Pulling weeds in my garden, I have a particularly sneaky one that has taken root at the base of one of my flowering plants. Hard as I try, I can never pull the weed completely out by the roots, because that would require me to pull the plant itself up. As I carefully, and almost meditatively, worked around the plant’s base, pulling the weed piece by piece, I became emotional and realized I was pulling away my own grief and trauma, both entangled in my own roots.
As I considered how best to rid this flower of the weed, the question became, do I stop watering the plant so the weed dies, but risk the plant dying also; or do I keep watering the plant, knowing it will keep the weed alive, and continuing pruning pieces of the weed over the plant’s lifetime?
Perhaps the weed’s roots have become one with the plant’s roots, much like the trauma, and resulting grief, that I have experienced over my lifetime have become one with my own roots. At this point, can one survive without the other? I know I wouldn’t be me, and I wouldn’t be where I am, without the trauma and grief I have lived through.