Welcome to my guest author and Connection Messenger*, Paula Chaffee Scardamalia, Creativity Coach and Dream & Tarot Intuitive. Our connection with nature is an important part of our physical and spiritual health, and I loved the way Paula captured that in this post. Enjoy, and please let us know in the comments below if you’ve ever felt a special connection with a tree. My favorite childhood tree was a mimosa tree in our yard in the Virginia Piedmont region, with spreading, forking branches that created wonderful places to climb and sit and hide. Wherever you live right now, find a nearby tree and get to know it this year: touch it, put your arms around it, examine it, watch it change with the seasons, learn about its history, and give it a little love. You might be surprised how much love you’ll feel in return.
Every time I meet a tree, if I am truly awake, I stand in awe before it. I listen to its voice, a silent sermon moving me to the depths, touching my heart and stirring up within my soul a yearning to give my all.
~ Macrina Wiederkehr, author
Years ago, when I was writing the first draft of my book Weaving a Woman’s Life: Spiritual Lessons from the Loom, I went on retreat in the Poconos. Because it was after ski season and before the busy summer season, I had the place almost to myself.
In the afternoon, after hours of writing and thinking, I’d take a walk along the curving main drive to visit with some special friends.
Tall, healthy, old, silver, smooth-barked beech trees.
These trees were impressive in their age and their size. Hugging them, my arms encompassed just over half of the circumference of the trees. I spent time stroking their smooth bark, listening to their silence and their whispers, imagining the depth and reach of their roots, wondering at all the events they had witnessed over the many years of their growth. They grounded and refreshed me.
Trees are an ancient symbol and element of this holiday season, whether it is a lovely Yule log or the traditional Christmas tree, covered in lights and ornaments. But sometimes we forget to really appreciate the tree itself.
Trees are such a gift.
Especially for writers. For centuries, trees have gifted us with ream upon ream of paper, box upon box of pencils, and board upon board of wood for desks and tables, the tools of our craft.
Trees are our Magic and our Muses.
Whatever and wherever your favorite tree is, give it a little love.
Divine musings,
Paula
Paula Chaffee Scardamalia
Divining the Muse
Paula Chaffee Scardamalia, dream consultant for PEOPLE Country Magazine, is a book coach, and dream and tarot intuitive. Since 1999, Paula’s taught writers how to use intuitive tools like dreams and tarot to write stories from the deepest part of their imaginations. She’s taught at small private workshops on the East Coast, and at both national and regional Romance Writers of America conferences and meetings, at the 2014 San Diego University Writers Conference and the International Women’s Writing Guild. She leads intimate writing and dream retreats. Paula publishes a weekly e-newsletter on writing, dreams, tarot, and is the award-winning author of Weaving a Woman’s Life: Spiritual Lessons from the Loom.
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NOTE: If you enjoyed this post, you might also enjoy one I wrote about the beautiful, old catalpa tree in my Shenandoah Valley yard: “Meet My Nature Neighbor: The Catalpa Tree.”
[stextbox id=”stb_style_870581″]* What’s a Connection Messenger? At Heartspoken, a Connection Messenger is someone who helps point the way to strengthening one of life’s essential connections: with God, with self, with others, or with nature. [/stextbox]
Esther Miller
In California I ignored most of the trees, except of course the magnificent Sequoias and the Coast Redwoods. It was in Virginia I fell in love with trees, specifically two silver maples on either side of our farmhouse. I know that silver maples are not the top of the maple heap, barely beating out the box-elders. But when I stood in my upstairs hall window and looked out at the first branching of that immense tree, each branch larger than the trunks of most trees, I knew I was in the presence of a Tree. Families of squirrels fattened each spring on the abundance of maple seeds and the big black snake in turn was fattened by at least one young squirrel. After a strong autumn wind, we finally found the Baltimore Oriole bag-like nest blown down from the top of that tree. The dead branch on the north side had square holes the pileated woodpeckers added each year. I miss that tree.
Elizabeth Cottrell
What a beautiful example of what a love affair with a tree really looks like. It involves paying attention to those small details and the changes that occur over the course of a year. When we learn to be more observant and truly develop a love relationship with nature, we will be quicker to defend and protect her. Thanks for sharing this, Esther!
Elizabeth Cottrell
It’s never too late, Karen! And, of course, I am reminded of Shel Silverstein’s book The Giving Tree. Trees do give to us with no expectation of reciprocation. I can only imagine how much they enjoy a little tree love now and then.
Laura Fogle
So I married a tree man and that has solidified my deep connection with trees but trees have always been very important to me. Back in my childhood days there was a tree in the front yard of my Granny’s farm in Botetourt County, Virginia, which provided hours of play time for my sister and me and some of our Botetourt cousins whenever we would visit my n the summer. It was a curvy Catalpa that had a low, but very sturdy branch which leaned out over the yard in such a way as to allow the climbers to perch on its outermost reaches without fear of falling. I remember running down through the yard early in the day to climb the Catalpa. There would always be two or three, sometimes four of us at once. We would each pick a spot to straddle on that wide, strong branch where we would stay for what seemed like hours talking and pretending and feeling powerful and brave. The tree eventually died and the branches were trimmed back but no one has ever had the heart to cut it completely down. It remains there still as a monument to our childhood.
My favorite deciduous tree is the mighty Tulip Poplar and my favorite conifer is the Hemlock which, sadly, is being destroyed by the wooly adelgid aphid. The virgin Hemlock groves in the Blue Ridge are all but gone now and it will be many decades before they will grow back to the size of not being able to get your arms around them. Like a civilization or a native tribe lost to the generations.
Elizabeth Cottrell
Oh, Laura, what a beautiful memory, and how grateful I am that you shared your unique and rich connection with trees. I can picture you and your siblings and cousins up in that Catalpa tree! We used to rig up all kinds of pulleys and baskets to haul food and other “secret” items up and down.
I’m so glad you mentioned the Tulip Poplar and the Hemlock. I did not realize the Hemlock was at such risk. There was a large one right outside my Daddy’s office window when I was growing up. I loved the little miniature cones!
Thank you so much for commenting!