Under the Fig Tree

Sitting at my desk by the window, I worked my way through a stack of school papers, red pen in hand. The low hum of the window unit filled the room, steady and almost mesmerizing, and the cool air lifted the loose strands of hair from my face. Then it clicked off, and in the quiet, I heard him. His pounding feet so rhythmic and familiar.

I lifted my eyes just above the edge of the unit and saw him there in the yard—my now, nine-year-old son, Kippy. His feathery dark hair lifted slightly in the breeze as he paced and danced his well-worn path. Three long strides forward, then take a bow, his body folding deeply, hands flapping like butterflies behind him. Then he’d turn, three strides back. Again. And again. And again.

There was a cadence to it, a pattern I knew so well that I could hear it even in my sleep.

The crunch of tires alerted me to a car passing slowly along the road beyond the cedar rail fence that edged our yard. It paused, and the window rolled down.

“Hi, Kippy!” Bonnie called, leaning out with a cheerful wave. Her eyes crinkled in a smile behind thick glasses. I held still at my desk, waiting. There was always that pause, but four years ago, there would have been nothing, no words or response.

But we had been working toward this, patiently and faithfully, one small step at a time.

It had started under our fig tree. That tree stood at the corner of our yard, right where the dusty river road met Dry Creek Road before bending up the hill. Its wide, glove-shaped leaves cast a thick shade, and Kippy claimed that place as his post—his safe observatory of the world. From there, he watched life bustle by. Neighbors headed to milk chores, and families walking toward the river for a picnic. He watched the children running, voices bright in the distance. He peered at the milk cows ambling by for milking time. He gazed out on our geese as the strutted among the orchard trees.

But if anyone turned toward him, he would retreat back under the leaves and into the shadows, the low-hanging branches providing a protective screen.

“Hi, Kippy!” they called as they passed, but he never answered. And still, everyone loved him. Everywhere I went, someone would stop me.

“How’s Kippy doing?”

“How’s he coming along?”

“Is he talking yet?”

He had captured the hearts of the whole community without ever saying a word. We began to work on that road to his heart becoming more than a one way street.

“When someone says hi,” I told him gently, “you say hi back.” So we practiced.

“Hi, Kippy,” I would say, waving.

He would study my hand, puzzled, then echo carefully:

“Hi, Kippy.” It was a beginning.

“I say, ‘Hi, Kippy,’” I tried again. “You say, ‘Hi, Mommy.’”

It took months, but even once he got that, when his dad waved, he then said, “Hi, Mommy.”

When his brother waved, “Hi, Kippy.” All the names floated around, unanchored. Still, we were moving forward. Day after day, we practiced.

In the garden, as I weeded onions, I’d prompt him softly as neighbors passed while he stood under his fig tree,

“Hi, Connie!”

And then urge him, gently, “Say, ‘Hi, Connie.’” His hand would lift. His voice would follow.

“Hi, Connie.”

We practiced with siblings.

“Hi, Kippy,” Zach would say, and together we would answer, “Hi, Zach.”

Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the pieces began to come together. Then one day, before Bonnie even saw him, he stepped out from under the fig tree, into the Texas sunshine and called:

“Hi, Bonnie!” And I knew something had clicked.

Now, three years later, I sat at my desk, waiting for his response. Outside, Bonnie’s hand still lingered in the air from the car window. And then—

“Hi, Bonnie.” The words came, clear and right. She smiled, and the window rolled up. Her car moved on. And the rhythm resumed. Three steps forward. Bow. Hands fluttering. Turn. Three steps back.

I smiled, marking the small victory. Then I heard his commentary to himself begin...

“Hi, Kippy.” I frowned slightly and looked toward the road, but no one was there. He was still pacing, still moving, but now speaking quite loudly.

“Hi, Kippy.” He repeated, then a pause.

“Hi.” Then again.

“Hi. Hi. Hi. Hi…” The words tumbled out—one after another, but not the same. Never the same tone or accent. Each “hi” carried a different voice. Low and gravelly. Light and sing-song. Fast. Slow. A trace of a Texas drawl. Then something sharper and northern. A New Jersey accent…

It was as if a hundred people were speaking through him, every greeting he had ever heard, replayed, reshaped, examined. I sat completely still, listening. Leaning over the desk for a closer look, I watched him mimic seemingly every “hi” he’d ever received as he loped back and forth on his worn trail. Minutes passed, and still he went on.

“Hi, Kippy. Hi. Hi, Kippy…”

His eyes lifted at an angle toward the sky, his body moving in rhythm with the words, as though he were sorting them, testing them, turning them over in his mind. And then, at last—it stopped. He stood still, and said, quite clearly:

“Why does everyone say hi, again, and again, and again…?” I leaned forward, hardly breathing.

“She has said hi to me 300 times.” A pause.

“Why can’t they say it once?”

“I already know they say hi. They want to say hi.”

Another pause.

“She said hi to me 300 times!” I pressed my hand over my mouth with laughter. We were odd, that need to greet each other again and again in the same way.

Slipping out of the room, I shook, half with laughter, half astonishment, and called Dan.

“You won’t believe what I just heard,” I said.

“Our son… he doesn’t understand why all of us keep saying hello over and over again.”

But later, as the laughter settled, I considered it all.

Under the fig tree, Kippy had not just learned to speak our language; he’d been studying us, listening and cataloging! He’d been trying to understand why we say what we say, the way we say it, again and again. What was automatic to us was such a mystery to him. What was simple to us was something he had to piece together—voice by voice, moment by moment, and I realized: He was not just learning to enter our world. We were being invited, little by little, into his. It was a wonder and an adventure!