Fruit Tree

There’s a process to giving up.

It takes denial, a fight, grief, and eventual acceptance. As if to say, I’m tired of this war, I surrender.

Much like there’s a process to persevering.

It, too, takes denial, a fight, and grief. But there is no acceptance in perseverance.

There’s something to say about those who persevere.

About those who take their time.

To wait years for the payoff. 

To plant a fruit tree now in hopes it survives the Winter.

Rip the weeds from their roots.

Sift the soil, and plant in the South.

You must tend and care. Anything left unnurtured will wither, did you expect much else?

A fruit tree planted today will bear fruit for the rest of this lifetime. Our children’s children will eat from this tree. We’ll be fed for generations.

Imagine,

Imagine it wasn’t a fruit tree,

It was ivy. So rapid its growth and simple maintenance, but suffocating every thing around it, it isn’t the ivy’s fault it's nature is invasive.

What I’m trying to say is, I’ve planted this fruit tree and years from now when it’s leaves are big and its fruit is ripe and round, I hope you remember what it bears for you, what I planted not for now, but for later, when you look back and remember, I was here and so were you, and we will always be sustained by this fruit tree so long as we don’t suffocate it.

I will cut back the ivy, and rip the weeds by their roots and shelter this fruit tree in the Winter. And if not you and I, then those who stumble upon it, I hope can sustain themselves from what I’ve nurtured. To nurture something now in hopes it brings fruition.

To plant a fruit tree now in hopes it survives the Winter, and bears fruit for us in the Spring.