Letters to My Daughter: The First Native Planting

Dear Daughter,

It began with a bench. And a cup of coffee.

The bees had arrived. The bench had been placed. But the bee yard was still bare—just sand, scattered stones, and the quiet hum of new beginnings. I sat one morning, early, watching the light stretch across the ground. In the center of the yard stood a ten-foot jumping cholla cactus. Weathered. Less than healthy. But still alive. Still flowering—one or two blooms, stubborn and soft.

I knew it had been there longer than I’d been alive. A sentinel. A survivor.

I debated what to do. Remove it? Leave it? How would I go about it if I did? I wasn’t sure. The layout of the bee yard hadn’t yet revealed itself to me. But I had my bench now. A place to sit. To think. To observe. 

And one morning, they did.

A wild urge came to me—to remove the cholla and plant a desert museum palo verde in its place. Not just any tree, but a keystone. A guardian. A canopy of shade for the bees and a shower of yellow blossoms in spring. I remembered the palo verde from our last yard—how you and I tied ribbons to its branches during Beltane, how we baked honey cakes together to celebrate the turning of the season. How the carpenter bees buzzed from flower to flower, drunk on joy.

That tree had been a friend. A teacher. A witness to our rituals. I wanted that same spirit in the bee yard.

I spoke with your father. We talked back and forth, weighing the choice. We agreed: the cholla deserved respect. It had stood long before us. And it could live on. Cholla reproduce easily from their segmented bulbs, so we brought out the wheelbarrow and, with great care, used a small chainsaw to cut sections. We placed them in quiet corners of the property—places where their offspring could root and rise.

I didn’t want to burn it, as some recommended. That felt wrong. Too final. Fire can bring life, yes—but it also ends things. And this cholla had earned the right to continue. I wanted continuity. I wanted to honor its place in the rhythm of the land. It had fed birds, shaded lizards, bloomed through drought and storm. It had held the center. I found myself wondering what it had seen over the years—how old it truly was, how many creatures had nested in its arms, found shelter beneath its spines, paused in its shadow. To reduce it to ash felt like erasing a witness. Instead, we chose to scatter its bulbs across the property, giving its offspring a chance to rise in new places. Respect given, respect returned.

We were not harmed in the process. The cholla is often dismissed as a nuisance—thorny, unruly, something to be cleared. I see it differently. If I move with care, it moves with me. I’ve left several cholla standing around the perimeter of the bee yard, like quiet sentinels. One holds a nest from seasons past, tucked deep within its spiny arms. When I peeked inside, I found a small miracle: the nest was woven with branches of local sage and, to my astonishment, a delicate white ribbon made of lace. A secret offering. A story I hadn’t known was being told.

I make it a point to show the cholla respect, to give them wide berth. And when I forget—when I rush, when I drift too far into thought—they remind me. A small sting. A piece of cactus clinging to my arm or leg. I am never upset. It is a lesson. A call to presence. Nature does not like to be rushed. It wants you here, now, fully. Like a mother teaching a child to slow down, to listen, to move with intention.

The cholla teaches mindfulness. It teaches reverence. And it remains—prickly, persistent, quietly sacred.

Once the center was cleared, we went in search of our tree.

We drove to the nursery I know well—the one tucked behind the highway, where desert natives wait in quiet rows. Your father and I grabbed the little four-wheeled cart, like we always do, and walked to the back. But something was wrong. The palo verdes were gone. Normally there are thirty or forty. That day, not one.

I asked the first employee. He shrugged. “Probably out,” he said. It was late in the season. Not impossible.

And that’s when I locked in.

I went on a polite asking rampage—smiling, patient, determined. I asked three employees in total, each one giving me the same shrug, the same vague answer. Your father stood by, knowing exactly what was happening. He’s seen this look in my eye before—the one that says, I will find it.

Finally, I found a kind man—older, gentle, the kind who knows the nursery by feel. He took a golf cart and drove me to the back, to the usual inventory rows. Empty. He was surprised. I was disheartened.

And then fate stepped in.

We crossed paths with the owner of the nursery. A weathered man with soil in his smile. He saw our confusion and asked, “Tom, you seem to be looking for something?” Tom explained. The owner chuckled. “I have one left. It’s over in row nine, with the mosquitoes. Last one.”

I beamed.

Tom drove me over, and there it was—standing alone in its five-gallon bucket, perfect and straight. The sweetest little palo verde. Its trunk was smooth and green, its limbs reaching upward with quiet confidence. And there, clinging to one branch, was a single yellow flower—left over from the rain it had received. It wasn’t the season for blooming, but this tree had held on. A small act of defiance. A quiet promise. I bent down, picked up the bucket, and smiled. I placed my hand gently on its trunk and whispered, “Yes. You will do your job well.”

We brought it home.

We planted it in the center of the bee yard, where the cholla once stood. We surrounded it with the white stones dug up when the water line was laid—bright, smooth, the size of small pumpkins, with a faint sparkle in the light. They felt like offerings.

Palo Verde

It was the beginning of the bee yard’s transformation—into a secret garden no one sees. A place tucked behind the veil of ordinary time, where bees slip between worlds. They hum through sunlit corridors of desert bloom, brushing past petals like whispered prayers, working the flowers with ancient purpose. Here, they are not just pollinators—they are emissaries. They visit gods in the golden hours, carry messages stitched in pollen, and return with news of the land’s quiet longing. The palo verde stands watch, the white stones gleam like moonlit offerings, and the air itself seems to hold its breath. This is not a garden for show. It is a sanctuary. A prayer. A promise kept between steward and soil.

We picked you up from school that afternoon. You saw the tree and lit up. “Can we dress it in ribbons during Beltane too?” you asked.

“Yes, of course,” I said. “And make our special honey cakes too.”

This tree will grow. It will shade the bees. It will bloom with memory. It will hold our rituals and whisper our stories. It will be a guardian. A witness. A friend.

Lesson for you, my daughter: 
 Some things must be cleared to make space for what’s sacred.
Respect the old.
Welcome the new.
 And when you plant, plant with memory. The land will remember you.

Love,

Your Mother
The Desert Druid