My Little Loquat January 8, 2017
Today, the earth’s upper crust is frozen, as is the air above it, and the trees, flowers. All growth springing from the mother’s womb stands at attention unable to continue the ease of flow ordinary to life. The leaves on my loquat tree are covered in ice particles left from last evening’s snow flurries that came and went in a way synonymous with the category of white falling flakes.
Here’s my loquat’s story. She’s a transplant from Montgomery’s slightly warmer and decidedly more humid climate. She sprang from the ground beside her mother on Thorn Place where my mother lived for about fifty years. I spent my formidable years there from age ten to 21 when I married and left home. I have roots there, though. Deep ones, as did my loquat tree.
The mother tree came from another family home, this one a great deal older. The ancestral mansion, of sorts, was built in 1828 in newly developing Montgomery, Alabama. Fig trees, pomegranate, magnolias, banana shrubs and loquat trees covered the grounds providing not only lush foliage of diverse greens and shapes, but succulent fruits from many. As years passed and centuries changed, the once lovely wooden home fell into disrepair and the only remaining bastion , my grandmother “Nannie”, was unable to maintain the homestead. It had to be sold. The historic preservationists had little money to offer in the way of compensation if my grandmother chose to donate it for history’s sake. She simply couldn’t afford that option. It had to be sold. It had to be demolished to make way for modern times—a parking lot. Ugh! Nannie moved into my parents’ home on Thorn Place. Some of the old furnishings, portraits, china, silver came with her, but much was disseminated between her offspring and other family members. Needless to say, the day the house went down, so did my grandmother.
Along with Nannie and a few reminders of the old days and home came some seedlings from the old trees. Among them, three loquat trees, a magnolia, one pomegranate, and one fig. The pomegranate eventually died, but not before producing a bounty of fruit I enthusiastically popped open, eating each red seed with gusto. The after-effect of consistent blackened fingers from the fruit never kept me from one more, and then another. Maybe the sight of the bundled, red seeds in lively clusters from each newly opened fruit gave me as much pleasure as the actual eating of the tart little morsels. I love them to this day. The fig tree grew well and produced, but the ubiquitous squirrels and birds feasted on most of the fruit before any human could get to it. The magnolia grew by leaps and bounds and soon filled a corner on the front yard on Thorn Place. The loquats flourished, all three and produced more tangy, small fruits that were a delicacy in my book of favorites. We fought the indigenous wildlife for a small crop each year. Eventually, they quit producing fruit, but held high their heads as they continued branching out and skyward. The three grew side by side. Eventually, my mother, the last inhabitant of Thorn Place, died at age 85. Thorn Place was sold along with the trees.
Two years passed and I never set foot back on the grounds of my Thorn Place home until one day when I was visiting my brother and his family who happened to live across the street from our family home. The house was vacant again. I decided to walk the familiar path around the house, the path my brothers and I had walked many, many times as children and adolescents. It all felt so familiar: the windows; the mossy bricks of the old patio where I once salted (more appropriately assaulted) slugs as they slowly slimed along leaving behind a silvery trail; the old millstone out back brought from the ancestral home downtown; the loquat trees. Beside the three tall healthy trees were some tiny seedlings shadowed but trying to find room beneath their parents. I dug up one. It was probably a foot tall, best. I transported her back to Birmingham, knowing her chances of survival were slim in the northern climate a hundred miles north. The loquat, categorized as sub-tropical, originated in China, but has been indigenous to Japan for over 1000 years. It’s often called the Japanese plum. In the 18th century, Europeans brought loquats to the new country from Japan for use as ornamentals. Today, California’s southern coastal plains offer a good climate in the USA, as do parts of Florida.
The odds were not in my favor. But the desire over-ruled. I planted her in a pot and set her in the sun for her first summer in a new land. She perked right up and began to sprout fresh leaves. The winter rolled around, as usual, and I decided to keep her potted for at least that winter. She thrived indoors placed by a glass-windowed door until spring. By then, she may have reached two-feet. My next big risk—I planted her. Front and center in my yard. I observed her in awe and appreciation that summer and watched her bloom with vigor. Two new limbs and bountiful leaves all curled open revealing more of the loquat’s characteristic appendages layered with a slight fuzz coating to counteract the severity of long pointed leaves. By the end of that summer, she was at least 3 feet tall and proudly so. Me too. I loved watching her grow and told her story to any neighbor or friend who cared (or didn’t) to hear.
Along came another inevitable winter. She was on her own. Out there in the cold. And then a snow was announced. I quickly googled “How to protect a loquat from a freeze” and found enough info to allow some protection for my little tree. I built a two layered tent out of clothe and plastic and staked it around her. Inside it, I place boiling hot water to keep her warm and moist, and hopefully not frozen. It worked! I worked like a farmer protecting his crop from an invasion of locusts. That pan was filled more times than I can remember, but she stayed warm throughout the storm. She made it, save a few burned bottom leaves, through that winter!
Another summer and she grew at least a foot higher and two feet wider. An another winter came and went and still she flourished. One more summer and she took off. No fruit, but my loquat tree lived!
Presently, she stands five feet-four, just like me. Only a few days ago, even though it’s January, I noticed more new leaves curling up from the top of her. She is tenacious from the roots upward. The weather changed drastically two days ago. The temperature dropped to far below freezing. The snow fell. The temperature remains around 15 degrees. I had no way to protect her from this. It’s make-it or break-it time. A remnant of snow ices her leaves. She is ever so still. The wind only causes a slight sway from her. She’s a stalwart, but even the strongest can only take so much. She’s given me all I could ask of her, and then some. She has ice in her veins today. That’s not what I would have planned for her, or wanted. All I can do now is wait until the sun shines and the temperatures rise to see if she remains able to continue being my little loquat tree. I’ve loved her tenderly. 5’4 is good enough, though.
