The Orange Tree

[Clematis]

Today is my dad's birthday. Yesterday I was thinking a lot about what this means and wondering if it could possibly be worse than his birthday last year when I was so worried about his rapid decline but trying to help him have a nice birthday anyway and trying unsuccessfully to get my sisters involved in doing something special for his last birthday. I think he was happy just to have my company, but I wasn't happy. He never really cared much about his birthday, and I don't think his birthday or anything else ever made him feel as special as he was. So in the midst of all those thoughts, I had this dream last night.

I have a good friend of many years; she and her girlfriend Jill had a marvelous orange tree in their back yard in Tucson. It was enormous and Jill devoted a lot of time to nurturing that tree, who responded by giving an enormous crop of fabulous navel oranges every year. We all helped; I remember donating old sheets to help the tree stay warm during occasional frosts, and helping to get them up with big ladders. It was a community project, nurturing that tree. And the oranges - they were the most delicious, juicy, perfect oranges any of us had ever eaten. They were the best thing about winter those years, and we all had oranges all winter. Then, one fall about 15 years ago the tree suddenly died in about eight days, with swelling green oranges falling all over the ground. The tree doctor said it was root failure and there was nothing anyone could have done to save it. We all grieved that tree; not only did we miss the oranges, it was shocking that this magical and bountiful tree had been stricken ill and died so suddenly. It was hard to believe such a thing could even happen.

In the dream, there had developed a lore about this tree. The lore was that from the roots of the tree had sprung an elixir that nourished the subsequent mourning of all those who had ever enjoyed its fruits, no matter what loss or how far each person now was. So Jill and I were wondering exactly this worked and we were poking around in her backyard where the orange tree used to be and found a hidden passageway to a hollow space like a cave, filled with dead roots. I'm not sure what it was we thought we would find but we were disappointed. There was a little sludge and mostly rather dry dirt forming the walls of the little cave. Then it came to us that we had been looking for something physical, when the truth was that this elixir - its derivation and entire process - was spiritual, which was how the tree could find every person who had loved the tree and its fruits during its life.

I'm not sure exactly what to make of this and how it's related to my dad's birthday, but I think it's a gift. Perhaps I should go find some navel oranges and share them.

[kayc]

I'm sorry I missed this yesterday, but I love the lore, I love trees and care for them tremendously.  That's why I grieved when the electric company took down nine cedar trees I'd planted about 20 years ago, they were nowhere near the street and I never anticipated they'd do that, but they changed poles and where they routed their cables, nothing I could have anticipated when I planted the trees.  It grieves me to cut something living and thriving.  I wish others felt the same.  
I hope you were able to eat an orange yesterday in memory of your dad...and that marvelous tree.  i do believe in that spiritual connectedness.

[Clematis]

The orange was good, and no doubt sweeter with this dream and what it means...