Life Needs A Little Nurturing
I’ve been spending a lot of time in my backyard lately. Partly because I want to get done with some spring planting before it’s too late. But mostly because I’m so worn out by all the devastating news that has hit us in these past weeks that I feel the need to disconnect, to step away from it all, even if for a little while.
Two mass shootings less than seven days apart that cost many innocent lives have highlighted, yet again, that there’s so much more work we need to do to build a better, safer, more tolerant nation. I’d begun to hope that things were getting better, especially with vaccines becoming more and more accessible and pandemic restrictions beginning to loosen in cities and towns across the country. But this past week offered a grim reality check that Covid-19 isn’t the only disease afflicting our country. Then again, there have been so many of these reality checks in this past year, haven’t there?
There’s an old cherry tree in my backyard. Small, gnarly, and covered with lichen. A windy rainstorm this past January broke it in two. But somehow it’s still standing — half a tree, reaching its one remaining limb out to the sun. Yesterday, I noticed the tree’s buds, which had been sitting tight and brown on the branches for months, slowly starting to unfurl.
Life is stubborn like that. No matter what the setback, how terrible the shock, how deep the sickness, it keeps moving on. Until it can’t anymore. At least not without some support, some nurturing, some healing. I’ll try to offer that to my cherry tree, for sure. But I’m also hoping that you and I, and all of us who care for this country, can work together to help this nation heal as well.
Maureen Nandini Mitra
Editor, Earth Island Journal
Photo by: John Morgan
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