As I go through the process myself, I get flashes of memories from when my parents built their house in the Valley of Lakes. Yesterday, I recalled the boxwood.
Their lot was wooded with a variety of deciduous trees. One of them was a boxwood. It wasn’t a small shrub, this was a 10′ tree with gorgeous, small, glossy, dark leaves. It stood out amongst the other trees. It was positioned where it would be visible from what would become the office/guestroom.
Until the contractor cut it down to make room for the heavy equipment coming in. My father was upset. Upset enough to complain to the contractor. Upset enough for me to remember this incident for 45 years. A boxwood that large had clearly grown for ages and wasn’t a common garden variety. It was not replaceable in a lifetime.
Well, yesterday the same thing happened to me. Maru-chan took down all the overhanging branches of a persimmon tree along the driveway to make room for the cement mixer.
When I saw what he had done, I cried.
Although he asked permission of Mr Kawasaki, he didn’t ask me. I would have said no to such a drastic solution. Because the persimmon, and the other overhanging branches above driveway, gave our entrance approach charm and mystique. I loved the way it looked. Now the approach is straight and bare. The long-growth of natural charm is is not replaceable in my lifetime.
He created a permanent solution to a temporary problem. We could have made accommodations for the cement mixer without killing the tree or ruining the landscaping.
Maru-chan’s been ripping (not even cutting, he yanks them off the tree with his yumbo) low branches for weeks. The first ones to go were some cedars down at the bottom of the drive. I didn’t mind those so much, but I didn’t like that he just left the branches off the side of the driveway on top of the bushes and in the neighbor’s yard.
So at the end of the day yesterday, I was irritated enough to muster the energy to haul as many branches as I could out of the shrubs and the neighbor’s property. I wasn’t energetic enough to bring them all the way up to the house, so I left them in piles in the drive. Then I reached out to Sasaki-san and asked him to tell Maru-chan to help me move them in the morning – they are big and there are many – so that I can dispose of them properly by cutting them up and burning them.
Shades of boxwood, indeed.
