My best guess, after researching pine trees, is that this little volunteer sprout is all of five months old, given it is but four inches tall.
Five months ago, even as this little pine tree wannabe would germinate in the spring, I lost my wife to cancer.
Her oncologist said it was inevitable. They’d done all they could. Cancer would win. I would lose.
As unbeknownst to me as what was happening beneath the soil, was how difficult the graveside, the grief, and the despair would be.
Five months ago, near where a tiny green stem emerged between a cleft in the rock – visible only to the likewise tiniest of creatures who frequented the dark crevice and paid it no mind – the landscape was marred by tractor treads which had ground and pulverized and otherwise obliterated the last of the remains of our family business which had been destroyed by fire.
Yet it was on this same site, one year before, we had celebrated our 50th Wedding Anniversary.
Then we had pushed to the side what had remained of the mounds upon mounds of debris that had been hauled off by truck after truck after truck, in order for family and friends to gather to celebrate a beautiful and glorious half-century together.
Now, this evening, as I water the flowers, I will smile at the tiny pine tree sprout, my heavenly reminder to me that despite devastation and loss, there will be a day, one day, and that day will be a beautiful and glorious day.
My reflections based on Isaiah 4:2.
David, I am so sorry to hear of your wife’s passing. What a beautiful story. I believe in things like that magical little pine. We can have such a broken heart and then God and Mother Nature share such a little gift with us that is huge in what it means and gives to us. And just for a minute our heart is full again.
In sympathy, Sue
David, I have read each of your Suburban times articles and they are simply beautiful. I’m sorry for the loss of your wife but I so appreciate you sharing your journey through loss and grief with us. May each day bring you more peace. Please continue to find the special messages your wife sends you. She’s smiling down on you.
Thank you Sue and Krista for your comments above. And likewise, to the others who read and have thus the opportunity to reflect on grief and loss, and the consequent introspection on what any more matters. Life is so precious. Each person has a story. If only in our busy lives we will listen and hear.
Just this morning I had the opportunity to answer a call from a gentleman from whom I had not heard for some years, and with whom there had not always been agreement. But we both had this in common: the loss of a loved one. And over the phone, we grappled with our emotions, brief pauses mid-sentence in which we struggled for composure and for words.
It’s a journey all of us must at some point, sooner or later, embark upon. Never easy. Treasured memories never forgotten.
So thankful for the signposts along the way that direct our steps, reminders that we are not, after all, alone.