Fortunately these are not the only sensations I feel. Other times I enter and feel their strength as they battle with their illnesses- for they are ill. Then I feel their pride in their strength and their refusal to give up in spite of overwhelming age. I love that and I too am proud of my strength. For these trees are still productive. Every spring a few blossoms appear and in the height of summer,bravely,small overly- sweet plums and hard little deformed apples appear. We pick some and make apple pie or plum upside down cake or cobbler. Also the deer eat them- for the fruit is easy to reach [they are not as careful as we are but rather wasteful as they bite into each fruit once and discard it leaving a trail of spoil ed fruit. But what a joy for these old sick wizened trees. To be useful still. I, of course, bond with them again and am proud that I still am useful and proud to be alive.
The best time is when I take my sketch book and try to put them on paper. This is slow work as they are so contorted. It is difficult to get their essence. During this very quiet time as I struggle, there is real communication. We talk about our long lives. We talk about how we have changed. We talk about what we have learned about life what we have seen and what lessons we have painfully learned.
Walking through an abandoned orchard is very different and can be very exciting. I remember an abandoned apple orchard on a Gulf Island. I came upon it suddenly- a lush group of trees bearing apples. What questions stimulated my overactive mind as I imagined it's history. It was romantic to walk through the silent trees and picturing it,
Another abandoned orchard I want to talk about was one my girlfriend and I stumbled on when we were young in the Okanagan valley near Kelowna where I grew up. It was a hot lazy Sunday afternoon -believe me, there is nothing lazier than a hot Kelowna Sunday afternoon- We decided to explore the mountain at the back of their orchard. We rambled up and over until we reached the Okanagan lake. There in the shimmering light was an abandoned peach orchard. There were no buildings, no roads, just mountain and lake. The orchard was on the top of a high cliff. The trees were laden with overripe golden and red fruit. Of course we feasted until gorged, Then we put as many as we could carry folded in our full skirts-yes in those days girls wore skirts on Sundays-and walked home, On the way we did meet a rattler but fortunately not a grizzly bear. This is one of my favourite memories.
My favourite book as a child was "The Secret Garden" a book about an English girl born in India who was forced to move to her uncle's castle in Yorkshire England after her parents died in India of cholera. The story revolves around her attempt to find and then restore an abandoned hidden walled garden, The idea of a hidden secret garden was magical to me-a little girl growing up in Alberta where there were no secrets, everything was out in the open in the vast prairies. I passed many magical hours in this forbidden hidden walled garden. Everyone should have a hidden secret garden. Of course that is not possible except in our imagination. There we too can spend many happy hours nurturing and bringing to life our own abandoned hidden garden. Aren't we lucky.
