Breaking Leaf

Perhaps my use of the word amazement is too easily triggered. In the sense of wonder I mean. And ‘tis the season for me daily to shake my head—spring, you know.

Despite decades of planting trees and shrubs and flowers, I am amazed at what returns from winter-induced dormancy. Despite a lifetime of seeing the process over and over and over again beyond the limits of my yard, I marvel at the sights.

Recently I made the drive from home to the Charleston area, and the flowering redbuds and dogwood along the way, those untended by human hands, out in the woods, startle me. Yet, I have seen this process along this road—oh, I don’t know—hundreds of times?

The paradox for me is that I am well aware of the biological drive in these living things to survive, but I have no expectation of the annual greening, the flowering, this reawakening.

Look to the woods, no humans pruning or mulching, but a thriving community of trees and plants and wildlife. I get that. And still I am struck by this springing forth.

As a matter of course, I walk my yard and check on what I have planted, waiting for the first sign of leaf or blossom. The nodes swell, another day goes by, another week, and then, finally—yes! The tiniest bit of color, the beginning of an unfurling. Amazing.

This year my daily checklist includes keeping careful tabs on the first apple blossom in my little orchard, the cuttings I have potted, and a Japanese maple I transplanted in mid-February. I put the tree in the ground in Ladson, SC 5 years ago, and now here it is after a 3-hour drive to the NW.

Of course, the root system was deeply developed, and I had my doubts about this uprooting, which I would have anyway.  Weeks, nothing. Then some swelling. And two days ago, voila!

Okay, a small thing, perhaps, so go with awe, an even smaller word. Surely, the daffodils are enough to astound. The first signs of the perennial sunflowers I planted by seed last year? Get out!