Roots and Branches
This virtual, interactive reflection was offered for a Sanctuary Boston worship service on January 19th, 2022.
Click the image to watch the video on YouTube.
January 19th, 2022
—
This week happened to be the observation of one of my spouse's favorite cultural traditions, the holiday Tu BiShvat, the Jewish New Year of the Trees. Inspired by this and our shared love of nature, in my household we've been spending time talking about these amazing arboreal beings together. This has brought up many special memories and feelings for me, and tonight I'd like to share some of them with you. I’ll be pausing a few times to present you all with a question, and when that happens I’d invite you to either share answers briefly in the chat, or simply contemplate them on your own - whatever feels best to you.
---
Many people had a hand in raising me during my childhood, but perhaps the most remarkable was a Norway maple.
She lived in the front yard of the house I grew up in. We had several good trees, but this one was mine. Many of my early memories, especially of those hours spent without other human company, are of quality time with that tree. She held me gently as I climbed through her branches. She spoke to me in whispers and rustles and feelings and scents. I hid safely in her canopy, I knew the taste of the chlorophyll in her leaves. I scraped the skin of my belly on her bark as I adventured up to new heights, and felt peace as saw the sunlight play through her shifting shadows.
Much of my behavior as a kid was considered a level of weird just shy of alarming to the adults around me, and they were certainly perplexed to observe me spending hours at a time perched in this maple tree with the side of my face pressed to the trunk, singing strange songs over and over again. When asked about it, I recall adopting a very serious tone as I explained that I had promised to teach my tree how to sing, and would say nothing more about it.
I can’t remember the conversations with the maple tree in a way that I could explain in English, because they were something else. But I remember the feeling I had, and being certain beyond question that teaching the tree to sing was something I was doing as a form of reciprocity, because the maple tree was always teaching me things.
As I grew into adolescence, I took hundreds of photos of this tree. Most of them are snow-covered, taken in the deep of winter when the tree slept and I missed her.
While reflecting on these memories my curiosity was peaked and I went looking on google street view. The maple tree is still there, in front of the house I grew up in. There’s a little swing hanging from her low branches now, so she has another child to care for. In the past decade, someone has planted three companion trees around her, and they’re growing up straight and strong. My chest filled with warmth seeing these photos, the way it would seeing the face of a beloved relative.
I was raised by a Norway maple tree, and because of that I have experienced love in a way that can’t be described.
Have you ever had a special tree in your life? Where? What kind of tree was it?
--
The nine wise hazel trees stood over a sacred pool of water at the mouth of the river. As the seasons turned, some of their hazelnuts fell into the water, and the migrating salmon ate them. Each nut a salmon ate created a spot on the fish’s back, and imbued it with a special knowledge.
The warrior, Fionn mac Cumhaill, caught one of these salmon of knowledge, and feasted on it, and it passed its blessing on to him. For the rest of his life, the warrior had a special insight which led him to victory.
This is one of the oldest stories honoring trees in Celtic mythology, and demonstrates a certain depth of reverence. The source of human knowledge is the wisdom of the hazel trees. Of the little reliable information we have about ancient Celtic civilizations, we do have around 400 surviving inscriptions in the old Irish alphabet, Ogham. Each letter of the Ogham alphabet is associated with a type of tree - birch, rowan, alder, willow, ash, thorn, oak, holly, apple, vine, broom, elder, pine, heath, aspen, and yew.
Celtic folklore is peppered with loving references to trees. They are the source and symbol of knowledge and understanding for humankind. Far from the dominant species, we are alongside the other animals as lesser beings to their power.
Does your religious or cultural tradition have any special beliefs about trees?
--
All children know that trees can talk. This is obvious to them. We know this until someone tells us that trees can’t talk, and then most of us go about our lives convinced that what we’ve been told is true, of course trees can’t talk.
Until once again, we learn that trees talk.
The work of German forester and author Peter Wohlleben revealed the enchanting idea that trees are far more conscious than we used to believe. Trees communicate with each other about all sorts of things - danger, water levels, sex, seasons - using airborne chemical signals. They are community beings, who teach young trees near them the techniques of healthy survival. Trees planted alone do not know how to conserve water or fight pests.
Their roots contain nervous system-type structures that intentionally seek out water and nutrients and bond with each other under the soil. In forests, networks of fungus also carry signals, sometimes for miles, through the crowds of trees.
Trees have been on earth for about 67 times as long as the oldest hominids, and 1300 times as long as homo sapiens. I tend to believe that trees will be around long after humans disappear, but that’s more a feeling than any kind of fact. What I’m getting at, is that trees have always been a part of the human consciousness. They’re in our spiritual DNA. Of course children know that trees can talk.
What is something that you knew was true as a kid, until someone told you it couldn’t be?
--
We are having brunch in Manhattan. Most of my friends here have lived their whole lives in the city and tend to think of Central Park as “more than enough nature, thank you.” One of my friends, bless her, asks “But what do we need trees for, anyway?!” and she’s only half-joking. As often happens to me, I find myself considering something for the first time in light of a question like this.
I explain to her that, aside from the whole carbon exchange thing, trees prevent erosion. They’re the reason why we have dry land - their roots hold it in place.
Years later, I’m thinking about trees again. I’m practicing ministry in the early days of the pandemic, and it feels like things everywhere are falling apart. I want to feel rootedness, and help others feel it too, and I come back to this image of tree roots preventing the land from sliding off into the sea. There’s a mutuality there - the roots hold the tree up, nourish it and stabilize it, and the tree and the earth hold each other in a sturdy embrace.
I have seen people do the same, when we trust in community. By tapping down and in to receive nourishment, we are also giving support. When we follow the examples of trees, self care and asking for what we need ceases to seem in any way selfish, and becomes a beautiful type of connection.
--
Happy New Year of the Trees, and may we all find that delicious stretch feeling as we reach our roots down and our branches high.
Copyright 2022 Miranda (Bran) Lennox
