The Willow

On the south side of Hubbard Park, just down the road from our complex, stands a mid-sized weeping willow tree. It shades the tennis court, and shelters a large rock marking the end of the parking spaces nearby. It seemed a normal tree to me. I never paid much attention to it except to notice that the graceful boughs tinker lazily in the breeze and that the shade feels delicious when I walk to work on a hot day.

On this particular day, the weather was neither hot nor cold. Beyond the tree and the park, the sky bled black with threat of storm while behind me the cheery blue sky sported goldfinches and robins. As I meandered down the roadway behind the fire station, I glanced up from the wildflowers that lace the road's edge and for the first time realized with surprise that there was more than one trunk to the little tree.

While it isn't an old tree, its trunk is gnarled and misshapen by some sort of tree virus, giving it the appearance of having the mumps in spades. From the rotund base rose numerous trunks, each with its own distinct strength. I began to count, but there were trunks behind trunks, trunks twisted around other trunks, leaves hiding some trunks, and with every trunk ending in the same base clump, I needed to get closer to see what was going on.

I bent low and swished underneath the branches, feeling the leaves brush my hair. I touched the nearest tall pole shooting upwards from a defect in the base, and began counting. Fourteen. There were fourteen branches rising up. From outside the leaf skirt, you couldn't see more than the solid unified bottom. It was only from within the leafy curtain that the true state of the tree could be discerned.

I ducked back under the branches, reflecting on the state of the willow. Maybe that's the way it is with people too. Maybe you see the good parts and appreciate what they offer. Maybe you don't see their pain and what is holding them together until you get up close. And even then, life's ravages may have resulted not in decay and destruction, but in creative ways of overcoming life's viruses, ways of keeping going that aren't necessarily the design or the plan, but work well nonetheless.