Illustration by Drew Shannon
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The new year is beckoning me, which leads to much reflection. Making resolutions, wishes and intentions for January has become my pastime. I often enjoy this changing of the guard. New beginnings and a new start are a part of existence and present in many cultures. I love preparing my next year’s calendar with birthdays and other milestones and often look ahead.
But this year is different. Is it my age or something else? I begin to ponder why can’t things stay the same? Somehow this year is harder than others.
My year ended with a loss. I lost a mature Manitoba maple in my backyard, one I’d just written about for this column. A huge branch came crashing down and as a result had to be cut down. It lived with me for 25 years but its life span was much more than that.
Initially I wanted to save the tree. My arborist explained he would have to lob off its canopy and then put in cables. It would not look as beautiful, he told me. It would go from being the focal point in my back yard, standing tall and majestic, to looking ragged and disfigured. He looked at me with furrowing brows and his eyes told me all I needed to know. I was disappointed and my heart was crushed, but I understood.
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Isn’t that the case with many things in our life – our heart tells us one thing and our mind another. One thing is for certain – clinging onto the past is not the answer.
Later that day when a friend visited, he reasoned with me and reaffirmed what I already knew. I wanted to save my tree and it was begging me to let it go. I cried and then made the tough decision. Fifty years in the life of a Manitoba maple tree – all that it has seen and experienced. Over just like that. Not atypical of a human life I suppose. One day we are breathing and the next we are taking our last breath. One day it’s Dec. 31 and the next Jan. 1. It was telling me to let go and that I would be okay. Let go of last year and embrace the new year. I was bidding farewell to the old tree, just like in the song Auld Lang Syne bidding a year goodbye.
The day it was cut down, I saved a few pieces of wood – enough for an end table, a charcuterie board and then another section to have something else made. My tree will live on in memories and also through objects to be cherished as I remember its presence in my life. I get it now, some endings need to happen before being replaced with the new. It’s not forgetting about the previous year but building upon it and making the new year better. Many resolutions we make are also linked to the past.
When the crew arrived again, this time to grind the stump and prepare the soil for a new tree, it became evident how massive the old tree roots were. Once again its age rang out for me to remember all it had endured. Shade for humans, a climbing apparatus for squirrels and a roosting ground for the local crows, not to mention the robins that would happily dig up the mulch now and again.
I watched all day while they ground the stump and dug the hole. The new tree arrived, a 10-year-old sugar maple weighing 1,500 pounds. The men struggled to get it in my back yard and then into the hole they so lovingly prepared. I gave them directions to move it this way and that, until it was in its proper place, three feet in front of my old tree. Welcome, I whispered. And in that precise moment, I let go of the past and embraced the future.
My new tree stands tall. Maybe new beginnings aren’t so bad after all. I look forward to redesigning my garden space and welcoming the extra sunshine. My new maple has big shoes to fill, but I know it can do it and so can I. Embracing a new year without completely forgetting the old becomes my mantra. Time will never stand still. As I age and change, I will continue to acknowledge new experiences and honour past ones. The adage about the past becoming a part of our future rings true for me today.
Susan Marchiori lives in Waterloo, Ont.