I can’t even remember if I was sitting at my computer desk or walking toward it when this happened. What I do remember is hearing a very loud sound, looking out the window and seeing a 100+ foot oak tree falling toward me. It hit the ground, branches bouncing around, and ultimately came to rest pressed into my window like an impetuous “please don’t leave me” lover’s embrace. The canopy was so wide it completely darkened a second window at the other end of the room.
The rest of the general story is fairly predictable. My landlords were quick to respond and the details that are generally left up to those who own property were in their hands; assessing damage, contacting tree services, etc. All around there was gratitude for the limited damage and the fact that no one was hurt.
This left me with the freedom to explore and play with it as a sign of some sort; to imbue the event with meaning, as is my nature. I’m aware that some people prefer to see it as: a tree fell, end of story, move on. I can see it that way too. I choose not to. I choose to live in a more enchanting world. I have been deepening my relationship with Nature for a long time and animals in particular have become lively and important messengers for me. I go to stands of trees to find healing and comfort. We have “conversations.”
The lease on another oak’s life is up as a result of the threat it poses by being so close to the house. It will be taken down because of its potential. I could not help but cry about that during my evening meditation; grieving the trees. At the same time, two pines, about 10 and 20 feet, are about to get a break as they no longer stand in the shade of the oaks.
I thought too of how the squirrels have been working so hard to collect their winter’s stash. I didn’t see them yesterday, but today I noticed they’ve already determined their new commuter route. They don’t pause for a moment to complain about the loss or the inconvenience (unless they do). They simply do what must be done and continue “squirreling away” for the cold months to come.
As I waited for the tree “morticians” to show up and improvise a requiem from chain saws and chippers, I wondered what happens when Cosmos decides that it has outgrown the form of an oak tree? Where does the energy go? What will be the new form? Chipper shred or something else? We see the tree, we see the chips and firewood, but there is something else we don’t see. Cosmos is always unfolding and moving and re-forming.
This week, the Tarot of the Spirit card upon which I’m meditating (as part of my class with Lightning Spiral Mystery School) is Seven of Wind – Many Tongues. There is change afoot. Articulation eludes us as we move into a new consciousness. Old structures need to give way as they, fashioned from an old perspective, no longer serve. It makes me ask: how can my mind, having created those structures as a mirror of itself, fathom a new one? What’s coming?
I am in that place between knowing and knowing anew. I have a sense, I have intuition, but I don’t yet have the words. The energy that was the oak tree and outgrew it is moving on and showing up in some new form, but I don’t know what. All I see is the fallen oak.
What comes with the fallen tree is the opening of a new vista. I can now see the previously hidden stands of redwoods and there is more sky which means more light, fuller sunsets, more moon and more stars. The birds and squirrels will be farther from my view having moved to the trees further down the hill.
A friend and colleague drew an angel card for me, regarding this event. She drew Aspiration which indicated it was time to set my sights higher. Now I have the vista and sky to do so and it may require the toppling of some structures.
This tree fell directly at me and if I crawled out my window, I could crawl directly down its branches to its main trunk and straight on down to the unearthed root ball. I can make up that a great groan of “done-ness” has arisen from its roots and shot straight up the trunk to me, entered into my field of awareness and left me with that same energy. All the things I am reticent to release, from beliefs to old stories to the stuff of clutter, are gathering, energetically, in me into a full surrender roar of enough!
It’s edgy business, this being done with no sense of what’s to come. There is no new structure already built and in place for me to inhabit and by which to live. I’ve purposefully invoked the unknown, the Mystery and here it is; a big gaping hole in the space where once a mighty oak stood; a hole where the light can now shine and from which the stars can be viewed.
I am setting my sights higher, wider, deeper, broader. I’m setting my sights and getting insights; familiarizing myself with the lay of this new terrain and feeling incredible gratitude for the Beauty we call Nature. In these ways and so many others, I allow myself to be enchanted an in-formed by a fallen oak.
Copyright (c) October 2009, Kathy J Loh, All Rights Reserved
Wow,Kathy.
Thank you for that. Incredible. Uplifting and thought-provoking all at once.
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Thanks Geni! Uplifting and provocative…like that! 😀
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I know you have a summer birthday in June. My memory seems to say that it is between June 10 – July 7. If that is correct that your birthday tree (according to the Celts) is the Oak.
For your reading pleasure:
http://www.novareinna.com/constellation/oak.html
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Good memory Karen…somewhere in there yes. I never knew this about the Celtic/Druid astrology. No wonder
I have such an affinity for oaks. Well…some more stuff to muse upon!
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Wow Kathy! Beautiful, I’m reading this at the end of my “working” day and is just the thing I needed. Thanks. Me Relieved that you were not injured.
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Thanks Carol – I’m relieved too, of course. Glad you found this helpful in some way. Thanks for letting me know.
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Lovely Kathy! Thank you.
I once had a very similatr experience. Afterwards, in my contemplation practice, I saw the trunk of the tree incrusted with a jewel at it’s center… I guess that fall brought a jewl to the moment. It is a while ago and I can’t totall remember wht it meant to me then. But I, like you, decide to see life as a more enchanting reality. Pregnant with the mystery of things, life becomes trully meaningful. It is the way I chose to live my life too; paying close attetion to what I call the “waking dreams” that guide me, those signs that come form strange or repetitive events that are difficult to make sense of… I believe it is the way with which Spirit talks and guides us.
And so we learn to go on, as you say in such a beautiful metaphore, “simply do(ing) what must be done and continue “squirreling away””.
You ask, (as if we could get an answer) “What’s coming?” after such a waking dream. And we well know we can’t know… It is out of this blessed uncertanty that we grow in trust, I believe. And, yes, we do have intuition to thank, for it helps us with our trusting in the face of uncertainty.
Beautiful embracing reality as is when you are able to look it in the eye and notice: here it is “the opening of a new vista”, more space, more light; what Grace!
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Not long ago I posted in your blog my reaction to your lovely post. Very soon after; a waking dream: the word “certainty”, again, in a story… and what about?? About an oak!
Here it is for you:
THE DANGER OF CERTAINTY
A reed got into an argument with an oak tree. The oak tree marvelled at her own strength, boasting that she could stand her own in a battle against the winds. Meanwhile, she condemned the reed for being weak, since he was naturally inclined to yield to every breeze. The wind then began to blow very fiercely. The oak tree was torn up by her roots and toppled over, while the reed was left bent but unharmed.
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There are no coincidences, only waking dreams!
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Thanks for all these lovely comments Shuli – I love all of them. Great food for thought. As I sit here typing at my computer, the tree remains before me, cut back from the window, but still here. The birds are having a grand old time with it and I get the privilege of viewing them up close. I don’t think I’ve ever realized how many species of birds are making the rounds in these oaks. Another silver lining.
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