While You're Away...

 

"I make the most of all that comes

and the least of all that goes."

Sara Teasdale

 

Driving about, during the times when deciduous trees have lost their leaves, I am always attracted to empty birds' nests in trees. I certainly would take notice of - and great interest in - them any time of the year, but they usually are not so easily seen. This is quite intentional on the birds' part, but once they're done with them, what does it matter?

 
For me, as in many things, it leads to interesting thoughts: Where are those particular birds now? Did they successfully raise their young and how many survived? Will they return to the same nest next spring or build a new one? Will I notice that they've returned or recognize them and will I even care by then? After my thinking has run its course on the birds, it turns inward. The birds may not wonder at all about me, but just what will I have done in the time they've been away? It is a thought worth pursuing...
 

 
We all suffer some degree of loss in our lifetimes. Relationships change, friends leave, spouses wander, parents and siblings die. The older we get, the more loss we have experienced, and that can become a burdensome thing. For those who believe in some sort of afterlife, there is at least the hint of a promise of reconnection. If the loss was caused by some kind of unresolved differences, there may be a chance of reconciliation - if not in this life, then in the next. If the loss was a person we cared deeply for, perhaps we will be together again someday. No more tears, pain, loneliness, or suffering - all will be well in the hereafter. The trouble is, no one can tell us when that will be and the waiting can be interminable.
 

 
While there are a number of different belief systems, those that offer no hereafter surely have ways of dealing with loss, but reuniting after this life would not be one of them. For those who have no belief in an afterlife, what's done is done. In some ways this might seem better, for putting one's life on hold in the hope for a better future "someday" could certainly lead to stagnation and dead ends - no pun intended. A great many poets and others who have ways with words have stated that the past is over and done with and the future is not guaranteed. All we really have is today - here and now. But if we are dealing with loss, how does this help?
 

 
I return to my thoughts of the empty birds' nests. To those birds I would say this: "While you've been away, I have remained the same in some ways and changed in others. I have grown, learned, and reached out beyond myself. I have made mistakes, stumbled, fallen, and picked myself up. I have remembered the past, but not remained mired there. I have anticipated the future and moved forward, knowing I may never reach it. I have endeavored to help others, share what I have, see life through their eyes. I have not wasted my life, but have lived it - loved, laughed, sung, danced, and enjoyed those around me. I think of you and remember all that you taught me; my life is richer because you were here."
 

 
If I would say that to birds, how much more could I say to those I've lost? The telling does not need to be in words, only in the living of our lives. Whether you believe we'll meet again or not, imagine it is so. LIVE your life - in honor of, or in spite of, those you've lost.  For in the end, this is what truly matters.
 

Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow.

What is your life?

You are a mist that appears for a little while

and then vanishes.

James 4:14

Leavings

Leavings pl. n. something remaining, scraps, residue, refuse, etc.

Crisp days of raking leaves - HA! Memories of those take me back to our years of living in Montana and Idaho where great dry masses of fallen leaves were as most of us think. I reveled in the swish and crunch of walking through them, loved raking them and being buried within the huge piles.

 

Here, fall can be a gooey, messy time of year. All those beautifully-colored leaves do eventually fall and with our perpetual rains they form a slick, heavy, sodden mass on the ground, which few bother to even try to rake up. Cheery fall colors and glowing fields of pumpkins and corn stalks slowly give way to wet, rotted leavings - some of which are internal. Unlike spring, with its bright cheerful awakenings, fall is a time of farewells for many of us. Farewell to summer, for sure, but also ever-shortening daylight, colder temperatures, thoughts and activities that often slow down and turn inward...
 

 

So, I was not too surprised when I glimpsed the nest and found it ragged and deserted. All my "good intentions" regarding it during the summer came rushing back. Discovering it fully-formed and humming with activity during our glorious late summer days, I checked on it each time I passed.

 

But I was busy with gardening, coming from or going to the mail box, running those countless errands like we all do. I fully intended to study it carefully, meant to photograph it and its inhabitants in detail, pretty much failed to get any of that accomplished...
 

But it was still there, gracefully hanging from the branch as it had from its beginning. This time, I took the time to study it closely and what an intricate work of art it was!

Sometime last spring, a fertile queen paper wasp emerged from hibernation and began the process of turning raw wood into this sturdy paper home. She used her mandibles to scrape bits of wood fiber from fences, logs, or even cardboard.

 

She then broke the wood fibers down in her mouth, using saliva and water to weaken them. Flying to her chosen nest site - the thin branch of this Kousa Dogwood - she added the soft paper pulp to it for support. As the wet cellulose fibers dried, they became the strong paper buttress from which she would suspend her nest.

The nest itself was comprised of hexagonal cells in which the young developed. The queen protected the brood cells by building a paper envelope, or cover, around them. She raised the first generation of workers on her own.

After they emerged, those workers collected food while she switched to only laying eggs. The larvae were probably fed pre-chewed caterpillars, while the adults fed on nectar.  The nest expanded as the colony grew in number, with new generations of workers constructing new cells as needed, until it reached its final size. Many nests are typically small, usually a few dozen workers, but may contain as many as 100.

As fall approaches, colonies produce males and new queens, which leave the nest to mate. After mating, the new queens burrow into the ground where they spend the winter. All workers, the males, and the old queen perish around November, leaving any young behind in the nest to also die. Old nests degrade naturally over the winter months, so each spring new ones must be constructed by the new queens as the process begins anew.

 

I tore open one of the still-sealed cells and shook out a fully-formed dead wasp. Evidently, it had not matured enough when everyone else left the nest - or the temperatures dropped low enough to kill it. A few other cells remained sealed but most were empty, so it seemed that a lot of wasps were produced in this nest.

 

It has been nearly a year now since my second-oldest sister entered the hospital with a severe case of pneumonia. None of us imagined she would be gone before Christmas. They say it takes a full year, at least, to begin to adjust to such losses, but who are "they" and what is a year when I'd known her for nearly 70? This sister was 14 when I was born, left for college when I was 4, married and moved away when I was 7. With the age difference and distance, it might seem that we'd have nothing in common, but that would be wrong. We shared a love of sewing, cooking, reading, the outdoors, the arts, and American Indian history and culture. She was the one who showed and explained to me all the parts of a living grasshopper and how to fish for trout in a cold mountain stream. She and her family came back to visit every summer and the memories of those times are priceless. We kept in touch - not as often as we should have, probably - with letters, phone calls, and occasionally emails. She was the one who always said "Oh, I intended to call you before now, but I just didn't get around to it..." Yeah, I know how that goes.

 

A cold wind rustled the trees and a light rain began. I tossed the ripped-open wasp's nest into the woods and smiled. True, I never did study and photograph it while it was at its peak of activity, but its remnants were still beautiful and intricate. Perhaps I'll get another chance - for I'm remembering that new queen tucked safely away just waiting for spring.

 

"Don't cry because it's over.

Smile because it happened."

Dr. Seuss

 

Other fall meanderings:

The Last Leaf

Tree People

 Prickles

Northern Harvest

Simply Live

I would never have recognized it, had I been expecting its former shape. Appearing lifeless, it hung there, suspended, shrouded, bearing absolutely no resemblance to what it had been before. But I knew the promise it held, so I carried it home for safekeeping.

During the passing weeks, I observed it carefully, hoping against hope that I would be present for the big event. I’d never actually seen one in person, only on television or on the glossy pages of a magazine.

When the predetermined time had passed, I was indeed privileged. First, the slow splitting open; Then, the silent emergence. It carefully withdrew one - then another and another - until all 6 rested securely atop the dangling shell. Then, braced & balanced, it slowly pulled the rest of itself out. How ragged it looked - all folded up & compressed - not at all yet the image of what it was to become. It appeared to rest, but silently shuddered - with anxious anticipation or from the pure effort of pumping itself into its full, final shape. I resisted any urge to touch it, for it was not yet ready.

Just what does a caterpillar think as it eats its way through its green world? Does it have any idea at all of what lies ahead for it? The fortunate ones - those not plucked off by some hungry bird, nor eliminated by an overanxious gardener, nor demolished from inside by parasites - have a transformation ahead that is difficult to imagine. I wonder if, deep, down inside their tiny brains, they quake in fear of the changes ahead. There will be the end of their gnawing, the slowing down, the searching for the perfect spot to attach and encase themselves. Then the months of waiting - the miraculous metamorphosis - as their bodies change into something entirely different.

There it sat fully formed, unfolded and spread into a gorgeous yellow and black shape. It nimbly climbed to the top of its branch, wings wide open then slowly closing and reopening , to survey the world through new eyes. Slowly I put forth a finger, gently urged it to climb on and lifted it high in the air to watch as it took off. I held my breath as it fluttered across the open expanse, wishing desperately for its safe, secluded landing beyond notice of those who would prey upon it. For it was, after all, only one small butterfly in the larger scheme of life.

And what of the caterpillar? Was not the progression of its life determined in the beginning? I think, perhaps, it spends its allotted days simply living. It does what it must, slowly crawling day by day toward its destiny - toward confinement, transformation - and glorious release.

Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed - in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed...But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
1 Corinthians 15:51-52 & 57