We know perhaps what it is to hug a tree, to sit under a tree, and feel the roots twining and living below us just like what’s above, but this week I’ve become aware of trees in other ways.

I mentioned the crackling of a wood fire, how I heard the sounds differently this week, as voices talking, as the tree speaking of new form, change.  

Then yesterday a friend, Anna,  presented the possibilities in tissue paper, the same crackling as the fire when it’s crumbled, and especially when it’s placed by the ear like a shell.

She pointed out that when one makes a circle with the first finger and thumb, and draws a sheet of tissue paper through it, it becomes a lightsaber, a sword.  One can play with its strength and when it comes to tearing off a strip, there is resistance as the fibers want to stay together like the fibers in the trunk of a tree, like when we contemplate the mysterious hand and heart hold of life into death.  

I’m with all that that morning as I feel my tissues, listen to their language, their voice, and what they might want to say on another morning of rain and wind.  I read of flooding in rivers all around me but here, other than plants in pots blowing over and me righting them over and over again, all is somewhat calm.  

I’m with delicacy and strength, and friend and family bonds.