Abscission Zone

“What we hold is not always
what we mean to keep—”
–From “Proximity” by Sarah Engle

Before dawn, I set out for the county dump to collect a truckload of compost. There, wreathed in fog, great mounds of organic debris in various stages of decomposition rise up in the pink light of day. At a small wooden shed, a kind-faced woman greets me from behind a glass partition. “You know where to go for the compost, honey?”

“No ma’am.”

“You pull up and around, drive all the way to the end. Tractor’ll be waitin’ for you.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I say. “Thank you.”

“You have a blessed day,” she smiles.

I’m starved for the small kindness of a stranger. Forced from a job that brought little pleasure in the first place, I ruminate on the former colleagues I worked so tirelessly to support and advocate for. Now they shun me. Where—and when—did I go so wrong? Filled with anger and sadness at my own failure, I replay each interaction, every conversation, searching for understanding that never comes. Unmoored, I’m at a loss how to occupy empty days.

With spring unfolding into summer, to busy myself, I turn my attention to refurbishing the yard. Week after week, I make my way to the dump, first for compost, then mulch. At home, I shovel and spread, heaping up and expanding the beds that line our corner lot, first the front, then the back. Physical exertion, I reason, will silence my chattering mind, or at least dampen the insistent inner voice, black as compost.

White heat presses down, boring into my skull. Sweat burns my eyes. My back and shoulders ache. I lose time amid the monotony of the task. If my mind will not be hollowed out, burned clean, then I will shovel my way to the sweet oblivion of exhaustion.

“Hey, baby,” the smiling woman at the dump says, each time I roll down my window, adding another receipt to the growing pile on the dash. “You have a blessed day.”

After more than a dozen trips, days begin to shorten, temperatures cool. I look for signs of abscission, the process by which plants shed aging leaves, flowers, and fruits, detaching them from the parent plant at a specific point, the abscission zone. Abscission is a crucial mechanism for plants to manage their nutrient usage by releasing organs that are no longer beneficial, allowing them to conserve energy and optimize resources for unfavorable conditions.

Having composted and mulched every corner of the yard, atop the tidy beds, I heap fall leaves. Then I scour the neighborhood for more. My husband shakes his head No whenever I veer off on morning walks to examine a cache of leaves packed tightly into brown paper bags: fat, tan sentinels, lined neatly at the curb. I study the tree canopy, then peer into the open tops, inside a mix of willow oak, red maple, sweet gum.

While neighbors discard their leaves, I covet them. “How can they throw them away?” I plead. “They’re like money.” I tip a bag to examine its underside. Too soggy to bear the weight, and the bottom may drop out, I learn from experience. Whenever I find bags that are dry and sturdy, I make a mental note to return before trash pickup. Like a thief, I wait until dark to make off with my treasure.

As I labor, like trees unclasping bonds between leaf and branch, I feel my unhappiness begin to loosen. In time, perhaps, the strength of the hold will weaken enough that I can let fly the brittle, withered leaves of bitterness.

My feverish drive to collect leaves is not aimless. Added to the truckloads of organic matter I spend the summer laying out, decaying leaves build loam and provide a home for insects and other creatures to overwinter. My goal is to shelter firefly larvae. Leaf litter increases moisture in the soil, attracting firefly food sources—worms, snails, and slugs. While my home in North Carolina hosts thirty-four species of fireflies, I learn, the one I’m most likely to see is Photinus pyralis, the Big Dipper, so named for its graceful J flight pattern. The male dips and raises his light to woo a mate.

A chill in the air, I finally put down my shovel and rake. I begin to look forward. If I’m lucky, I envision, and the spring is wet, in early June, as the gloaming sinks into night, from the glider on the front porch, I may catch a random flash, a tiny lantern-glow of hope.