The Embrace

A dozen years ago, a seed landed in a field next to where we would eventually install a driveway. There were no cars, no trucks, no roads or electrical lines. There was just an adult mesquite tree, and a cedar seed lying at its roots.

Over time the seed grew into a sapling, and during the summers of its youth the mesquite leaves would shelter it from the worst ravages of the sun. Mesquite thorns kept away any deer or other wildlife who might want to dine on the new shoots, and discouraged rabbits from tunneling through and destroying the young tree.

During the winter, when the sheltering mesquite still had protective thorns but no leaves, the cedar sapling drank in the sun spilling through the naked branches. Safe from predators and without competition for light, times were good.

Eventually Annie and I moved in. We put in a road that skirted the two intertwined trees, installed a house, imported dogs and donkeys and goats and wireless internet and all the detrius that accompanies us. The cedar is no longer a sapling, and the mesquite is no longer the protector. Now the mesquite is struggling for its own life, as the cedar branches block out the sun and acidic needles drop to the ground below.

This is no warm embrace of a mentor and student. No, this is a life and death struggle taking place in slow motion, over the course of instants that stretch for years. Eventually the cedar will choke out the mesquite, and the thorns that once served as armor will instead become markers for a grave.

I pass these trees every day, and I wonder at the lessons they hold. Are they a metaphor for the older giving way naturally and gracefully to the younger? Or are they evidence that the wages of kindess are death and destruction?

I am not wise enough to know for sure. I can but watch, and wonder, and be thankful that my eyes are able to see the struggle.