No Longer There: When Forever Becomes Never

Laura, the Elephant Tree, and the Field

No Longer There: When Forever Becomes Never

Laura, the Elephant Tree, and the Field

I thought the elephant tree would always be there. As I did the field, the jetties, and the cement sea wall.  I thought my daughter Laura would always be here.  This place and my house were regarded equally as my home, a constant in my life. The tree, the field, the jetties and Laura were supposed to be here. They were all meant to be here until I die, to outlive me, to be there for me forever and always. This belief was a source of great comfort. I knew I could always go back to give the tree a hug, even after I could no longer give Laura a hug anymore. Nature is forever. 

The tree was my home. The field was my home. The grassy bluff, the rocky ledges, the jetties and the beach were my home just as much as my house at 25 Crescent Bluff Avenue was my home. My family of six lived in a ranch house half way down the street that led to the bluff, the field, and the beach. My family spent summer days at the beach. The jetties were structures that divided the beaches that we sun tanned on and dove off of to swim in the sea.

Our neighborhood friends named the old copper beech tree in the field with its wide trunk, the elephant tree. We formed our first real friendships in and around the elephant tree. When we were teens we all carved our names and initials into the tree. I climbed it and perched on its branches to gaze at the field and the sea. When no one was looking, I kissed the tree and spoke to the tree and gave thanks to the tree. When I hugged the tree my arms reached only halfway round the grand copper beech tree. One mild winter day, I sat in the field with a sketch pad and charcoal pencils to draw the elephant tree to try and capture its greatness. This sketch became the draft for a copper etching I made during a high school art class, a print that I will have forever.

After my parents divorced and my two sisters, my brother and I grew up and moved on to other residences, my mom kept the roost alive and lived in the house by herself.  I was living in Boston at that time, studying to be an artist and art teacher at Massachusetts College of Art and traveling and dating a fellow artist. We married and settled in the South Shore of Boston and gave birth to a daughter, Laura. This was the beginning of my journey of raising a family of my own. Laura and Paul soon became intermingled with my childhood memories of the elephant tree, the field, and the jetties.  

During our visits home, I would hold Laura up and place her on a branch of the elephant tree. We would walk out along the jetties and sit there dangling our feet in the sea water. We would sit Laura down in the field when she was a baby and too young to walk.  Paul, Laura, and I would roll around in the grassy field. We would watch Laura giggle as she pulled up pieces of grass and playfully put them on our skin and pretended to feed them to her father. We still have these photos. We will have them forever.

My Mom eventually moved away from the house on Crescent Bluff. Each time we visited her, we took a ride to the old neighborhood to visit the elephant tree, the field, the jetties, and the beach. They were a constant, always there to touch, to sit on, and to gaze at.  I would run my hands over the cracked and peeling bark on the tree’s trunk to feel for our names and initials that were obscured and weathered from time. Still there, hardly visible.

After Laura died in 2001, Paul and I visited the field, the tree, and the jetties. The once copiously mowed and tended field became overgrown with no one to tend to it. The jetties were rotting from years of storms, winds, high tides, and the constant onslaught of seawater. The jetties were still there, barely standing.

 After Hurricane Irene in 2011, a decade after Laura passed away, the jetties were completely demolished and so was the cement sea wall. The field was still there and so was the elephant tree. Paul took a photo of me leaning on a branch within the tree. I snapped a photo of Paul in the field. A bright white light illuminated him when I took the photo. I felt that Laura’s spirit was with us, shining her love down into the field. 

In March of 2021 I visited my elderly mother, the elephant tree, and the field to find comfort and stability during the Covid 19 Pandemic.  I discovered that I could no longer walk onto the field nor up to the elephant tree.  I looked at the sea, the sky and over to my beloved field with remorse.  A gate had been put up all around the elephant tree and the field with a sign that said, DO NOT ENTER. I could see that a foundation had been poured and a house was going to be built there.  The field was gone to us. It only existed underneath and around the future home. I looked through the gate to try and see my tree. The elephant tree was still there, alive and well. I could see that my tree would soon be enclosed and surrounded by a permanent gate with the new house next to it, on the field I thought would always be there for me. Forever.

If I try to visit the tree or field now, I will be trespassing. If I want to visit the beach I will be trespassing. I will need ask for permission to park my car to walk over to the top of the bluff and stand to look out at the sea. Now the beach is eroding. The rocks used as a seawall have been broken up by the storms. The water is sometimes too polluted to swim in. I will never be able to touch, hug, kiss or sit by the branches of my tree again. I will no longer be able to photograph my husband standing in the field by the sea. He will no longer be able to photograph me by the elephant tree. 

I can no longer touch my daughter, hug or kiss her, or sit with her under the tree in the field or anywhere at all. The tree, the field, and the jetty are no longer available to me. I thought I could visit this place forever and it would always be my home. I thought Laura would always be here to hug and to hold. My constants became my absences. What I used to call home and what I used to define as home are gone to me here on this earth. My memories are now my treasures. My forever is now my never. 

Note: This story takes place in Branford, Connecticut, my hometown.

To read my story of how I became a painter while living in Branford. Read Monet and Me - by Susan Fusco-Fazio