Standing

There is a dead tree off the side deck of the house. It's an oak that was hit by lightening almost two years ago.

A visiting friend first noticed it and since then it's presence has elicited all sorts of comments and advice. There are those who are immediately alarmed, and think it should come down right away. Others are more sanquine and suggest that when it does fall, because of where it is on the ridge, it will probably fall down the hill and not up towards the house and my bedroom. Can I say I found this viewpoint oddly comforting? After it was first discovered, on windy nights as I lay reading in bed or drifting off to sleep, I would give that viewpoint a great deal more thought.

As time passes, I have watched it's slow but deliberate journey towards decay. It took a while for all the dead leaves to drop. Isn't that curious? I would have thought they would have been shed right away. Even with the arrival of Fall, they held on and only reluctantly, if not stubbornly, let go. It was early Spring before the branches were finally bare. Now the tree's shape became clear and stood out starkly against the green trees around it. The bark had been stripped in places by the lightening and there was a slight bend over halfway up the trunk from it's impact. It seemed that would make it all the more vulnerable to high wind. Surely the top would just crack and fall first? How long could it stand?

Over the months, the bark slowly stripped off and the tree became the gathering post for all sorts of insect loving birds. The woodpeckers especially commandeered it, crisscrossing it multiple times during the day searching out insect morsels from the decaying bark and wood. They did not though, nest in it.

Early this Spring, deep in the night I heard a pretty loud noise. My rule of thumb is if it doesn't hit the house, I go back to sleep. In the woods, the nights are full of interesting sounds. In the morning I discovered that the first of the largest branches had fallen. Late this summer as I stood looking out the glass doors of the studio, the second long bare branch gave a sharp crack! and fell away. Now the tree is mostly trunk, branching upwards with two arms like a V into the sky. It appears to be lifting it's arms in an act of praise or is it surrender? or both?

My Mom has Alzheimer's. After a long journey she is now in the final chapters of her life. Looking at that tree I am reminded of this mysterious process of dying. How we begin so strong and earnest and often must leave bit by bit. It's very hard to witness, but it is not without it's beauty or joy. The once proud oak, is still proud. It still stands bearing up under the slow decay working it's healing within it. Unless the tree is cut down, it will fall at some point known only to the ineffable cycle of life. Until then, the tracery of the beetle borings on it's trunk are beautiful, as is the almost totem pole look it has achieved. The squirrels swirl around it chasing each other and the red tail hawk often surveys the ridge from the top. Meanwhile it stands quietly, a witness to the mystery of death in the midst of all the budded up trees around it, waiting for Spring.

There have been countless gifts involved in my Mother's illness and more grace than can be expressed. But essential to the understanding of any of that has been our willingness to see the beauty and joy; to take each day as it comes. There has been more laughter than I would ever have imagined, some tears, some heartfelt moments. Somewhere along the way we have learned to accept what is happening has a time table we cannot know.

I wonder about the oak. Will it fall in the night? Will it break halfway off first? Will the winds and rain take it?

We can only wait and see.

"Yes. There are things in this life that we must endure which are all but unendurable, and yet I feel that there is a great goodness. Why, when there could have been nothing, is there something? This is a great mystery.

How, when there could have been nothing, does it happen that there is love, kindness,beauty?" Jane Kenyon