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We spent the afternoon on our burned-out lot, and I did an assessment of the many trees we’d planted, to see what was worth salvaging. The fruit trees are sprouting from their root stock, which means the graft is dead and who knows what kind of fruit we’ll get from them. The leaves on the mulberry suckers look remarkably like fig leaves, and a little research tells me that yes, mulberries can be grafted onto fig rootstock, so that’s what I’m seeing. Invasives are taking over. The usual suspects like mustard and spurge are thick on the hill, but trees and shrubs too—there are now acacias sprouting in the cracks around the pool.

The hours spent looking closely at the changes grieved me in a way that my previous visits have not. So many days and years of labour on that land, undone.