Under The Mulberry Trees
It’s funny how forgiveness often comes a little more easily when we’re standing at the end of one long thing, and it’s time to say goodbye.
Ever since the calendar flipped to August, I have had to stop myself from slipping into fall mode—which is laughable because we are currently in the middle of a record-breaking heatwave with temperatures sitting solidly in the triple digits. The city has been making announcements urging residents to stay indoors for the next few days.1
Despite spending our days at home with the curtains closed and the fans on full blast, the imminence of fall is evident in the little things. One morning, I walked into the kitchen to write and realized it was too dark. The sun had not quite risen above the ridges. For the first time that summer, I had to click on the cupboard light to see. We eat our breakfast out on the balcony, and there is a delicate but definite coolness in the air. We savor the breeze on our arms and faces as we cut into our fried eggs and fresh bread because we know the sun will soon scorch the ground in all her intensity, forcing us inside.
Something in me responds to these tiny hints of a new season. And I find myself dreaming of chunky knit sweaters, moody clouds, and apple cider.
I am too ready to move forward into new places with new circumstances and new scenery. But the reality is, we’ve still got several more weeks left of summer.
My daughter gallops a zigzag around the line of mulberry trees.
“I was just talking to the trees.” She stops in front of me, giving a small shoulder shrug, her palms splayed open at her sides. Before I can respond to the unprompted explanation, she dashes back to the trees.
Her scooter lies abandoned on the sidewalk. The hot wind tosses the grape vines along the stone walls, and I move my body in small, slow motions, only raising my arm to bat away a bee. Any big movement causes instant sweat.
My daughter ducks under the mulberry tree, scratching at its trunk with a twig. Weeping mulberry trees grow most peculiarly: their branches rise upwards towards the sky, then cascade dramatically down to the ground, like hundreds of elongated drooping arms sweeping the grass.
I always imagined this row of mulberry trees to be a group of sisters with long hair all bent over, brushing the strands of their green manes. They have watched me walk laps around them with a newborn nestled in the stroller, pleading for her to nap. They have seen me bring a toddler here, taking wobbly, excited steps around the cobblestone. And they look on now as I chase a preschooler, who is fast and sure and asking for a game of hide and seek.
The city comes by periodically throughout the summer to trim short the long branches. But if you time it right, the eccentric shape of the tree provides the perfect hiding spot underneath.
I call after my daughter to ask what she and the trees are talking about. “Secrets! Secrets I never will tell,” she shouts back in a singsongy voice, quoting a line from a children's book we read at bedtime. The book is also where she learned the concept of a secret and loves to use the word any way she can, feeling cheeky and grown up.
A new season is dawdling at the horizon, with new challenges, changes, and chances. There is something about standing on the threshold of changing seasons, closing out a long and hard chapter, and staring down the unknowns of the next, that makes me extra aware of all that is around me.
Sylvia Plath called the month of August an odd, uneven time, and I’d describe the last several years here the same—odd, uneven, and full of bumps and breakneck turns. August is loud and blinding and, oftentimes, too much. The gardens erupt with so much growth, and the sun sizzles too hot. It’s sensory overload.
But I want to capture all of it—the things that have inspired me and the things I will never quite come to terms with—as many details as I can before these moments slip away and the next season lays out its welcome mat.
It’s funny how forgiveness often comes a little more easily when we’re standing at the end of one long thing, and it’s time to say goodbye.
My husband joins us at the park just before lunch. He crouches under the mulberry tree. Purple stains from sitting on fallen berries dot the back of my daughter's pants. I follow them under the tree, all three of us verging towards the shade. The thick wall of branches encircling us becomes a cool canopy blocking out the blistering sun.
The light filters through the leaves, and I want to take a picture. The moment feels too beautiful to let pass. But then my daughter starts giggling uncontrollably, and I look over to see my husband on all fours, his chin tucked to his chest, and my daughter pushing his backside, trying to get him to somersault in the grass. They halfway succeed, dissolving into more hoots and giggles and tears. The shade under the tree is cool. Instead, I leave my phone in the bag and relax into the moment.
There is so much uncertainty on our horizon as a family, so many outside stressors we cannot control. The seasons are changing, and the calendar is flipping, whether we want them to or not. But in the precious impermanence of this moment, there is laughter and coolness and beauty.
That evening, I watch geese soar south, cutting great wedges of black across the cloudless sky. The flock innately knows to fly in the right direction, headlong into the right season, at the right time.
Summer will soon end. The trumpet vines will slowly die, and the rose bushes will dry up. The eggplants will be harvested, and the tomatoes that turned red will be cooked to make a paste for the colder months. The grass will turn a dusty and fragile brown.
But then a new season will come. There will be time for coziness and soup and warm drinks. There will be time for healing and renewing, for rest. We may not be there yet, but we’re surely on our way.
And these mulberry trees will continue to stand in their row, anchoring themselves in the steady rhythm of the changing seasons as they have done for years and will continue to do for years to come. This row of sisters—strong and silent—hold secrets as the earth tilts and spins.
The sun streaming through the long branches, the overbearing heat of August, and the three of us under the mulberry tree, popping berries into our mouths, just trying to survive the intensity of the season—there won’t be a moment exactly like this again.
And so I thank summer for what she has brought: daydreams and difficulties, growth and goodness, for there were little glimmers of grace there, too.
Which is doubly laughable because an air conditioning unit is a rare sight here. That’s right. No AC. 105º F. Pray for us.
Thank you for your beautiful words this morning. I, too, have such a tendency toward forward motion and the next "season" and this is a lovely reminder to keep pressing into the present. A daily but worthwhile fight 😂
Beautiful! I love the way you captured the textures and tensions of the season. And those mulberry sisters--what an image!