On the drive from western Pennsylvania back to New England, there was a wide tract of land, near the New York and Pennsylvania border, with low hills and a gray and beige demeanor in the rain-soaked day. Then, my eye registered green. A stand of bare trees, and beyond them, a drift of evergreens up the slopes — not just evergreens, but wintergreens.

Evergreens offer greenery all year, but wintergreens stand staunchly in the face of bleak winter and declare: “We live.” Sometimes they have a slightly brackish or coppery tinge like tired water or bruised leaves, but that just intensifies their message: We are green despite.

I would like to be a wintergreen, but I suspect I am more akin to deciduous trees — I lean toward bolder colors and bend more in storms. I likely cry more easily. Evergreens do shed their needles over the year, but it is a more discreet process, not so dramatic or abrupt like our huge Catawba tree who holds on and then suddenly discards every leaf overnight.

Evergreens are important for many reasons — holding back winds, sheltering places from snow, and continuing the process of respiration, albeit more slowly than during the warmer seasons. Their protective needles hold water that can be used by the tree even while the ground is frozen hard. If nothing else, they offer hope as they stand stalwart through the cold and gray.

Mid-February, I appreciated a piece in the Recorder by Rabbi Cohen Kiener, who explained that among lesser-known Jewish holidays is one for the 15th of the month called the New Year of Trees. This is when the trees begin the slow awakening process that brings us maple syrup’s sweetness, and the anticipation of spring. It’s too early for the evergreens to add new growth but when it appears, green on green, it is thrilling.

I suspect Joe Biden is a wintergreen. While he may appear a bit worse for wear, he continues to grow into his strength, working quietly in the low-fertility soil of the current Congress to achieve some remarkable legislation that just might prompt the globe-saving action we need to counteract climate warming. Rather than being unnerved when unruly and disrespectful Republicans shouted at him during the State of the Union, he deftly got them to disavow their plans to disrupt Social Security and Medicare and provoked a standing ovation to the idea of securing these important programs. Talk about jujitsu!

In the dormant fields of the European coalition, he has stimulated a new growth of commitment and investment in the protection of law and democracy. It is doubtful that a younger leader, less seasoned, could reassure allies as well in the face of a threat like Russia. He has been there before.

Other cultures view their elders as rich resources, wells of experience and insight that people seek out for sustenance, especially in hard times. Our culture discards older people, dismisses their value, and so loses the potential to learn from the past.

I’ve been reading “No Word for Time: The Way of the Algonquin People,” by Evan Pritchard, in preparation for our church wading into the potentially turbulent waters of awareness about the role of our “First Church” in the founding of this colonial town 350 years ago on land used by a branch of the Algonquin people. As the author follows the guidance of his “Grandfather Turtle” to study his culture’s “old ways,” he learns about the “geenap” or Strong Elders who can bring their experience to answer his deepest questions. The elders are held in reverence and respect, and they are not above plain speaking and sharp lessons as needed.

When Pritchard asked his Micmac language teacher about the word for tree, he was surprised to learn that there is no one word for “tree.” To this Native culture, trees are so distinctive and have so many uses and values that each has its own specific name. In contrast, there is but one word for “human being”: ulnu. Compared to trees, humans are “all alike.” Imagine if we viewed all humans as recognizably the same; and all trees as having a special place in our world.

It’s a good while until spring. We don’t know what is coming. For now I am grateful to have a wintergreen elder holding the hillside, spreading the seed-cones for a new forest in the future, and offering the respite of green even in the chill time until the new season begins.

Judy Wagner lives in Northfield.

]]>