| Touched
by a Tree by Mahria Potter |
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I have always been touched by trees. As a young woman living Ion a tree-filled island in the inland sea of Puget Sound, I rode my bike the three miles to and from high school. Gliding by the ravine filled with big-leaf maples, wild red alder and cedar trees, I was I drawn to stop and visit them many times. Pulling my bike off the road, I meandered through, feeling the rough bark of the Douglas fir and the softness of the maple mamas. They beckoned me to come and sit in the fern and leaf debris and smell the mushroom-laden earth. To know our forests, one must do just that. Know them. The deep greens of sword fern and moss and salal stand steady and proud beneath the majestic and commanding evergreens. As the sunlight filters through, it doesn't matter whether it shines or not. When you are engulfed in green, a gray sky is as welcome as a blue one. Looking around and above, the branches called in patterns of a language spoken and understood by a wood's dweller. Here the evergreens hang, mellow, satisfied in their place. The more wildly expressive deciduous, however, callout: "I am here, I am here!" It was on one meander that I found the most enchanting triple- trunked red alder. At the time, I called it birch and maybe it was. 'I Its base was not so thick—maybe 36 inches around—yet immedi- ately branching into three sweet selves. I felt the spirit was large and full and yearned to feel three times the canopy, rather than just one perspective. Every couple of days, I visited my triple birch. I sang her songs of love and of the difficulty of having just lost my lover to college. She witnessed my tears and I hugged her, sensing her under- standing. As I entered the ravine, my song and dance would erupt upon sighting her and I would encircle her with my instinctual dance of life and love. Then I would speak of this and that, knowing full well she was listening. She knew me and I knew her. I visited her over the summer and into my next year. Then, the island began exploding and people began to build and build. One day, in pulling my bicycle off the road and into the safety I had known, I saw her. Her trunks stood a perfect 18 feet off the ground debodied so perfectly. Beside the beautiful triple stump stood a triangle of six beautiful logs neatly stacked. For me, the death was complete. I could not accept it, though now I feel life is always changing and growing. The gifts of her life and her death are always there. But, at the time, I felt completely betrayed by the human race. How could they not see? I fell to the ground and screamed my pain and anguish. I traced her body with my fingers feeling her spirit and yet not. I knew she was gone. I felt totally alone, forced into abandonment by some greedy woodcutter. Alone, and missing her terribly, I went back two more times to visit and just make sure. It was hard to accept. She was the first tree I had ever truly loved and felt its love back. Not since then have I had such luxury of privacy and trust. I will never, ever forget her.
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