The Hedge Woman

Nobody really did notice her. She was just there, always. Dependable, trustworthy Laura, who never got sick, or complained.

If something needed to be done, Laura did it. If anyone needed to be helped, Laura helped them.

Time went by, as it always does, and Laura noticed one day a little leaf hanging on her sweater. She picked it up and studied it, wondering where she might have picked it up. Her commute did not involve any green spaces.

In the next weeks, Laura was annoyed to find even more leaves around her desk, and a strange almond smell seemed to follow her everywhere.

‘Somebody must be playing around …’, she told herself while quickly sweeping the leaves away for fear somebody might notice.

Laura continued doing her work, being there every time she was needed, giving it her best day in and day out.

Soon, the leaves became too many to just hide away, but to her surprise, Laura found out that nobody around her noticed them. They did not notice her.

They sent her emails and messages, and asked her for this or for that, but they did not actually acknowledge her physical presence.

One morning, Laura was stunned to find that, while combing her hair, little white flowers fell into the sink. Also, on her way to work, try as she might, she was not able to get rid of an annoying bee.

Life followed its course unperturbed while Laura started to struggle more and more with the changes she was going through.

‘Grin and bear it!’, she encouraged herself. ‘You can do whatever you need to do!’

‘You have to!’

Laura worked hard to keep it together, to deal with all the strange things happening to her and the disappointment that no matter how much she had changed nobody seemed to notice, nobody seemed to care.

One day, while working on her laptop and with bees buzzing around, with a little bird chirping in her ear, and a hedgehog hiding under her feet, Laura got a message reminding her of a task she was meant to deliver asap.

That was the moment when she felt so alone, the most alone she had ever felt in her life, and tears flowed down her face.

Laura got up quickly, embarrassed, and went outside to the park right across from where she worked. Here she found a bench and sat down, curling up and crying.

Crying, letting it all out, made Laura calm down a bit, and from her curled-up position, she had a great view into a huge Cherry Laurel hedge growing unhindered right next to the bench.

Looking at it Laura saw the bees, the flowers, the birds nesting, and she also saw the might of the hedge, the strong trunk well established in the ground, how well it recovered when it was pushed this way or the other by the wind, the beauty of its shiny leaves and all the life it sustained, plus the protection it provided the bench she was on.

That was when she had this thought:

‘I am like the hedge, and like it, I don’t really get noticed …’

The hedge did not look like it cared about that; it had so much life in itself, it did so much for the world, it was strong and kind, and it did not need the passersby to admire it. It knew what it was and what was important, and it drew its satisfaction from the support it gave to all the other beings relying on it.

‘I am like the hedge’, Laura muttered to herself while getting up.

‘And I like it …’

That was when Laura understood she liked to be needed, to be asked to do things, she just did not like not being seen, but that was something she was going to change.

Back at her desk, Laura found she was a bit euphoric and a lot relieved.

She flew through her tasks and then, with a trusty notebook, she sat herself in front of the window to have a good view of the impressive Cherry Laurel hedge and started to formulate a plan.

Plan to Be Seen:

Step one:

…

WIP