The Giving Tree

I was going to write something profound and meaningful to celebrate the 4th anniversary of us moving to Juárez but instead I'm just going to talk about a tree because I am an ass like that.

I started writing this blog in July after tipping back a few too many and actually accidentally hit publish. So to those of you on my direct email list who got a blog full of drunken gibberish last month, I'd like to apologize. I aim to be only half as belligerent.

So about this tree...

A while back I was talking to my dad about the weather in Juárez and mentioned how much a tree in our backyard had blossomed since his visit. The truth is, this tree I spoke of started off as nothing more than a nuisance to us.

Last year a weed popped up in our backyard. Even though I've always dreamt of having a home with a garden, the truth is that I am lazy and have no desire to get down and dirty with seeds and dirt and give endless attention to said garden. So I never pulled the weed.

A year later, I had no desire to knock down the little bush that was the result of my laziness. Raymundo bitched and moaned about this... weed, but I just let it be. Two years later, it had converted into a full blown tree, but the trunk promptly split in two.

Fast forward to today, two and a half years later. I am discussing this once weed, now tree, with my father and I see that it holds so much more significance than I could have ever imagined.

Simply put, it's a weed that grew. It was neglected and left to grow without supervision. This little weed became a tree and in time the trunk began to separate. When Raymundo saw this he tied the two trunks together with a rope. The rope caused the original trunk to become even stronger.

In time, the two trunks have grown back together and are now joined as one.

Maybe I've had just a few too many glasses of wine, or maybe I am still riding high on the romanticism of our wedding anniversary or the shock that we've actually survived the last 4 years here but I can't help but feel that this tree symbolizes my marriage and the journey we've taken together here in Juárez.

To most, this is just a picture of a tree. For me, it is so much more. It is a reminder that each marriage has it's own unique ebb and flow. It's a reminder that when we question what's going on in our lives, God finds simple ways to guide us or give us hope. It's almost as if right when we felt like nothing made sense, or that the only thing around us was disparity, He stepped in and literally planted a seed.

Like our little tree, or the tomato plant that unexpectedly grew out of the drain on the cement patio at our friend Veronica's house in Juárez, or those poppies that Robert Andrew Powell noticed in the middle of the otherwise barren Chihuahuan desert on the outskirts of town.


"Hope is the thing with feathers

That perches in the soul

And sings the tune without the words

And never stops at all."

- Emily Dickinson