October 26th, 2017

Over the next month our NorCal Gingkos...and those all over the world will turn from this deep blue green to gold under your feet....

The Ancient and the Street-wise
The ginkgo trees on my street speak to me daily. As both a chaplain and a landscape architect, we have a lot to chat about. Ginkgos are some of the BEST NoCal partiers of the seasons. (It is easy to forget what month it is in the San Francisco Bay area…we get three or four rose blooms here.)

However, the ginkgoes are not fooled by easy weather.  They offer bright green spring leaves, which deepen to summer blue greens.  Then at some magic autumn moment they withdraw their greenness and reveal gold. The thing with ginkgoes are they hold that gold in Northern California like no other tree.  For weeks they stay in their sunlight colors just hinting at pink—it’s like they are holding their breath for a grand finale...and they are.
 
The Curtain Call
Over one or two days, with particularly windy conditions, they escape their earthly branches and dance around the street—animating the air.

It is not fall for me without this moment.
 
My neighbor cavetches about the leaves, but I dance with them (like nobody is watching...).

​Find one and watch it turn ....nirvana. 

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