The Life Inside of Sleeping Trees

Thoughts on Winter Solstice

A few nights ago, it was the winter solstice, “the longest night of the year” in North America. While this probably seems like a quaint concept to the people of Svalbard, Norway—who endure three months without a single sun rise—here we are keenly aware of the shift, the incredible brevity of light.

For myself, December 21^st is also anniversary of the bombing of Pam Am Flight 103: the loss of 270 souls in the air and on the ground, including my magical friend, Sarah. I often wonder if the terrorists who chose that particular flight were aware that it was the winter solstice, or if it was just a random date to them. For myself, I choose to believe in divine symbolism, the idea that great darkness does exist, but cannot last forever. The light always precedes and procedes the darkness, because the light is always stronger.

I never got to say goodbye to Sarah, but on the last day of 1988, she bid farewell in the sunset, when the clouds above our home in rural Wisconsin parted to form a gigantic, golden “S,” blazoned across the sky. That “S” marked an ending but also a beginning, the awakening of my consciousness to “all that lies beyond,” all the great mysteries I still love to read and wonder about. In the end, I think death is only devastating to those it leaves behind. For the soul that passes, their journey continues “onward,” beyond what our little human brains can comprehend.

I think our most tangible proof of eternity lives in nature, in the re-creation of life that happens every spring. I am particularly moved by the transformation of deciduous trees. Although I’ve spent most of my life among deciduous trees, my last fifteen years in California—mostly among redwoods and a more subtle shift of seasons—seem to have blurred my memory of winter. When I moved back East this summer, I was amazed by the abundance of the lush green trees. But then, as ridiculous as it sounds, I started to get scared, dreading the thought of winter. I kept panicking myself with the question, “How will I stand it, when all the leaves are gone?”

What I had forgotten and have since been (very gratefully) reminded of, is that there is nothing as beautiful to me as barren tree branches. I am completely awestruck by the delicate, sculptural, and utterly artistic lines of every individual branch, interwoven like black lace against the white horizon. I also love the way tree branches mirror the veins in a human heart—and the idea of everything that exists beneath the branches, under the earth, in the root system that continues to grow throughout the winter, slow but certain, gathering strength for spring. The trees remind me that what appears to have passed is only paused, dreaming of its next incarnation. The trees are sleeping right now, but soon they will reawaken. The same applies to us.

Even when we feel like something has ended or nothing is happening around us, there is still so much happening inside of us. Whether or not you identify as a creator or storyteller, that is the truth of who you are. We all creators and stortytellers, always thinking and feeling and wondering and wishing and telling stories about everything, both in our heads and out loud, in conversation with each other. In the words of Pat Schneider, the heroic creator of the Amherst Writing Method, talking is just “telling stories on the air.” To be human is to tell stories. I love this about us, how funny, insightful, thoughtful, and wildly interesting we all are, whether we realize it or not. We tell stories about what happened to us and then we create the meaning. The impulse to create and tell stories goes on forever, an inward-growing—like tree roots—that no darkness can limit or contain.

Sometimes I read the news and am overcome with tragedy of the world, too much suffering and destruction. And yet, the darkness often evokes the light and breaks our hearts open. The challenge, as always, is to trust in things we cannot see, trust that the earth will spin back toward the sun and new life will return and will tell stories about it.

It was on the winter solstice that my lovely friend Nanou sent me this exquisite poem by Jan Richardson, “Blessing for the Longest Night,” which includes this stanza:

“This is the night
when you can trust
that any direction
you go,
you will be walking
toward the dawn.”

In an uncertain world, this is something we can trust. Trust that the dawn is inevitable and darkness passes and the soul goes on. And no matter what we’re up against right now, remember that there IS a power within us that can never be lost or diminished, that only grows stronger with time. Our power lives in the love that drives us—and the stories we tell about it.

Possible writing / pondering prompt:

Give yourself permission to stand outside—without thinking about anything or moving toward any goal—and just gaze at something(s) you love (flowers, plants, birds, trees, moss, water, the sky etc.) and breathe deeply and appreciate it, just as it is. Then ask yourself, “Who do I love the most?”

If you’re up for writing, write the story of what you love the most.

Therein lies your power.