Chopping it all down - by Jo Carroll
This:
is all that remains of my apple tree.
It was, once, impressive. Its blossom hung heavy in the spring. I sat in its shade to read in the summer. It kept my neighbour and I in apples through the autumn.
Then last year it began to look sorry for itself. My tree-man (everyone should have a tree-man - or woman - someone who knows all about trees and shrubs and comes round every now and then to give them a serious talking-to, and sometimes a serious pruning) frowned, broke off a twig or two and said it had a hint of green, leave it, it might recover.
I left it - but, as everything else burst into bloom this spring, my apple tree stayed resolutely bald. It was obviously an ex-apple-tree. It was gone before. Its fruiting days were done. And so it has had to come down.
It wasn't fun, taking it down. It involved a lot of noise and lugging logs up and down the garden and general harrumphing because (to be honest) I loved my apple tree and was sad to see it carted about with such lack of ceremony. But sometimes, needs must.
And in its place - at the moment - nothing but space. Potential. Decisions to be made about plants, or shrubs, or maybe just to grass it over and put up a swing for the grandchildren. Or a pond? (But next door have cats ...) The garden looks surprised, the unfamiliar light given surviving plants a different hue.
Sometimes my writing it like that. I write because I love it - but sometimes my pages of scribble need more than an edit, they need the delete button. And that's fine - for in place of the drivel is potential. Start again. Anything can happen. The blank page is only terrifying if we let it be. Instead it is the seedbed of ideas: some will grow and others will wither and some will develop a shape of their own without any apparent intervention from us.
That, surely, is the joy of writing.
(For those who are interested, the book about my trip to Cuba has not succumbed to the delete button but is currently with a copy editor. It should come out towards the end of June - keep an eye on my website for details - http://www.jocarroll.co.uk )
is all that remains of my apple tree.
It was, once, impressive. Its blossom hung heavy in the spring. I sat in its shade to read in the summer. It kept my neighbour and I in apples through the autumn.
Then last year it began to look sorry for itself. My tree-man (everyone should have a tree-man - or woman - someone who knows all about trees and shrubs and comes round every now and then to give them a serious talking-to, and sometimes a serious pruning) frowned, broke off a twig or two and said it had a hint of green, leave it, it might recover.
I left it - but, as everything else burst into bloom this spring, my apple tree stayed resolutely bald. It was obviously an ex-apple-tree. It was gone before. Its fruiting days were done. And so it has had to come down.
It wasn't fun, taking it down. It involved a lot of noise and lugging logs up and down the garden and general harrumphing because (to be honest) I loved my apple tree and was sad to see it carted about with such lack of ceremony. But sometimes, needs must.
And in its place - at the moment - nothing but space. Potential. Decisions to be made about plants, or shrubs, or maybe just to grass it over and put up a swing for the grandchildren. Or a pond? (But next door have cats ...) The garden looks surprised, the unfamiliar light given surviving plants a different hue.
Sometimes my writing it like that. I write because I love it - but sometimes my pages of scribble need more than an edit, they need the delete button. And that's fine - for in place of the drivel is potential. Start again. Anything can happen. The blank page is only terrifying if we let it be. Instead it is the seedbed of ideas: some will grow and others will wither and some will develop a shape of their own without any apparent intervention from us.
That, surely, is the joy of writing.
(For those who are interested, the book about my trip to Cuba has not succumbed to the delete button but is currently with a copy editor. It should come out towards the end of June - keep an eye on my website for details - http://www.jocarroll.co.uk )
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