fuschia

Some of my favorite times of the day include the late evenings when I check up on my fuchsia tree.

Through countless times of grieving, I’m always reminded that the best way to get over a loss is to buy a potted plant and tend to it. The idea is that, by owning something that requires a lot of attention, you do not lose yourself in your mourning. Just the simple routine of remembering that your plant needs water is enough to jar most people from sinking down, down, down. At one of my lowest points in my life, my mom and I bought a fuchsia tree.

Over the summer I cared for it like a fragile child. Every morning before school, I watered it, creating rainbows with the mist as the showers tickled the leaves, leaving behind flecks of water that shimmered, so lovingly, if you stood in the right spot. I pinched the stems of the flowers that’d already fallen off, and before I went to bed I sat outside and tended to the tree again. Sometimes I’d just sit next to my fuchsia tree for awhile, enjoying the breeze, looking for Orion’s belt if the stars were visible… I’d listen to the wind caress the willow, and the fuchsia shake softly in response. Listening to my heart beat in my chest, and being acutely aware of the inner workings of my lungs. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. And I’d go back inside after awhile. During the winter time, we had to bring the fuchsia tree inside to protect it from the harsh cold. My mom almost gave up on it because it looked beyond dead, but some researching assured me that, with proper care, it’d come back in the spring and bloom in the summer again. There were a few times when I neglected it, of course, because even I had doubts it’d come back. But I kept believing, and tended to it throughout the cold months. And then, like clockwork, I passed by the tree one day and saw new sprouts. Now it’s begun to flower again, not quite as beautiful as its first year, but with its own tender strength.

Tonight, I thought a lot about loss and other things while I watered the fuchsia tree. How, for half a year, it looks like it’s fallen so far beyond saving, and yet, by tending to it and continuing to hope and love and believe that it will bloom again, it will. And it made me think about people, in that sense. Nurturing your love of, for, and with someone. Believing in them. Hoping they will see the best of the better days to come. And that, just by being there to tend to them, regardless of whether they show a weary heart or not, that they may even grow as a human being because you care for them.