Druid Shrine

Ok...So...I found this Awesome tree, and if you don't care to read my waxing poetic about it, just scroll to the bottom to look at the other pictures.

I was just driving home the other day, heading east away from the sunset, which glared a bit in my mirrors...And there it was, a gargantuan sycamore. (I was gonna just say huge, but that doesn't even begin to cover it, and my son used gargantuan this morning to describe...something... Anyway, it fits.) There it stood, it's branches white, like bleached bones drying in the sun, having shed it's bark as a snake would shed its skin, ready for the warmth and new growth of Spring.

I thought, "Wow! I just got this handy-dandy new camera phone! I'll pull off the road and take a picture!" I turned down a little neighborhood road and parked my car in the parking lot of this little fitness place, cause this tree is behind the place, and it didn't look like anyone was there, anyway. (Thank the goodness of whatever spirit kept them from cutting down this tree when they erected the building!) I had to go behind the building to get a good shot. When I got around to the back, I could finally see the trunk of the tree. It's circumference must have been at least 12 feet. I dug out my little phone, aimed it at the enormous web of bare, white branches and clicked..."capture failed." Ok, so I figured I'd try again..."capture failed." Dangit! So I figured I'd kidnap my buddy who's always got his digital camera on him, and have him take a shot for me later.

So today, I bought him lunch for the favor of a few pictures of this druid's one tree paradise. It was a perfect day for picture taking, smooth, white branches against a bright blue cloudless sky. I stood under it and just stared up at the sky, taking in the life of this tree. It must be at least 150 years old or more. Its roots are raised in places, leaving little hollows for chipmunks and squirrels to make it home. As I circled the trunk I saw a few small boards nailed to it, forming a ladder up to the fork in the trunk. Obviously, some rambunctious kids used to climb this tree, and survey the surrounding area from high in its branches. Perhaps there had been a clubhouse in it at some point, though I could only see evidence of the ladder. A few of the rungs had rotted and fallen off over the years, and were scattered on the ground around the foot of the tree. I wonder at the secrets this tree has heard...at the shelter it has provided...at the generations of critters it has housed...at the picnics it has overseen...at the sound it must make when its leaves are doused by a cooling summer rain.


At the base of the tree looking up through the limbs


the old 'ladder'



The base of this tree reminds me of old ladies' thick ankles...with the hose slipping down and wrinkling a bit, gathering up on tired feet swelling out of their orthopedic shoes.