The Wonder of Trees

I was thinking about trees the other day. About how trees have been so instrumental in my well being, about why they “chose” me to tell their story, about how they have actually touched and healed me of pain and sorrow, about how recently my psychic friend advised me to be around trees to help me over a health issue.

I don’t know about you but I talk to trees. Not every moment but when I’m alone and out in nature I confide in them. They respond (yes, they do!) by perking up, branches lean down and tap my head gently and make themselves known. I feel pain when someone cuts down or heavily prunes a tree.

My son-in-law “logs” his acreage in Norway. The Norwegian government requires landowners to log, clear-cut actually, a certain amount of forest. I shake my head and try to explain that trees feel but my explanation falls on deaf ears.

Calvin’s story started because of trees—Redwood trees. In 1999, I was driving up Highway 101 from Sonoma, CA in a 17 foot U-Haul trailer packed to the gills. My car, trailered and hitched to the back of the truck, carried my two cats and extra baggage inside. It was a full load. Coming down a steep, winding hill into Crescent City, CA, my brakes failed.

My heart stopped when I discovered I had no brakes. I pumped and pumped. Finally—and I don’t know how—the truck stopped with a thud on the long, straight stretch about a mile from Crescent City. I pulled over on the side of the highway and called for help. Hours later the CHP (California Highway Patrol) knocked on my window and demanded I have the rig towed.

I spent two days in Crescent City. The town, a shadow of its former self then, edges a redwood forest. Backing my Kia Sportage off the trailer I headed up the winding gravel road to the redwood forest and the start of a new era for me.