{"id":41131,"date":"2024-03-30T15:50:01","date_gmt":"2024-03-30T22:50:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/barbarafalconernewhall.com\/?p=41131"},"modified":"2026-06-05T12:24:15","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T12:24:15","slug":"not-dead-yet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/not-dead-yet\/","title":{"rendered":"Not Dead Yet. That Feral Plum Tree Lives On"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Not<\/a>Not dead yet — the flowering tree had fallen over and died, or so I thought.<\/p>\n

It’s not dead yet. That feral plum tree whose obituary I so mournfully — and confidently — wrote two months ago has risen from the dead.<\/p>\n

I first spotted the little tree way back in 2010<\/a>. It was growing in the canyon below my house, its cloud of pink and white blossoms mostly hidden from my view by a cluster of oak and bay trees.<\/p>\n

Forgotten<\/strong><\/h5>\n

Over the years, the oaks and bays grew up around the sturdy little tree. It disappeared from sight, and I forgot about it.<\/p>\n

Then, this past January, while checking the progress of the Douglass irises<\/a> I’d planted in my backyard, I spotted what had to be that plum tree lying on its side, a massive carcass of blackened limbs and twigs.<\/p>\n

I took it for dead.<\/p>\n

\"Not<\/a>A plum tree gone wild. Photos by Barbara Newhall<\/em><\/p>\n

But that was January<\/a>, winter in California. And now it’s March, springtime hereabouts.<\/p>\n

When the rain let up a bit the other day, I took a walk on the muddy path at the base of the canyon to see what green things might be coming up after the winter’s generous rain.<\/p>\n

Not Dead Yet. That Feral Plum Tree Lives<\/strong><\/h5>\n

And there it was, the venerable old plum tree lying on its side at the entrance to the canyon. Yes, it was a messy scramble of black and useless branches. But it wasn’t dead.<\/p>\n

A cloud of flowers, pink and white and delicate, had burst from its farthermost tips.<\/p>\n

Though not as lush now in its senescence as it had been in its sturdy youth, the tree was very much alive, doing what a plum tree does. It was making sepals, petals, ovules and pollen. It was getting ready for what comes next, confident there would be a next.<\/p>\n

More about that backyard at “A Love Letter Arrived From Jon This Week.”<\/a>\u00a0 Thoughts on the garden at the side of our house at “I’m Planting a Secret Garden Outside My Office.”<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"feral-plum-tree-blossoms\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The old plum tree lying on its side was a messy scramble of black and useless branches. But it was not dead yet.\u00a0 Read more.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":48805,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[221,13,14],"tags":[103,2842,187,34,1427,521,472,88],"class_list":["post-41131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-house-and-garden","category-my-rocky-spiritual-journey","category-widowed","tag-aging","tag-canyon","tag-death","tag-dont-miss","tag-easter","tag-flowering-tree","tag-garden","tag-nature"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41131"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41131\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48807,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41131\/revisions\/48807"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48805"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}