Pining for a Tree

This Saturday Israel will celebrate Tu Bishvat, the Jewish Arbor Day, signaling the beginning of spring. It’s one of the nicer holidays, symbolized by blooming almond trees. Its main activities involve eating dried fruit and planting trees. Nice.

In the spirit of the day I’ve been negotiating with the gardener to replace a dead tree near the curb with a laburnum. The laburnum is a beautiful tree with spectacular clusters of yellow flowers. While yellow is not one of my colors I’m willing to overlook this because of its sheer gorgeousness. I’m even willing to pay for it even though strictly speaking the area in question is not part of my garden.

The problem – and there always is one – is the resistance of the garden guy. For some reason I cannot seem to convince him of the beauty of my vision. We’re even having trouble agreeing on the facts. When I first raised this issue a year ago, he tried to convince me that the tree isn’t dead it’s just dormant. The conversation continued in the spirit of Monty Python’s parrot sketch (if it’s been a while since you’ve laughed at the comedy classic, it’s on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oj8RIEQH7zA) and I was only waiting for him to tell me it’s pining for the fjords. A year later the tree just keeps getting more and more dormant.

Now we cannot seem to agree on exactly which tree we’re talking about. I’m saying the tree is at the end of a line of trees and so can be replaced with a different type. The garden guy says it’s in the middle and must be the same type to preserve the unity. Thus we arrive to the crux of the matter: the tree species. This is important because the trees that are there, and I have no clue what kind they are, are definitely unlovely. They’re spindly with little foliage – the ugly stepsisters of the tree kingdom. In fact, now that I think of it, they could easily be mistaken for dead. Maybe I should re-check my facts. Tell me, where do you find a tree’s pulse?

Resolved

I’ve never understood the thing about New Year’s resolutions. Everybody makes them, nobody keeps them and everybody is surprised. And then when the next New Year rolls around the whole process begins again. Talk about an exercise in futility.

It’s always been perfectly clear to me why no one keeps their resolutions. January is not a time to begin projects. It’s the coldest, bleakest, longest month when all you can do is hunker down with something pulled over your head and wait, no, pray for it to pass. It’s a time for over-indulging in mac and cheese and hot chocolate, anything for a bit of warmth and comfort. It is definitely not the time to start that diet.

The time to take stock and begin those improvements has got to be in the spring. The sun shines and warms the earth, flowers sprout, birds sing and it is finally possible to feel optimistic about the future. That’s when the new exercise regime actually seems possible. That’s when you have a fighting chance to make a change.

Whoever put the New Year in January and then added the resolution requirement got it horribly wrong. Timing really is everything. I suppose it’s far too late to do anything about it and we will continue to answer the obligatory questions about our resolutions with the usual stuff. And then by the week’s end, we’ve blissfully forgotten the whole thing.