old apple trees

and old mamas

Dear Mila,

I’m sitting in the porch. The black of night just morphing into the navy and indigo blue of early morning. Somewhere out there, the sun is beginning to rise. I know this not because I see it, only because the birds are announcing its impending arrival.

I’m looking at the outline of the ancient apple tree in front of the house. There she sits, that old tree, over a hundred years old, probably planted by the people that built this old house. The gypsy moths came en masse this year. A great torrent, falling from the skies. They were everywhere and on everything. They descended and destroyed. First, they found the apple trees.

All of the old trees were hit first.

Earlier this spring, they had put forth luscious pink and white blossoms. We could sit under the trees and listen to a cacophony of bumble bees banging drunkenly against and into their fat petals laden with nectar. All was promise.

But soon thereafter, as the tender green leaves erupted from the stems of the tree, came the tiny little caterpillars, their poisonous filaments gave us itchy rashes that looked just like poison ivy. The same, tiny little caterpillars that grew fat and sluggish on the very life force of those ancient apple trees.

And still, those caterpillars grew bigger, curtains of them blowing in the breeze. One could hear the crunching of them eating leaves and the sound of their poop hitting the forest floor. The leaves turned to lace and then, finally, to nothing at all but a central spine. Trees with twigs and little green spikes and enormous, slimy caterpillars was all that was left.

Now, here we are. Me in the porch, looking at the darkened outline of a tree, majestic in size and fullness, using her reserves to try again. All of the trees around her doing the same. There were no blossoms this go around - no time for that and she already knows there will be no fruit. No, this is not a celebration of spring with the hope of sweet fruit, this is survival. She uses all her might to put forth the leaves she needs to absorb the light she needs to live. That is all. Survival. And to live, she must take from the what life she has remaining. There’s no other choice. To live she must bring herself closer to death.

I have no blossoms to bloom. I have no fruit to bear. I can only bring forth the bare minimum. There’s no flourish, no celebration, no symphony. There is just a frame that moves and does the things it needs to do to keep on living knowing that with every minute, I am closer to death than my last. Like this old tree and her sisters all around her. I watch them and notice. I wonder what they can muster. What will they become? Will it all be too much? Will they succumb to the frigid winter? Will their second set of leaves be pale and anaemic? Will something else come along - some bug or disease and take advantage of their weakened state?

I watch. With great anticipation I watch, captivated by their tale, praying for their resilience, learning from their unquestioning determination to live today.

The only way I know how to find any peace is to pay attention to what Creation tells me. Find me here, please.

I love you always.

Your mama, mamie, mamsie. Your anything and everything you need me to be. Am so desperately sad.