My first thoughts about me

My first thought about me is that I love trees.

I discovered (or rediscovered) this about me recently in the Pennsylvania Grand Canyon.  That Pennsylvania even has a “grand canyon” was news to me, but while I was there, I lay under a beautiful leafy canopy and watched the rythmic sway of the leaves in the breeze.  It was nothing short of hypnotic.

I hope that I’ll be able to lay under the branches of a tree, and watch the sway of the branches in every season.  I hope to do it again when the canvas is multicolored.  I hope to make snow angels under clackity branches.  I wonder if it will feel the same inside, even if it feels frosty on the outside?  I want to lay beneath the tiny spring buds and try to count them.  I want to see that beautiful chartreuse hue that blends over days into lime and eventually to deep kelly.

When does that hypnotic effect hit its full potential?  I wonder: will it be the same over the seasons?

I remember being small and looking out my bedroom window at the tree in the neighbor’s yard.  Especially when a storm came in and caused the barometric pressure to fall, all of the leaves would lift up to show their undersides from the wind currents rising underneath them.  It looked like a grand puppet play to me.  Each branch conversing cartoonishly with the branches all around them.  It was alive in my imagination.   Though I can’t quite remember what I thought the many characters on that tree were debating, I do remember that they all felt very strongly about their views.  Waving their leafy arms emphatically, they sometimes pounced on one another to make their point.

About 15 years ago, my husband and I participated in a forestation project in Texas where, together, we planted some 500 or so trees over a period of two days.  That was just a sliver (so to speak) of the trees that were planted by the many volunteers who helped, but thinking back, I’m sure I wasn’t aware of my love of trees at the time.  We were just trying to be helpful to a friend who needed it.  Now, I wonder about those little seedlings.  I wonder how they are doing.

You may or may not remember that Disney’s Pocahontas sang that she knew every tree has a life and a spirit and a name ?

I think she was right.