The Lilac Tree

See that top photo? That's the view from my front stoop - or, it was the view. One day, this past summer, a neighbour cut down the lilac tree that sits center stage in that shot. That ethereal mauve wonder is now just a few short sticks poking out of the ground.

I live in a co-op where the area outside of one's apartment is common ground. Neighbours of a gardening persuasion get together and decide what to grow and how and when and where to grow it. They also collude on what needs trimming or uprooting or harvesting or weeding out.

But this lilac-demolishing neighbour didn’t consult anyone about that tree: she just casually mentioned that she was going to prune it. Other neighbours thought: "Oh, sure a little cutting back is healthy." I thought that too, even though I had no issue with the way the blossoms brushed the top of my head when I walked beneath it. I liked the delicate rainfall of fragrant petals falling on my hair.

And then the lady disappeared the petals, the blossoms, the whole tree.

The vision and scent of that tree in full bloom was heavenly. To walk down my front stairs and plant my nose in one of its blossoms was a balm that brought a sweet forgetfulness - all the turmoil in the world gone for a few glorious seconds that felt like an eternity. Inhaling deeply, prolonging the moments of transcendence, a heavy heart could be made light again.

Little bouquets of amethyst divinity: free and instantly available.

Until the lady chopped it down.

This tree was central to the view outside my living room window. Sitting windowside with a cup of tea or glancing out while sweeping up, I got a lot of restorative pleasure from watching squirrels play among its branches. My partner and I laughed as we saw them jumping from the roof to the lilac bush, then riding the outer branches, up and down, as they flew to the magnolia tree across the path. My partner called those squirrels the Flying Wallendas.

The lilac tree also had a particular kind of gorgeousness in other seasons. Bare branches in autumn made the Wallendas more visible, while, laden with snow in winter, the lilac limbs became landing strips for birds, among them brilliant red cardinals.

I was as shocked as the tree itself must have been to find it had been slashed to its core. Some neighbours witnessed this radical “pruning” in real time and asked the neighbour to stop. She ignored them while persisting with her clippers and her saw, offering no explanation.

On sunny days, this woman bustles about in crisp flowered frocks, basket in hand, nose in air. She doesn’t participate in neighbourhood functions, which is her right. But she’s lived here long enough to know how it works with the common grounds. I mean, neighbours can do small jobs independently, like plant a clematis in front of their apartment or grow tomatoes in the communal garden or sprout seeds in a pot on their stoop - but cut down a whole tree?

She told one very upset neighbour that the lilac would grow back and bear flowers in a couple of years...maybe. Now, time is precious, something possibly felt more acutely in one's senior years. I'm a senior. Who knows if I'll be around “in a couple of years”? Who knows if any of us will be? The lilac tree was there for all to enjoy in the present - here, today, while we live.

Until the lady executed her hatchet job.

I know there are worse things in the world than a cut-down tree - boy, do I know. But isn’t it just this kind of non-consideration of one's fellow human beings that’s responsible for the mounting hate that's festering in the world? This lilac-demolisher purportedly told a friend that she didn’t know that the pruning would affect her neighbours so much. But she might have known had she not continually turned her nose up at us. Just as those feeling superior to members of marginalized communities might gain new insight were they to get to know someone from those communities.

Long before this lady was my next door neighbour I went to a craft show one day and stopped to admire a table full of upcycled wrist-warmers. They were salvaged cuffs from deteriorating wool sweaters, all nicely curated and hemmed. I bought a pair of butter-yellow cuffs laced with silver threads, something elegant to wear perhaps while holding a sparkling purple posey after a spring rainfall.

The lady behind the table, the one who made the cuffs, was the future lilac-destroyer. That lady has - or had - talents and gifts. She also belongs to a priviledged class and looks like someone who's got it all. What beef could she possibly have with that lilac tree?

But who knows her story? Who knows what suffering or rejection or failed education might have brought her to her moment of destruction? I don't. And I don't know why she hacked the tree to its death, but one day when my emotions have calmed I will attempt to talk to her, although I've tried in the past and was met with a cold shoulder and a nose that could've been in blooms but chose instead the high air.

I will enjoy other lilac trees when I come across them, of course, just as a variety of flowers will delight my eyes and nose as I go about my spring-and-summer days. And in winter I'll marvel at twinkling snow and glittering icicles. And I will say "Hello" to people along my way. The Wallendas and the cardinals and the blue jays will always find a plethora of foliage in which to frolick. And lithe cats will still sit on windowsills in the twilight as the sky turns amazing shades of blue and purple.

As I remember the lilac tree, I will affirm by mission to bestow gratitude and love onto all living beings, with extra going to marginalized folks, each vulnerable member as treasured and beautiful as lilacs in the spring.