Cultivation

Still the plants need water. Early spring hits Los Angeles and dries out the soil. Through winter: dormancy; then with the heat the promise of renewed growth. I’d been neglecting them, and could see in the slight browning leaves signs of parchedness.

Some for five, six years I’ve cared. They argue plants have no feelings, but tending them I’ve found a common language with mine. I can intuit when they need light, when they need water, when something is wrong. I know, too, that the vibrations in the room, my emotional register, the music I play, the mood of the dog, all the things that build the energy of life impact them too.

I’d like to own property. I’d like to plant a tree. I’d like to watch it grow. I’d like to lie on my death bed and look out at the tree ten, twenty, thirty feet in the air and know that it was there because of me, and that I sustained it, and that after my passing it continued. There’s a sense of the future in planting a tree. I’d like to cultivate the future.

Around the world moments of despair send a numbing shockwave and seem to pause time. History bends and suddenly there is a before and there is an after. And still the plants need water.