December 1, 2006
men and trees
I just don't know what it is about trees that bugs men so much. I have observed that cutting down trees, and the use of implements of cutting things down, generally gas-powered, and in all cases noisy, is almost exclusively engaged in by men. Guy gardening, or chainsaw gardening as I like to call it depends to a very large degree on a perception that the plant world needs controlling in the worst way. Grass must be mowed, bushes must be trimmed, and trees should not be messy. Any tree that drops a leaf in the course of its natural life cycle is suspect. A tree that drops leaves and fruit? Mother Nature help us! It faces certain condemnation by the Guy Gardener. I do not mean all guys who garden (there are a few exceptions to my rule) but the regular Joe who spends weekends not otherwise dedicated to total immersion in televised sports in a brisk ordering of his vegetative domain. Case in point: my father.
And if you think I've gone off the deep end here on my gender-warped plank, think about the last time you called a woman-owned tree trimming service, or talked to a female Public Works employee about your unruly street tree (the kind that has roots and the unfortunate habit of spreading them under sidewalks). And don't get me started on the "mow, blow, go" guys. Still, I never expected to go to battle with my own family over tree rights.
The silk tree in my parent's backyard died this spring and had to be cut down. This apparently inspired my father to think about other trees that could be disappeared - to his great benefit. All of them leaf droppers. "I've been thinking about cutting down the paper birch" he says to me one Sunday afternoon. At that moment we were standing on the driveway at the front of the house, October light illuminating the drooping branches of the birch tree in a golden cascade. It stands high above the roof of the house now, a stunning sculpture of pale striated bark, in winter etched against the bare sky, in summer robed in shimmering glass green. I looked at him, trying hard not to explode in a St. Vitus dance of outrage. "Why would you want to cut down that beautiful tree?" I calmly asked. He began to shout, "It's so messy. I'm constantly raking up the leaves!"
I thought about this. My dad can often be found in the yard raking things. Or sweeping the vast patios. Whether leaves or redwood bark or the various flotsom of nature, he spends a good deal of time tidying up in the yard. He tells me it's meditative and he likes to do it. His favorite tool is a plastic-bristle broom, its bristles nearly rubbed down to nothing, and for hours it seems I will hear the swish swish swish of that broom against the patio cement as he contemplates things in his green overalls while I groom rose bushes or stake the dahlias. Somehow I am never there when things get cut down.
My brother often visits my father on weekends, now that my mother is gone and we siblings have instituted a rotating schedule of father-minding or spying more like. We want to make sure he is taking care of himself and not doing anything too crazy (like deciding to drive a friend to New Mexico as he did last winter). And we try to keep up the garden. My sister and I like to buy plants and tuck them into bare places, tend the roses and annuals, and check on the water needs of all the potted plants. My father and brother dig things up, trim things, and engage in major surgery. And then there is my father's goal of covering all the surfaces of the yard not already cemented or bricked with black plastic sheeting and redwood chips. This began as a crusade against lawn and has moved on to include anything that comes up that he doesn't recognize. My brother obligingly helps dump the chips onto the plastic, and trims my mother's herb garden into geometric compliance.
I managed to talk my father out of cutting down the birch tree. And asked my brother to at least question the next time Dad asked him to help take out all the agapanthas or dig up Mom's beloved roses (he hates the thorns). We were talking at my kitchen table over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. He was looking out the window as we talked, November light filtering through the half-leafless tangle of the Scarlet Oak's branches. Then he says to me, "Have you ever thought about taking out this tree?"
