May, 2013
Dear Cub kids,
By the time you read this letter, my daughter will have
graduated from high school! Julia is 18, and will begin attending university in
late August. For a mom, this is very hard to believe… that day by day, month by
month, year by year, the cherished newborn, baby, toddler, older child, and
teenager, has grown to the very cusp of adulthood! What a wonderful, amazing
journey, which has been delectably slow and astonishingly rapid at the same
time.
Now, it is as if she is a fledgling bird, perched just at
the edge of her nest, flapping her wings to strengthen them for flight. I am
writing to you about her, and about the two of us, here in Cub because one of the strongest and deepest bonds between this
fledgling and me is our passion for nature.
I began writing these letters to Cub kids way back in early 2000. Only a few short months after
writing my first letter, my daughter, then 5-years-old, found a maple seedling
in her playground sandbox at school. Since she and her pre-kindergarten
classmates had studied seeds that year, her teacher encouraged her to bring the
seed home, plant it, and watch what happened.
I remember the seed. It was the tiniest thing, just the
beginning of a little germinating root, but it had a determined look about it.
At home, I gave Julia some soil and a tiny pot. She named the tree-to-be,
“Little Tree Grow Grow.”
Wow, did that tree grow. And grow. I wish I had kept track
of how many different pots it had to be moved into, like a hermit crab outgrowing
its shell! Luckily, we lived in an apartment with a terrace, and the tree was
able to live a hardy, outdoor life, braving the elements and the seasons, until
at 8-years-old, we knew for sure that this amazing being needed to live in the
earth – no pot was going to be able to contain a tree clearly destined for
greatness!
“Little Tree Grow Grow,” it turned out, was a silver maple,
and the little seed Julia found all those years ago had been dropped by an
enormous, old silver maple mom growing near the playground at Julia’s school,
that children and teachers have tapped for maple syrup during each year’s
spring thaw. She is a beloved old giant.
Well, it was time for the young giantess to go home to her
mother! With the help of teachers and maintenance workers, we moved her, in her
enormous pot, onto a small, flatbed truck for the short drive back to school.
There, in a wonderful spring ceremony, a merry band of pre-K and kindergarten
children helped to plant “Little Tree Grow Grow” in the ground just a hop, skip
and a jump from the sandbox where the tiny seed had been found 8 years earlier,
and almost within the shadow of her mother.
And now, five more years have passed. “Little Tree Grow Grow”
is a towering 13-year-old beauty, and Julia is ready to fly! This year’s pre-K
children have heard Julia’s story, and each day, they excitedly gather the
seeds showering down from mother silver maple, and run around the playground
planting them in every available corner.
Meanwhile, a few days before her graduation ceremony, my
fledgling walked across campus from her high school to her primary school, to
take photographs of “Little Tree Grow Grow” for a school field guide she has
been working on. I have had a lot of fun being
Julia’s assistant for this project, staying up into the night when Julia has
been overloaded with other homework, helping her to finish all the final
details of research on the many species of flora and fauna at her school.
At the back of the book, in photographs and words, is the
story of “Little Tree Grow Grow.” It’s a natural history story, of two beings
joined in care and love, a young girl and a tree, growing through the years
together, becoming graceful and resilient, and ready for the wider world.
While Julia takes flight, her silver maple will stay rooted,
for countless years to come, dropping its yellow autumn leaves on 5-year-olds,
and always there to welcome home the one who raised her.
To children, to parents, to teachers, to the nature and
nurture that sustain all of us, happy graduation!
Your friend,
Jen
