Witch Hazel
As told through the eyes of my daughter.
November is not a time for flowers, the days short and cold. Heavy
clouds drag at my mood, and sleet like a muttered curse propels
me indoors—I am reluctant to venture out again. So when the sun
breaks through for that rare yellow day, maybe the last before the
snow falls, I have to go. Because the woods are quiet this time of
year without leaves or birds, the buzz of a bee seems inordinately
loud. Intrigued, I follow her path—what could bring her out in
November? She makes directly for bare branches, which, when I
look more closely, are strewn with yellow flowers—Witch Hazel. The
flowers are a ragged affair: five long petals, each like a scrap of
fading yellow cloth that snagged on the branch, torn strips that
wave in the breeze. But, oh are they welcome, a spot of color when
months of gray lie ahead. A last hurrah before winter that suddenly
reminds me of a November long ago.
The house had stood empty since she left. The cardboard Santas