 A few years ago we noticed a volunteer tree was growing unbidden in our backyard. It wasn't a Christmas tree, but in a way it has become one. It wasn't much of a tree to begin with, only a sapling really, something that had come from yard trash. Or a stray seed scattered by birds or the wind. Or, so we came to think, as some kind of a gift from God.
I was for pulling it out and putting it back where it belonged—in the trash. But my wife, who loves any growing thing, said to leave it alone to see what would happen to it.
So we let it grow.
Its first year wasn't much. It looked a little like Charlie Brown's Christmas tree, spindly and thin, with a few green leaves that quickly turned brown in the fall and fell to the ground.
But as the years went on, it began to grow, slowly at first and then faster.
By last year it was about seven feet tall and it was clear what kind of a tree it was: a liquidambar.
Liquidambars have, like most of us, good things and bad things about them. The bad things are their roots, which spread widely and are disruptive to lawns, and their "balls," spiked and hazardous to walk on and a mess to clean up. I know because we had a liquidambar in the front yard, and each winter it was my job to rake and sweep up its "balls" before someone fell down walking on them.
The good things about liquidambars are their shapes, graceful and tall, their green leaves in the spring and summer, and, above all, the color of their leaves in the fall. It's this which gives the tree its name. Usually the leaves are a liquid amber or gold and they last for weeks, bringing a touch of New England to California.
A good deal of how the leaves look, of course, depends on the kind of a year it's been: how wet, how hot, how cold. Like great wines, some years are better than others for liquidambars.
Last year was so-so for our growing backyard tree. Its leaves weren't really red before they fell to the ground. Whatever the reason, they were mostly dun-colored and not much to look at it.
But this year has been a different story. For almost a month this fall our volunteer grew first gold and then red.
The red became simply indescribable. Each day it deepened and grew more and more wonderful to behold.
Finally it was a glorious fire, lighting up the whole backyard.
As it happened, the tree took it upon itself to grow where we could see it every time we looked out the living-room window. And every time we did, we would pause for a couple of seconds just to enjoy the view.
The leaves have begun to fall now. They won't quite last until Christmas. But it doesn't matter. They have become a foretaste of the season that's to come. They have been absolutely beautiful.
We've thought a lot about the tree this fall and about its relation to Christmas.
We have come to think of our liquidambar as a gift from God, a sign that although the year has been filled with war, death and disaster, it also has been possible for beauty and wonder to appear, too, unbidden and in an unexpected place.
We've thought that maybe God dropped this gift unasked into our backyard as a reminder that there can still be wonder in the world, even as there is adversity. In a time when nothing seems to be right, when arrogance, ignorance, prejudice and bigotry often seem to rule, when mankind often seems small, petty or downright cruel, it's a thought worth holding.
Whether that's true or not, it's a nice thought to keep in the Christmas season—that the gift of wonder can come unbidden into anyone's world to remind them that that's what gifts are, that the best gifts are those given unasked for and that they often become the most glorious.
Carl Heintze is a frequent contributor to the Willow Glen Resident.
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