We humans spend a lot of our time waiting. We wait in lines and in traffic. We wait for special days to arrive and other days to end. We wait for certain years to come round, certain birthdays that mark moments of growth or transitions. That is until we aren’t so interested in marking birthdays any more……which I’ve never understood. Consider the alternative. With all the waiting that is a part of living, you’d think we’d get better at it. But it is the nature of waiting, perhaps, to be a nag.

Right now I am sitting in my office that overlooks an enormous oak tree. It doesn’t look too much different today than it has over the last several months. Bare. Barky. Gnarly. Limbs twisted this way and that in a way that fills me with love. But I am waiting for some action from this tree. I am watching for the greenness of buds to begin to emerge, creating the shade that plays havoc with the little solar powered wind chime that sits near my desk. A robin, plump as anything, sits on one of the branches. But no other life seems to be happening out there. No signs of the rebirth that is to come. I am left waiting.

Truth be told most Minnesotans are waiting these days. We are uncovering flower beds weighed down by months of snow and ice. And we are looking with hopeful eyes toward the ground that is invisibly ripe. We vaguely remember the plants that will soon….soon….make an appearance. But for now, our work is to watch for the incremental arrival of green in a variety of shades pushing its way to the stage that is our yard. Our eyes will work overtime, as mine are right this minute, scanning every available space for something, anything, blooming.

I have seen some daffodils showing their brilliant yellow faces toward the sun. It felt like a pure shot of adrenaline! I wanted to stop my car and get out, run around and shout loud hosannas just like we did Easter morning. But I didn’t. I just tucked the sight into that happy place where we store memories for recall…..for a time when we need them.

Do you think humans are the only ones who have this experience of waiting? I don’t think so. Anyone who has ever been greeted by a dog at the end of a day knows somehow they were anticipating someone’s arrival. They might not care who that someone is but their excitement says something.

Waiting can be, if we allow it, not an annoyance but a meditation. How long might it take a bud to appear? How much longer till it becomes a leaf? How long will I need to wait to see the color of tulips emerge from their winter home? How much longer until they unfold their sunburst to its fullness and then let loose their petals,dropping them to the ground below? Being present to this slow, mysterious process, a process we have no part in nor control over, can teach us much about living this precious life.

Keeping watch over the oak tree has reminded me that the two of us are in a relationship. I am witness to its living season to season and I suppose it does the same for me. Over the years I have seen its limbs bear bud and leaf and then slowly let these leaves fall to the ground below. I have followed the path of their falling knowing that their letting go signaled by own. Another season come and gone. Another one on which to wait. This oak and I have a ‘thing’ going on and I plan to stick with my part of the bargain.

The buds will soon be visible and leaves will make their way into the world. That is the work of the tree. I will wait and watch and give thanks that I have the privilege of watching and waiting into one more season, one more summer, filled with its beauty.

It is an agreement we have made with one another.