The jacaranda tree in my front yard started dropping purple blossoms this week, and that means it’s time for my annual column about our love-hate relationship.
The blossom-fest is late this year, maybe because we’ve had so much rain. Usually by late May I’m already sick of trying to sweep the periwinkle detritus off the sidewalk.
This year, I began chuckling to myself, watching the new neighbors who are rude and full of themselves park their extra car with the “I love New York” bumper sticker underneath it.
If I liked them, I’d warn them about how the sticky blossoms adhere to your car and require an electric sander to remove, which they’d better do before it eats into the paint.
But, because I’m a kind and altruistic person, I’ll let them learn this for themselves. Welcome to California.
These neighbors remind me of the married young architects who moved in next to me when I lived in my 100-year-old shingle bungalow. They clearly thought they were socially way above any of the rest of us who lived there, so they kept to themselves.
They immediately set to work remodeling their historic bungalow, even though it had literally just been remodeled before they bought it — apparently not to their satisfaction. They also planted new trees in the front yard that were totally inappropriate to our historic neighborhood near the beach, including a mesquite tree that hung over the front yard fence.
I considered warning them that mesquite trees have viciously sharp thorns that will jump out and attack anyone who walks by, which I know because I had one at my vacation house in Joshua Tree. But they wouldn’t have listened anyway, so I just blessed it and released it.
I put up with endless whines of power tools for months as they remodeled that house, even late at night, without complaining. Meanwhile, they griped constantly to their other neighbor — my friend —about her deaf rescue Dalmation’s barking. To the point that she had to get a shock collar for him. Personally, I would have happily put the shock collar on the neighbor.
One day, it occurred to me that I had never actually welcomed them to the neighborhood. So I baked some brownies and rang their doorbell. When the female version of the architectural pair opened the door, I gave her the brownies and asked her if she’d like to come over some time for a cup of coffee.
I’ve been a news reporter for 40 years, so I’m pretty good with facial reactions, and it was interesting to watch the quick expressions that changed over her face, as she tried to decide how to say “Not until pigs fly, you lower-class person,” without actually being totally offensive. (Just in case I had a violent streak.)
But she was not all that quick-witted, so she just mumbled something about how she was really busy, and that was the end of our neighborly chat sessions. (Sound of door slamming here.)
I moved out of that neighborhood in 2006, after a fatal gang shooting across the street led me to believe it wasn’t the best place to bring up kids. And now I live on a quiet, tree-lined suburban street where the most exciting thing that’s happened this year is when the city started randomly chopping down our street trees without warning.
It’s become astonishingly expensive to live here, on a street that was once filled with tiny tract homes thrown up after World War II. So I know the snotty new neighbors must have money.
What they don’t have is California savvy, at least not enough to warn them not to park under my jacaranda tree. Or walk on a sidewalk covered with the blossoms, unless they want them stuck to the bottoms of their shoes.
I’m willing to give these new folks the benefit of the doubt, despite their New York-loving bumper sticker. But if I see them wearing a New York Yankees baseball cap, I really can’t be responsible for my actions.
I know I bring the following up every year, but I don’t care. Because it’s still true. Jacaranda trees remind me of my former boyfriends. Beautiful but extremely messy. I don’t know if you’ve ever tried sweeping the purple rain off your sidewalk, but it’s frustrating. (Also like my former boyfriends.) The stuff sticks to your broom and is hard to get off, and by the time you’ve finished, an entire new crop has already rained down.
One year I wrote about this, and a man emailed to tell me that he agreed about the mess, so he’d chopped down the tree in his yard. Please! Please! Don’t chop them down. Yes, they are transplants from South America, and I know how some of you feel about immigrants.
But they bring such a burst of beauty to our streets every year, I’m willing to put up with the aggravation. Let the heavenly blooms remain.
