambles, he meanders, he doubles back, then stops absolutely, as though gripped by indecision. And once home, he spends the greater part of the day in a sound sleep. 

Kiko, sampling the copious smells of a vinca patch..

Kiko’s hearing seems to be less keen.  Has his sense of smell become more acute, to make up for the other loss?  Sometimes he appears overcome by the sheer volume and variety of aromas he’s attempting to untangle.  He has always preferred smells to the actual dogs or humans associated with them, but now the preference is more pronounced.  I’ve heard that as long as a dog can smell, a dog enjoys life.  According to this measure, Kiko is enjoying life immensely.  I find this thought comforting. 

Usually now, Kiko and I head out alone.  We’re a pack of two, just as we were during his puppyhood, before I had a number of friends with dogs.  We tend to walk early, soon after sun up.  We go then because the day is at its loveliest, and because it leaves me the option of joining my friends later.  If it’s socializing or exercise I want, it’s best to leave Kiko behind.  Of course, he doesn’t like this.  If he’s home, he wants me there, particularly after all the togetherness we’ve shared during the last pandemic year.  After we return from a walk, he eyes me suspiciously, like a jealous boyfriend.  I pretend to settle in at the computer, and soon he hops up into his bed.  I sneak out quietly if I go.  

I’ve come to appreciate walking alone with Kiko in the early mornings, though.  There is little to divert my attention from the pervasive beauty around us.  I’m attuned to the springtime world, which often glows in a rosy, golden light, especially when filtered through deep pink cherry blossoms and tangerine-hued maple buds.  The birds are at their most active and celebratory.  Kiko lingers, his nose at the base of a clump of daffodil foliage, takes a few hesitant steps, then pauses again, and again.  There is no point in rushing him.  I summon patience, and breathe in the sights and sounds of the sparkling new April day.   If I surrender to the moment, and release the urge to speed things up, I can sense the natural world regenerating and rejoicing.  I can be part of all this daily morning glory, because my odd, old dog brought me to it.  Together, we’re fellow creatures basking in “God’s recreation of the new day.”  The words and melody of Morning Has Broken* seem to float in the sweet-smelling air:

Morning has broken like the first morning;

Blackbird has spoken like the first bird.

Praise for the singing, praise for the morning!

Praise for them springing fresh from the Word!
 

Sweet the rain’s new fall, sunlit from Heaven,
Like the first dewfall on the first grass.
Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden,
Sprung in completeness where His feet pass.

Mine is the sunlight, mine is the morning;
Born of the one light Eden saw play!
Praise with elation, praise every morning,
God’s recreation of the new day!

Kiko, sniffing, and sniffing, and sniffing some more.

*While Cat Stevens made this song famous, the words were written by Eleanor Farjeon in 1931, inspired by this verse of scripture from Lamentations 3:22-23: “The faithful love of the Lord never ends! His mercies begin afresh each morning.”  The tune is a traditional Scottish Gaelic one called “Bunessan.” 

Family, Nature, Walking the Dog

Spring arrives. . .and time warps

4 Comments

These recent March days here in Northern Virginia have been cold, windy and sunny. It looks like spring but still feels very much like winter. This is the March I remember from Easter trips to visit my grandparents in Kentucky during my childhood. How different it was from March in Atlanta, where it usually had felt like June, humid and overly warm, off and on since February. I loved the Kentucky version. I remember the white and green speckled look of the slowly awakening grass, the clumps of daffodils dancing in the bracing chill, the fast-moving clouds against a brilliant blue sky. It felt exotic, yet it also felt like home.

And that’s why it feels so right to be here in Virginia during these frosty March days. As I sit at my desk, decades later, I look out on a landscape that evokes happy times long ago, of memories glimpsed and sensed, not fully seen. Much as when I look at my daughter and see both the little girl she once was and the young woman she has become, the co-mingling of past and present is especially tangible in the bright briskness of early springtime.

Spring in Virginia is typically slow-moving, a deliberate and measured progression. Each development can be fully appreciated in its own time. The first tiny green shoots among tangled vines stand out against winter’s dominant palette of brown and gray.

The aptly named Lenten roses have been blooming, amidst their lush green foliage, since February, impervious to the cold. With their bowed heads and subtle coloring, they’re the perfect floral expression of humility.

Crocuses, another early herald of the season, have been popping up for a couple of weeks now. Their small size and delicate appearance contrasts with their hardiness and stubborn determination. They push their way up into the light, through layers of dead leaves, and through the snow if necessary.

The first of the daffodils to bloom in our yard are always the tiniest ones. These spunky miniatures test the waters for their taller, grander sisters.

On a recent morning walk with our pack, we noticed a fresh, lemony fragrance in the air. The source was the yellow bell-like flowers of spiky mahonia, a plant I know well from Atlanta. By the time my mother relocated to Virginia, what had begun as a couple of isolated plantings in our back yard near the garage had developed into a veritable and formidable mahonia hedge. This is a shrub that requires no encouragement before seizing new territory.

Kiko enjoys these cold, sun-filled March days because they offer a wide variety of cozy choices for inside napping. This week I found him in a new spot. Until recently, the carpet beneath him had been rolled up in storage in my mother’s basement. For forty years or so, its location was the dining room of our Atlanta home. It was a favorite resting place of Popi, my childhood dog. (See here and here.) During family meals in the adjacent kitchen, Popi would lie on the rug, his head facing away from us, partly because we taught him not to beg at the table, and partly because he had too much pride to do so. Because I’ve noticed that Kiko, as he ages, tends to slip on bare hardwood floors, the carpet is now in our Virginia dining room. Seeing him lying there on that old familiar rug, I see sweet Popi, as well.

Popi in the dining room in Atlanta, December 1971.

The earth turns and tilts on its axis. Spring comes. The past is alive within the present. I can feel it outside in the chill of the breeze and the warmth of the sun. See it in the radiant grass around the old silver maples. Smell it in the fragrance of mahonia. And sense it in the calming presence of my sleeping dog. Is it 1971 or 2021? Somehow, it’s both.

Popi enjoys a rawhide from his stocking on Christmas morning 1970. Our family rarely took photos except at Christmas.
Popi, at his endearing best, 1970.

Nature, Walking the Dog

Thaw

2 Comments

February has been true to form this year. The snow that fell at the beginning of the month has been largely with us since, with periodic refresher doses every week or so. Sleet and freezing rain have made regular appearances, also, turning most surfaces into treacherous sheets of ice. Even grassy areas have been dangerous to negotiate. The white coating on our lawn was impermeable to a human boot-clad foot and as slick as a hockey rink. It reminds me of royal icing that dries to a rock-hard finish, the kind I used when making gingerbread houses years ago. Largely thanks to that icing, those houses are still with us, decades later, boxed up in the basement. This February snow threatened to be nearly as long-lived.

Rising temperatures were therefore very welcome when they arrived at the beginning of the week. Road surfaces gradually became visible again, but the shoulders only increased in perilous iciness. Morning walks with Kiko were difficult going. He seems to understand when I say “Slow, slow” in an urgent tone. So I repeated the mantra nearly non-stop as we made our way out and back (very slowly, of course. )

The snow retreated throughout most of our yard, leaving big frosted circles around the wide bases of the old trees. Fallen maple buds are all the more distinct on the white ground, assuring us that spring is, indeed, in the works.

Several days this week, we’ve had winter in the mornings and spring in the afternoons, a March specialty that arrived a bit early. On Monday, Kiko and I were out early enough to see the grass frosted to a pale gray-green.

My fastidious dog wasn’t sure what to make of the frost and snow combo.

We were treated to a couple of days filled with glorious sunshine that melted away all but the most stubborn traces of snow. The outside world appeared revived, refreshed and joyful, teeming with the essence of early spring. Robins dotted the yard and circled in the trees above. Beneath our bird feeder, gray juncos, cardinals and white-throated sparrows scratched in the pine straw. They mixed peacefully with doves, squirrels, (including Bobtail) and the chipmunk.

The bright early mornings were especially alive with the sounds of the birds. High in the trees, all around, the woodpeckers, drilling for breakfast, seemed to be engaged in songs of call-and-response.

The sun often got so warm on Kiko’s bed by the window that he became periodically overheated. Every hour or so he pulled himself laboriously to his feet, jumped to the floor and collapsed in the shade at the base of my chair, evidently too sun-saturated to move further.

The thaw continues this weekend, although less scenically, with gray skies and rain. I’m relieved to see that no snow is predicted for the first week of March.

God speed, Spring. We need you more than ever!

Covid-19, Nature, Walking the Dog

Back Again: Snow Season

It’s snow time once again here in Northern Virginia, as it is in many parts of the country. While 2020 brought much in the way of unexpected and unwanted developments, it brought very little snow to our area. What did fall was fleeting. It didn’t linger. The white stuff began here early Sunday morning, and it hasn’t stopped. Fine flakes have been floating down, without haste, but steadily, for three days now. We’re not used to it.

Kiko was understandably irked by the crunchy ice coating on Day 2 that collapsed with his every step as we attempted to cross our front lawn. After a few belabored attempts at progress, he refused to move, looking up at me plaintively. I had no choice but to carry him. After that, we avoided grassy areas. But the edges of the street are problematic, too, as the salt stings his paws, again stopping him in his tracks.

He’s apparently decided that the best way to enjoy the snow is from the comfort of his raised bed by the window. The local wildlife stands out distinctly against the white background, providing hours of comfortable entertainment for an elderly lounging dog.

It’s a pretty, puffy, fluffy snow, exuberantly frosting leaves, branches, and tree trunks. . .

. . .and dramatically coating the evergreens.

Other parts of Virginia were treated to a similarly beautiful snow. Our daughter, now back in school, sent this photo of the grounds of the University of Virginia. Because her coursework continues exclusively online, she needn’t trek through the snow unless she feels like it. A rare pandemic plus. We’re learning to appreciate these when we stumble upon them.

Will this be our last substantial snow of the season? Is there a blizzard, like the one from 2016 pictured above, bearing down on us soon? Will we have an early, gorgeous spring?

2020 taught us that many so-called certainties are not, in fact, certain. So whatever happens, through snow and snow melt, we’ll continue to look for pandemic pluses.

If winter comes, can spring be far behind?

–Ode to the West Wind, Percy Bysshe Shelley

Community, Covid-19, Faith and Spirituality, Holiday, Nature

Deck the Tree stump (2013) + Update (2020)

In 2013 I wrote a post about decorating the tree stump at the edge of our front yard with a Christmas wreath. In the course of seven years, the stump has changed substantially, as most of us have. I didn’t hang the wreath the past two years, but this year it seemed fitting to do so. The original post appears immediately below, followed by the current update.

Deck the Tree Stump (2013)

This December, we hung a big wreath on the craggy silver maple stump in front of our house.  It seemed like an interesting, if unexpected, spot for a wreath.  And by decorating the tree, we could send a message to those who might see it as a business opportunity, as well as to those who think the stump is unsightly and wonder why we leave it standing.  The wreath says, We love this old tree trunk, and we’re letting nature take its course.

Then I thought a little more about it, and the pairing struck me as even more appropriate in its juxtaposition of life and death.  The stump is the opposite of the traditional evergreen Christmas tree.  Firs and spruces, retaining the appearance of vitality through the winter, get the privilege of being cut down, hauled into our homes, strung with lights and ornaments, and left to wither and die.  It’s tough work, being a symbol.  Our maple, though, would be in no such danger.  If intact, it would be gray-brown and leafless by now, like its neighbors in our yard.  But of course, it’s a stump, a snag, and already dead.  Yet it harbors vast, unseen colonies of creatures that go about the business of breaking down lifeless material.  It won’t be long before nature’s course is run.  The stump may not be here next year; its center is soft.  All the more reason to decorate it this year.

My husband and daughter hung the wreath one weekend afternoon, as I was napping, trying to get over a persistent cold.  When I trudged out to the road to see their handiwork, a new insight hit me.

I like to think that God works with us for good, despite ourselves, despite our selfish intentions and our vanity.  I initially wanted to decorate the tree because I thought it would look pretty, if a bit odd.  In truth, it was a way of declaring a certain pride in being different, in having the ability to see beauty where others see ugliness.

But once up, the wreath reminded me of a greater truth, of the essence of my Christian faith.  Out of death comes new, transformed life. How better to say it than in the words of John 3: 16:

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

And then the snow settled beautifully on the wreath and the tree, on the green and the gray, on the quick and the dead, like a blessing from above.

Update: The Remains of the Stump (2020)

The stump lasted far longer than I expected. But nature, human error, and cars have taken their toll. It’s in a vulnerable spot, close to the narrow road, on a particularly sharp turn that’s proven problematic for drivers time and time again. Several years ago one May morning we were awakened around dawn by a policeman at our door. He asked if that was our vehicle outside. “What vehicle?,” I heard my husband ask in a confused tone, after he’d finally made his way downstairs to the door.

“The one in the tree.”

“What?”

And sure enough, it appeared that a dark minivan had merged with the tree. While most of the stump remained, it must have been considerably weakened, as its decline soon accelerated.

Two summers ago while we were away on vacation, a little red Honda found its way quite forcefully into the stump, demolishing half of it. The section that remained no longer looked much like a tree, or even a stump. When that final piece gradually eased to the ground one day this fall, we barely noticed. Why not, one might ask, remove it, at this point? One answer is that, even as a pile of debris, it serves as a barrier for future wayward vehicles.

Last week, returning from a walk with the dog, I surveyed the battered remains of the once mighty silver maple. It, with five others, was planted the same year that our house was built, in 1920. (See The Silver Maples Say Welcome Home, April 2012.) Several large patches of ruffled pale green lichen had sprouted from the decaying wood. Even in its final stages, the tree continues to serve as evidence of the circle of life. (See Underfoot, and Easily Overlooked. . . October 18, 2013.) I thought of the big wreath hanging neglected behind the hockey nets in the garage. Why not, during this Covid Christmas season, decorate the vestiges of the tree as it’s in the process of transformation? The wreath on the ruins is, to me, a reminder that hope does indeed remain. We can have hope in human ingenuity and resilience during the darkest of times, proof of which is offered by, among other achievements, the development of highly effective Covid vaccines in record time. We can have hope in a divine and loving parent, who created not only maple tree and lichen, but also each one of us human children, unique in our blend of talents, strengths, weaknesses and inconsistencies. We were created for a life that increases in abundance as we love one another and rejoice in our differences. We were created for an abundant life that transcends the boundaries of this flawed and fantastic earthly realm.

. . .and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured out on us through the Holy Spirit which has been given to us.

–Romans 5:5