On International Day of Forests, 2025

 

Summer, 1949: age eight. I wander miles from home with total freedom of the Wellesley woods. White pines have welcomed me not into a perfect dream, but into their perfect reality.

I slowly walk in half-light through the fragrant grove, across a soft cushion of clean forest floor. I sink slowly, gently down, reclining entranced and spellbound in the hushed harmony of a surreal world. I daydream.

The trees have grown with sufficient separation, graciously sharing space, light, water, and nutrients. My gaze lingers on strong trunks, then drifts upward, through and beyond the highest, youngest growth, into brief glimpses of a bright blue universe. I daydream.

Spring, 2025: age eighty-four. Vivid forest memories return. The trees were my mentors. I thank them for their virtues and inner strengths: perseverance, resilience, nonviolence, stillness, patience, tolerance, contemplation, grace.

I thank them for my profound, quiet awareness. I daydream.

 

Will