Pussywillows
Today, a moving truck will come and take with it all the things that have rested in my childhood home for twenty-four years. The first place I learned to read, to ride a bike — lost my first tooth, had my first kiss.
I wrote a goodbye note to my childhood home. Out of all the things that happened there, I found myself dwelling on whatever bloomed in the yard. I realized that I was quite affected by the bright pink Prairifire Crabapple tree blooms in spring, the bold Hydrangea bundles in late summer, the red pops of the Burning Bushes out front when the first signs of autumn came, and that same Crabapple tree donned in maroon-colored berry-like drupes as the yard began to freeze with winter.
All that life, and just the flora to speak of. All those days, and when I sat to reflect, visions of blossoms and leaves sat at the forefront of my mind.
I think, maybe, I like to cling to visuals (especially beautiful ones) to mark the seasons, the eras. I suppose I’ll chalk it up to my propensity for the sentimental. Or more honestly, my obsession with the passage of time. To put it most bluntly, my fear of death.
Ah, the lesson that plagues me so – looks me dead in the face, reminding me that I’d better get used to the idea sooner or later, and ideally before the Great Clock takes me, or worse, my beloved. Illustrated well in my biweekly therapy sessions, every last discussed topic dipped in a coat of time scarcity and sprinkled with a fear of loss. The same theme was reflected back to me once again when I sent my childhood friend a photo of the for-sale sign in the front yard and her response, “Damn the wheel of time, why must you continuously roll over?”
…
Today, I sit in the sunroom of an apartment I’ve lived in for six months – the first place I’ve lived with a significant other, had a pet, hosted a dinner party, paid a 401K bill.
I take care of myself here, as well as my partner. He takes care of himself, as well as me – right here in this home we share, the first home we’ve made together. We feed our kitten here, I sleep with her wrapped against my neck like a scarf, already fearing the day I’ll have to say goodbye to the soft little creature who has so quickly taught me so much – the first alive thing that has fully relied on me to be, just that, alive.
I keep our home the way I’ve watched my mother do it. Using her same candlestick holders, Christmas tree-decorating rituals, dish-washing techniques. I fold the couch blankets before moving to my bed, no matter how sleepy I am after dozing in the TV-lit living room – a habit my father, for better or worse, ingrained in me.
As I sit here today, at the precipice of my first spring in this apartment, I notice some odd-looking branches in the tree outside my front window. I’ve only ever seen this particular plant in its Hobby Lobby faux-flower form: a typical tree branch, unassuming at first sight, but upon closer look – covered in soft, furry gray bulbs. I remember my best friend saying that when she and her sister went grocery shopping with their mother and one of these strange silky podded plants was featured in the flower section, her mom would snap them each a tiny bulb, as a pet – if you will, to carry around and hold while they went about their errands – feeling the soft silken hairs between their tiny fingers. My best friend and I kept a fake craft-store version of the soft and strange fluffy-branched plant in a vase in the dining room of the apartment we shared together, the one we said goodbye to last September.
So, as I study these familiar yet mysterious twigs in my new-ish front yard, I pick up my phone to ask Google what they are.
“Pussywillow” pops up from my clumsy search: “fuzzy gray on tree.”
Wikipedia goes on, “Before the male catkins of these species come into full flower, they are covered in fine, grayish fur, leading to a fancied likeness to tiny cats. The catkins appear long before the leaves, and are one of the earliest signs of spring.”
…
Later today, I’ll go help my parents unpack at their new condo. I’ll choke down (as will they) some of the bitter goodbyes in order to make room for the sweet newness that will start here, in this place they’ll now call home.
Call me sentimental, attached, fearful of the end, haunted by the ticking of time. Call me cheesy, soft and sappy like the great poets – endlessly comparing their love affair with life to the fragrant lily, the enchanting rose. But here I stand, affected – yet again – by the soft, small, sacred, short-term little something that I tend to, which will inevitably be greeted by its own end someday. Something that offers the promise of something new. Something, like the chance to open my soft self up to another something again.
