Wisdom in a Wall

The leaves of our big maple tree seem to be plunging from their branches. I can see other trees in the distance also raining foliage.  Perhaps shedding quickly lest more damage be done by premature snowfall. Were such a thing possible, it looks like a mass tree anxiety attack manifesting in this strange storm of spinning, torpedoing, floating leaves. Just watching the chaos almost triggers one in me: my heart rate increases and jaw sets.

CHANGE seems set on fast speed today. There is catching up to do. (although we actually gained an hour with clock shifts) Or else? Why the anxiety? That’s the question that gets me. It’s an abstract sense of things happening out of control — and maybe those things are not good. That’s my default. But, rather than let my day get railroaded by this irrational anxiety, (triggered by falling leaves?? yikes) I will finish yesterday’s project of rescuing a tree from bittersweet.

Yesterday, with my heavy-duty lopper and a few choice cuts with a chain saw I cleared the lower trunk of the oak.  The woody vines were so thick, this strangling sucker must have been there for years. How had I missed it?  The tree is set by the road, ambiguously close to my neighbor’s overgrown plot and surrounded by the privet hedge and a sprawling forsythia we mostly ignore. Not until yesterday did I notice the trunk of this oak tree was being swallowed — the orange berries gave the culprit away.

For over an hour I tore at and chopped at the vines, pulling branches and years of debris away from the trunk. I followed the trail of bittersweet, yanking, pulling, cutting — and uncovered a beautiful stone wall. Smothered for years, these great old stones set tightly together, have been here, invisible beneath the bramble.  A forgotten foundation weathering crazy seasons, storms and bittersweet. From my window, I cannot see the stone wall just beyond the hedge, but I know it is there and remembering it, my heart slows. The leaves continue their frenetic fall. I breathe easy.