Glimmer #5: It’s Bittersweet

When the cold weather sets in here in New England, all color seems to drain from the world.

The woods behind our house, usually a gorgeous palette of green, gold, orange and yellow, are suddenly a uniform grey. Grey tree bark, grey stone walls, grey skies and grey squirrels.

I know how long it will be before the next tender green sprouts appear.

So as I drive around this small town, my eyes are immediately drawn to any bit of color.

The brilliant red of bittersweet berries breaks up the monotony of the landscape. On the highway, small spots of bittersweet flash past in the dull grey of the roadside. I can barely notice it when it is gone.

On the back roads of town, I get a bit closer. The wild shrubs grow along the road, and behind the stone walls. I often think of cutting some, but most are on the edges of people’s property, and it doesn’t seem right to take it.

Over the past few years, I have driven with clippers in my car, just in case I spot a cluster of red berries in a spot that is both unclaimed and accessible. I have never yet found one!

If the bright flames of the bittersweet are not on someones lawn, they are often in the middle of swampy wetlands. I drive by with a sigh of frustration, imagining how pretty those berries would look…