The Shade Tree

Isn’t October lovely? I think this is the most beautiful October I remember in recent years. With no wind or snow storm to deter them, the trees are standing in their glory. While walking amongst them this week, I listened to a podcast about creativity and writing.

One of the speakers described herself as creative but entirely too pragmatic to allow herself that in daily life. Always too many “shoulds;” creativity felt indulgent. I am empathetic to this. Last night, we were out to dinner with family, and there was a silly question on the kids’ menu: what flavor of cake are you?

Easy.

Vanilla.

Right? Pragmatic. Checklist. To Do. Yes!

A few weeks back, I was checking off “clean out my bedside drawer” when I came upon this book. I have had it since college.

I gingerly opened it as pages fell out. I expected to cringe as I reread my younger self’s words. But, they weren’t too bad actually. It reminded me of a time when creativity felt part of instead of in addition to.

This type of book is designed to support a daily writing habit- you know, a prompt a day sort of thing. Most writers likely do write with great frequency (I write emails every day – does this count?). I so enjoyed reading these prompts and, for a moment or two, I forgot about cleaning the drawer. It just so happened that one of the daily prompts was titled simply, “Shade Tree.”

Though shade implies summer (which is what I pictured as I wrote), I actually cannot think of a better time to sit beneath a tree than right now.

What would your story be?

I thought I would share mine, because … perhaps, why not?

The Shade Tree

The oak waited for her to come. She was as common to it as the water to its roots and the sparrow to its branch.

Each day she came, usually some time after the sun peeked over the eastern sky but long before it bathed the tree in overhead heat. The oak waited while the wind pushed and the rain pelted. It waited even when its naked sticks and bones body was dressed in little more than a January icicle. She would come.

With her she brought a red cloth bag. A faded yellow daisy was stitched onto the canvas with thread, and she carried it slung over her right shoulder. Her left hand clung to the intersection where the red handles met the sack. Because the bag had no zipper, no protection from the rain or hot sun, she clutched the bag so tightly some days that her fingers tips felt raw. On those days, she quickly slung the bag down upon a piece of the oak’s roots that was jutting up and created a sort of crevice for protection.

When the blood rushed back to her white fleshy tips, she leaned over the bag and laid her head upon it like a pillow. There, on the dirt beneath the giant oak, she curled herself into a C shape, her bottom tucked into a soft bend in the trunk, her legs sprawled out upon the buds beyond it.

From here, she could turn her head to the left and look up to see the negative space where the sun silhouetted fluttering leaves. Then, as any other day, she held her breath and began to count the patterns in the sky.