Recently I’ve been learning all I can about trees. It’s been a long time coming. It’s something I’ve always wanted to do but this life pulled me out from under my seedling mother and branched me off in so many directions that I forgot all about the roots underneath my own shadows. I forgot what I knew and I forgot how to grow in the place I was meant to be. Until now. So I’ve been learning about trees.
We have some nice fruit trees out front that I’ve neglected over the years. But I’m learning how, when, and why to seed, plant, prune, replant, cut, tie, train and listen to my trees. I’m also learning all I can about Bonsai. I have a little Norway spruce I call Brucie that looked to be all but dead, just a stick in the dirt a few seasons back. He didn’t look like he was going to grow where he sprouted between a concrete slab and block foundation. When I dug him out and potted him, I trimmed his roots and then trimmed the needles and branches to match. I cut off everything brown as well as most of what was left of the green. I plucked each new needle on the little trunk one by one. In the next growing season we’d direct all his energy toward putting down strong, new roots. For most of that season I thought he was dead. But I watered anyway. I watered a dead tree with hope. Today he’s thriving in his shallow little pot. We’ll see, in 20 years I may have something magnificent to show you. For now he’s my first success, rescued and revived, with strong branches covered in new shades of green and strong roots so he can stand in the wind and whisper her secrets for more years than I’ll ever see.
I wanted to understand more about trees and perhaps more about life at its root, under the scattering surface. He took his time but Brucie taught me about roots. Now I’m looking forward to what else he’ll teach me if I can keep him going. I wonder what he’ll be. I think I’ll let him tell me this time. I’ll keep watering and feeding and sunning and shading. I’ll be watching and listening as he unravels into the wind.