On an autumn day in Boston, the Buddhist philosopher finished explaining to the eighty-year-old man, the teachings of reincarnation. He sat back in his egg shaped chair, pulled out his pocket square with the name “Lonnie” embroidered on it, and wiped a smudge off his glasses.

“Well Herman,” he said, “do you have any questions?”

Herman had been thinking about death quite a bit lately. It had been the subject of his dreams for months. I’ve thought a lot and I’m nearly fifty years younger.

“Could I come back as a Jacaranda?” He asked.

“What is that?” Asked Lonnie.

“In Los Angeles, where I grew up, there are these trees, these magical trees! They look ordinary most of the year, but in the springtime, they turn purple.”

“Oh I know the trees your talking about.” Lonnie sat up from inside his egg. He pulled out a mason jar from a drawer. It was filled with cigarette buts. He opened the lid, stuck his nose in the jar and inhaled, and then, making a rancid face, closed the lid. “Sorry, I’m trying to quit smoking. Anyway, we had those trees in Georgia. Why do you want to be one of those?

Herman closed his sparkling eyes, and raised his boney fingers towards the soft recessed office lighting. The flab under his neck swung back and fourth and his cheeks bunched up around the corners of his smile. “Because they get to be brilliant, and celebrated, and they also get to be ordinary and unnoticed. They have the potential to be spectacular, and they have the ability to be forgotten.”

“Couldn’t that be anything? Couldn’t it be a tulip, or a poppy?” Asked Lonnie.

“I suppose, but they are the landscape of my youth. Plus the purple blossoms can be seen from far away. And if there are many Jacarandas together, they look like a purple forest.”

I actually agree with Herman. A few days ago I went to visit my lawyer in Century City. His office is on the 42nd floor of the south tower. We sat next to the window as I signed some paperwork. From his window you can see all of west Los Angeles, and purple trees lined the streets and decorated yards all the way to the Pacific Ocean.

Lonnie swiveled in his egg chair and looked out the window. He gazed out at the birch trees in the courtyard. He imagined them with purple blossoms.

“We can’t decide how we come back in our next life. It isn’t our decision.” He said. “The key is to live this life in each moment. We must let ourselves feel true happiness, and embrace suffering. We must love ourselves fully for who we are and become what we wish to be. And if it is the Jacaranda, that you truly wish to be, then I am sure in one way or another you will in somehow, be the Jacaranda.”

The session ended and Herman went home to his apartment. He ate a small dinner that his daughter had prepared for him, went to bed, and fell into a deep untamed and very long sleep. He slept all through the fall and winter, dreaming of his childhood and all the memories that he had forgotten.

When he woke up he was in a different place. There were people all around him that he did not recognize. They were calling him by another name, and he had forgotten how to speak. He was wrapped in a blanket and held in the arms of a young woman. The room was sunny and familiar. Herman’s eyes followed the sunlight out the window. There was a purple Jacaranda in the yard.

- By Brett Dennen