Outside my window is a mountain laurel — not an extraordinary plant in any way but one: it’s not supposed to flourish in this neck of the world. I live in a place where it gets very cold, very often — and mountain laurels are a (smallish tree? largish bush?) plant that generally thrives down south — Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania. In those somewhat balmy states, mountain laurels grow happily into lush understory stalwarts. Smaller branches on a mountain laurel typically sport a handful of rich green leaves, a few inches long, an inch or two wide, ever-green in the winter, almond-shaped, a bit shiny (but not too shiny), a bit leathery (but not too leathery). Late in the spring, exquisite little wedding-cake white blossoms make tiny fragrant bursts of beauty every spring.
But this mountain laurel is up here where there are long stretches of sub-zero weather, and something about this winter was, in so many ways, brutal. The tale is told on the laurel: three or even four of every five-fingered leaf group is a dull, dark brown. The green leaves look much the same as always, but the effect on the overall plant is one of impending disaster.
In past winters, the plant seemed to tolerate these patches of sub-zero weather. But now, twenty years after we moved here, the laurel is clearly a bit tired, the way I sometimes feel now. It’s persisting, clearly: the green of the spared leaves is no different than in past springs we’ve seen together. It’s struggled, for sure. But I’m a bit concerned.
We’ll keep watching. The green tells me there’s life in it still, and where there’s life, as they say, there’s hope. It may be about to slip away from us in the next few years. My sense of cherishing it has grown with every spring and this spring I feel almost a sense of panic: so many brown leaves! What could it mean? Nothing good.
I just want one more spring with the laurel. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned in the last few years is the value of letting go of things and accepting that my role is often more to witness than to shape. That acceptance, often, is the place where peace lives.
So while I’m hopeful for this tree and its future, I’m going to use my gaze on the tree as a cue — my cue to remind myself of the nature of witnessing. To witness is to simply live in this moment, with the brown and the green together, and admire the tree’s yielding persistence to the vagaries of the weather. Just abiding, one more spring.