Tree Hugger

Last fall my husband dragged what looked like a broken carpet-beater without the beater part into the living room and asked for a pot.

"What on earth is that?" I asked.

"It's a tree. Can we use the pasta pot till I can go to Home Depot?"

"You mean it used to be a tree right? Now it's a scratching post for racoons?"

"It's a tree. I need a pot...and some dirt."

"It doesn't have any leaves on it."

"It needs some dirt first."

"There's plenty on you. Where'd you find it?"

"The dumpster. Someone threw it away - help me save the tree!"

And then I looked at my husband. He was cute...he was all pink faced and bright-eyed. For some reason he had decided this was the tree for him. It was torn up, the leaves it did have were brown and crunchy, the stalk was leaning way over and it only had two other huge branches sticking up like a fork. It looked sad, like it would cry if it could. My husband on the other hand was perky - dare I say happy. He found a tree! It needed a little love, but it was a tree. It was a true Charlie Brown moment.

I put the tree in the pasta pot. It took my husband two hours before he found a pot that would be suitable for the tree. We set it up in it's new home...it looked just as sick only now it had a pretty pot which accentuated all the sick parts of it.

Our roommate made fun of it. "That is a dead tree, that is a tree that ceases to be, it is an EX-TREE!" My poor husband moved the tree out of sight.

It lived in a few places. On the patio where it sat between us during dinner. In the bathroom where I started getting these nightmares that the tree was watching me naked. It lived in the kitchen, in the bedroom. Finally we moved it to my husbands desk...right under the air-vent. It leaned over and rested it's trunk on the printer. All it's leaves fell off.

"I think it's depressed." I said one day.

"Well give it some more water."

"No it's not thirsty...it's abandoned. It's lonely. It feels like it's an orphan. It's an orphaned tree!"

"So what should we do?"

"It needs a name. You need to name it."

"I'm not naming the tree." Said the not-so-Charlie Brown husband.

"You have to, or it won't believe it truly belongs to us. We need to make it's adoption official. He needs to know he won't be abandoned again."

"It'll be fine...give it some water."

The tree went nameless. I spent every morning stroking it. I don't know why, but it seemed like it liked having it's branches petted. I'd whisper to it: "You're a good tree, you can make it, all you gotta do is grow a few branches." Secretly I'd leave the radio on for it to listen to music - it preferred jazz.

Slowly the tree grew little green buds that I would massage and pet. It started to stand up straighter and finally the buds turned into leaves.

"Look! Look! It's green!!!"

"Wow! That's a good tree!"

"You hear that...you're a good tree!"

The tree got gold stars everyday. It was a good tree...always little, very quiet, very green.

Last night we were moving the last of the apartment. The tree got moved out to the living room, to the kitchen, to the hall, finally it was lumped outside with miscellaneous boxes and cleaning supplies. It was the last thing to be carried to the truck.

"You can't put that in here, it'll get tore up" said our antagonistic roommate - he always hated that tree.

"It won't fit in the station wagon. He'll be smushed."

"Well, you'll just have to throw him away then."

"NO! He's part of our family. We won't throw you away so we won't throw the tree away!"

My husband punctuated my remark by plopping the tree in the truck.

"It may not make it honey." I said.

"Goodbye tree. You were a good tree. We like you." He said.

"Honey...he needs a name."

"You think?"

"So he knows we're not throwing him away in a truck. We're taking him home...give him a name."

We both looked at our good tree. We nursed this tree back to life for a year - he had endured pot after pot, move after move. He had been taunted, teased and scoffed at. This was a very tough little tree.

"Herman." I whispered.

"Herman? You think?"

"Yeah. He's too small for a tough name...and Herman's are always little. But when you're named Herman, you have to be scrappy."

"Okay then, bye Herman! We'll see you there."

"Bye Herman! We love you!"

And we do, we really, really do.