February 7, 2012-- trees

This is where my head was today---looking at trees. In this jar are a stem of tulip poplar (with burgeoning bud), a stem of American beech (with dagger-like bud), a stem of red maple (with flower buds about to pop), and two stems of smooth alder (with both catkins and cones on the same twigs). All so beautiful and indicative of the season.

The most interesting part of this conglomeration, though, was an event that happened as I was moving these twigs from one container to another. The last remaining beech leaf on my twig dropped off (as all the beech leaves on these twigs will soon). I saved the leaf and displayed it as below, but the real magic of this is that I finally found the word I'd been looking for to describe beech leaf color at this stage. I'd heard someone else describe is as "parchment," and I'd once described it myself as "bleached blonde," but tonight I saw it as "palimino," which feel rightest of all.