There once was a magnificent maple tree flanked by two equally magnificent, but smaller, oak trees. The oaks would eventually catch up and exceed the maple’s height and width, but for now, this tree was the most beautiful in the woods. Because of this, it was a popular tree, a coveted tree, a very much sought after tree. Every fall, people and animals would meet at the tree to watch as it changed its green leaves to magnificent fall splendor.
Now on this tree, there were many leaves--big and small, fat
and thin, important and not so very. But
this story is about one leaf in particular, the tiniest leaf on the tree. Of course, this tree had thousands upon
thousands of leaves. Still, one has to
be the largest and one has to be the smallest.
No matter how hard she tried to grow, she was puny and ridiculous
looking. Many of the other leaves just
laughed at her or completely ignored her, but most of the other leaves didn’t
even know she existed because she was that tiny.
Well, fall came to the tree in its usual manner, and the
tree responded with fantastic color.
Every leaf began to turn brilliant shades of orange, yellow, red, and
pink, as sugar maples are known to do.
Every leaf except one, that is.
The tiniest leaf stayed a solid green color. No matter how hard she puffed up her cheeks,
she stayed plain green. Now the other
leaves really laughed at her because they were all dressed in their finest
colors and she was still a dull green.
This made her very sad and she finally just wished that they would all
fall off, including herself, so that she could be out of her misery.
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| The glory of the maple tree as it begins to change color. |
Nature is inclined to respond to desperate wishes, as you know, and
after every person and animal had gotten their fill of the beautiful sight of
the maple, she sent a terrible storm with a deluge of rain and ferocious
winds. This took every single leaf off
the tree, none of which were very happy about it.
Every leaf except one, that is.
As the colorful leaves flew violently off the tree, they lamented their
fate and stared jealously at the tiny green leaf that still clung to its twig.
Eventually the storm died down and the tiny leaf was all
alone. She was very lonely, but at least
she didn’t have any leaves laughing at her anymore. Being all by herself certainly made her stand
out more. At least now she could be
seen! The weeks passed by and finally
her colors began to change. It’s too bad
that no people or animals were around because never had there been a leaf with
such spectacular color as the tiniest leaf.
She glowed brilliant neon colors that could be seen far away, if one
happened to be looking.
All things come to an end though, and fall ended abruptly
one night with a terrible deep freeze.
In the morning, the world had been plunged into a severe winter. The tiniest leaf had never rotted and so she
stayed frozen and brilliant on the tree, although no one knew about it, and winter continued on, harsh and terrible as
always.
Into that winter, a man traveled alone. He had come from a far land to warn the
people of a new enemy who had destroyed all of his people. But the winter was so very harsh and he had
lost his way several times and he was ready to give up. Late one day, he and his horse stumbled into
the clearing where the bare maple and oaks were. The man had it in his head that he would
start no fire this night. This time he
would allow himself to freeze. He went
to the maple tree to sit under it, and his eyes filled with tears--tears for
his own people who had already died and tears for the people of this land who
would die if not warned. As he was about
to sit down, he spied the tiniest leaf in the last rays of the sun. He could not believe how beautiful it
was! He jumped up to look at the leaf,
grateful and mesmerized by its brilliant beauty.
He stared at the leaf for quite a while until the sun had
set and it was getting darker. Somehow something in that leaf had changed him, had given him hope. He quickly found as much dead wood and broken
twigs as he could, and he started a big fire near a very large rock next to the
tree. The rock protected him from the
wind, and his horse shielded him as well.
Somehow, he made it through that night alive. In the morning, he went to the tree and took
the tiny leaf off of it and brought it with him.
He got on his horse and headed for the village, which was so
much closer than he realized. To think
that he would have given up when he was only an hour away from the
village! Of course, he had no way of knowing
that, but he was so eternally grateful to the tiniest leaf for rekindling just
the tiniest bit of hope in his heart.
The man was taken in by the village people who fed and
housed him. He explained the plight of
his people and that the enemy was on its way to their village and would be
there by summer. The people had heard
rumors about this from many others, and they knew what he said was true. He told them everything he knew about the
enemy, including their weaknesses.
Because of this, the people were able to mount a defense and hide
themselves in the forest where the enemy would not go.
The village was saved because of this man who traveled so
far to help. No one knew about the role
that the tiniest leaf had played except for the man. He never told anyone because he thought they
would all laugh at him. But the tiniest
leaf knew, and that was enough for both of them.
