Fenceless

I understand the purpose of a fence for holding things in–wayward dogs, wandering toddlers, windblown lawn chairs.

But a fence raises questions; unbordered space offers answers.

Our block contains five open back yards without a picket or chain link. All summer long this unfettered rectangle has bloomed and buzzed, unconcerned with crabgrass or heat. Owners complicate matters with mowing and trimming and spraying, but the yards don’t care. Not one bit.

Smackdab in the middle of this space, a towering oak tree grows. At 130 feet tall, it is the high point of this part of town, arguably perhaps but no less majestic. One day from our porch, it held robins to the south, a hummingbird to the north, crows near the top, and a black squirrel continually scampered up and down the trunk on a mission.

This trunk is massive. When I asked Rob about the circumference, he and his visiting brother-in-law Richard produced a tape and measured it at 15.5 feet around. Its powerful roots surely hold the world in place. When I stand between them, I believe someone in China could peek up at me.

Rob said the center of the tree received damage during a forceful storm once. A tree service removed cracked and broken limbs and figured the whole thing could die at any time. That was 20 years ago.

The tree didn’t panic. It did all it knew to do: reach up.

Why not?

For my part, I believe magic resides in this space. Untold possibilities abound.

One day Beth called me over to see a curiosity in their compost pile. A pumpkin vine grew straight up, defying gravity. And that vertical vine had one pumpkin attached, leaning against a metal rod for support. You never think about looking at a pumpkin eye-to-eye. Still, she and I did.

I added to the magic by painting our porch ceiling blue. Several legends exist for this tradition, but I embraced the belief that evil is frightened by blue, thinking it’s too close to heaven. In my mind, as a menacing spirit arrives on 3 creeping feet, it whirls from our door, fearful of descending angels.

Further honoring mystical realms, I offered a token to any fairies drawn by the mighty oak and the flowers around its root walls. Why else would Beth fill these spaces that are too faraway to be visible from our porches? I suspect she knows about magic. So I contributed a tiny bench among the impatiens at the shaded back–the most likely place for fairies to rest.

Call me foolish.

I believe in what others call nonsense or superstitions. I believe things go bump in the night. I also believe they dazzle.

I believe favors are repaid.

Every fall I look for the perfect pumpkin and never find it. Until this year.

On the back road to Norwalk, I saw it at Kramer’s Market, sitting atop a bale of hay beside a burgundy chrysanthemum. I pulled in quickly as a man approached the display–for the flower, it turned out.

My find now resides on our freshly painted porch. It’s dappled with autumn orange, golden yellow, and precisely the right shade of green. Not a pumpkin at all, it’s a gourd, not what I thought I wanted.

But the fairies knew.

The perfect thing is out there.

If you wait.

If you watch.

If you wonder.