Hugged by a tree

I was embraced by a tree last night.
The night before last night, actually.

I have been battling a cosmic battle for the past year and a half.
(I know this sounds pompous, even ridiculous. Most transcendent personal truths do.)

And I have been - still am - battling it alone.
(That is the only way to fight cosmic battles. If you do get allies, they are unlikely to be obvious. Or even people, for that matter.)

But being a fighter can be lonely.
It's the loneliness what makes it so exhausting.
It's the loneliness what makes you. Or breaks you.

The night before last night I really needed a hug.
Not just any hug.
I wanted to be hugged by the one person whose hug means EVERYTHING to me - or else, by something greater than myself. By the Cosmos, my battle companion and adversary. (Well, not really: my ignorance and fears are my adversary. The Cosmos is just a mirror.)

I went for a walk.
I ended up in a little park - just a lawn with a few trees, really; and the dark night sky above me.

I've always loved trees.
Always: even as a baby, a newborn.
And they have always inspired a certain awe in me. They still do.
It's a natural kind of awe: an affectionate respect for them, for their mighty silence, for their benevolent power.
(I know it sounds like animistic adoration, but it isn't. And even if it were... well, that's a way of "loving God", too. It certainly beats adoring shoes and stuff.)

And so, badly needing a hug, I decided I should give one.
I walked to a tree that was standing near a bench, and I put my left arm around it, as I would put an arm around a beloved shoulder.

I had never "hugged" a tree like that before - never like I would hug a person. Un-selfconsciously.

As I did that, as I leaned with my arm around it, with its bark against my side, I felt being hugged back. That rugged bark, in the proximity of my heart, was warm with life. And my own hug, the hug I gave, felt like a hug received.
Still with my arm firmly around it, I leaned my head against the tree, as I would lean on a beloved shoulder.
And I felt supported.
I felt hugged like I was never hugged before.
I felt comforted to the core of my being.

It was an unexpected experience. Unexpected in its force.
Unexpected in the responsiveness of all that is to my silent yearning.

It is sad, really.
For a year and a half, I have been asking the Cosmos to listen to me, extorting an answer, singing broken-hearted songs to coax mercy, to soften the ever-soft, water-soft heart of the Universe, fencing my way through a hall of mirrors and mirages...
Why, then, was I surprised by this very simple and profoundly real experience?
How am I supposed to "manage" the Universe to my will, if I am surprised even by the simple fact - intuitively and intellectually acknowledged for years! - that you can feel connected to a non-human being?

As you can tell, I am still thinking about that tree and the profoundly comforting "hug" I received from it.
I am still feeling it, to the core of my being.

I can see that tree from one of my windows.
In fact, I could see it - even now, when its dark branches are indistinguishable from the deep darkness that precedes dawn - if I just turned my head to the left.

Yes, I am still feeling that warm embrace; and I am still shocked by the unexpected comfort it brought me when I was looking for just that: comfort.

I feel it standing there, like a sentry in the night, looking for me - looking after me.

Which is why I do not turn my head.
Which is why I am avoiding even the sight of it.

I know it is not "looking" for me.
I know it is a mirror - nothing more (and nothing less).
But something is there, in that dark, bewildered river that runs from my heart to the memory of that hug, of that tree, standing out there right now, overseeing my windows from inside the night. There is a shared heart beating through the darkness, as if echoing the heartbeat of my former self, of myself as I would like to be again, of myself as I exist in the mirror that I only saw once, I think.
Or maybe I just dreamt about it.

I am avoiding the sight of that tree because I felt embraced by it.
I am avoiding it, as I always avoid anyone who has really embraced me.
Because I don't feel I can ever return their sentiment.
I am a mirage. You can't love mirages for long.
They desert you.
(Which is why they are so common in deserts, I suppose - haha)


I wanted to write something else - something completely different.
But now I can't. The birds are starting to chirp, and the sleeping pills are starting to take hold of my mind. And life is too short for ramblings.

Trees deserve better than that.

And so do you. ;)

(I'll be adding the name of the author as soon as I find it.)

Here are trees that need your love and attention:

A forest in Sweden and An oak in France

Here is man who once scoffed at "tree huggers",
like you are scoffing at me now
(no, not you - the other you):

Come hug a tree with me

Here is one of the most inspiring stories you'll ever read:

And here is a primer in trees and natural magic,
should you need one:

If you find the philosophy behind it befuddling or unfamiliar, visit the link withing The Silent Light. Once you are befuddled no more, your real life will have started.
(And no, it has nothing whatsoever to with Madonna or any other celebrity.)