My love for the deep woods began as a small child. The doors to the house would be locked during the afternoon, and I would spend hours following the stream flowing from the natural spring in the woods behind the house, communing with faeries and making potions with mushrooms and berries and moss. When it’s time for me to dive back in amongst the arboreal groves, a yearning pulls my heart as rope with a grappling hook. With the golden goddess in tow, I set out to answer the song in my heart.
As it is early in the day, we find ourselves to have only the company of squirrels and woodpeckers. Thick with pine needles and fallen leaves, our favorite trail is soft, carpeted and cushioned for quiet passage under the autumn canopy. The ferns have turned golden, and I am reminded briefly of mature wheat in the Kansas wind, although that thought fades as quickly as it came to the chatter and babble of a nearby stream splashing its way down to the reservoir. I find that these memories that used to pervade my thoughts I no longer have desire or will or cause to chase after, and their transience is truly most welcome. Moondog dives in, tail wagging and drinking her fill.
It has been a minute since I was last here. Spring, in fact. The air is different now – musky and sweet, an exhale of relief settling into the soil. As we make our way over root and rock, I notice trees that once stood towering above had broken with the last strong windstorm. One in particular, an old oak, long stripped of its branches and bark, has broken approximately a third of its height up. The remaining trunk and branches balance between the long stump and another nearby oak tree. It appears as if the young stout oak was cradling the fallen with its sturdy branches, and softening the effects of the weather with its bountiful leaves. A soft breeze sways the branches, and they rock gently to and fro, creaking.
After a few hours, the longing in Luna’s eyes tell me it is time. I hate to leave. I could very easily craft a small home, nestled inside the cove created by ancient stone walls that run throughout the woods. I’d roast acorns, forage mushrooms and berries, and make friends with the creatures that also call this wood home, and Luna would continue to, much to my chagrin, snack on deer droppings. Ducking behind a wall to pee, I’m greeted with the swoosh of a hawk, diving feet above my head and landing in a nearby skeleton of a tree. He looks our way as I’m tugging up my jeans, and flies off as quickly and quietly as he came.
Life as we know it will someday not be as it is. We break. Grow older. We fall. If we are so lucky, someone may just happen to be there to catch us and soften the journey. If we are luckier, we will be the one doing the catching. I was reminded today there is as much grace and beauty involved in the falling as there is in the support of the fallen. We all have our time. We all have our season. We all have our turn.
“Love is the only prayer I know.” Marion Zimmer Bradley, The Mists of Avalon
A Walk In Neverland 