Under The Trees

As I was coming down my back stairs into my laundry room, I saw them.
I stopped in front of the door and looked out across the street.
I saw a bike resting against the stop sign at the corner.
I saw figures walking under the trees.

And I remembered.

When my youngest daughter was seven years old, she loved imaginative play.
She would tell elaborate stories that explained whatever she was doing.
Sometimes, her play would mimic a book we were reading.
Sometimes, she pretended that she was a character from a story we loved.

She wanted to spread her wings a bit.
Playing outside our house was fine but she wanted more.
She wanted to play across the street by herself.
She wanted to play under the trees.

Our neighborhood is small and self-contained.
There is only one way in and one way out.
The cars we see driving by belong to the people that live here.
Even the carrier in the mail truck and the UPS driver are waved to each day.

I want to play under the trees, she said, her big brown eyes pleading.
What can you do there that you can’t do here? I asked wanting to see what she would say.
I want to pretend; I want to be alone, she explained.
I understood; it is hard to dream in a crowd.

The safety rules of crossing a street were gone over.
Unbeknownst to her, I could see her the entire time.
From my laundry room and from my dining room, I had a clear view.
She was not on our property so I reminded her to take care of it while she was there.

It became her go-to place.
It was her place of imagination and whimsy.
I could see her talking to someone who was very present to her but invisible to everyone else.
I could see her sitting on a clump of rocks that were under the trees.

She was away but not away.
She was far but not far.
She was alone yet not alone.
She was in her own world yet visible in mine.

I called our neighbor to let her know that my daughter loved to play under her trees.
I asked her if it was fine with her that my daughter played there.
It is more than fine; we love watching her from the window, my neighbor said.
We would love to eavesdrop on her play if we could, she confessed.

So would I, I remember thinking to myself.
A child needs freedom to imagine all by themselves.
A child needs to spread their wings as they grow more independent.
A child wants to expand their horizons but they like to know we are near.

One day, when we were on a walk together, we passed her place under the trees.
There’s your place, I said ready to walk on.
Want me to show you? She asked.
I sure do, I said excitedly.

She beckoned me to come to her special place.
She called me forth from my world into hers.
She invited me to be under the tress with her.
She shared something with me that meant so much to her.

Sit here, she said pointing to the clump of rocks.
I sat down on one of the taller ones.
She picked up a large stick that was laying nearby and began to stir.
Leaves, mulch, and seed pods were the ingredients in her special concoction.

She grabbed a large leaf.
She used a stick as her serving ladle and poured the mulch-y stew onto the leaf plate.
She handed me a twig that she had collected nearby that was to be my fork.
We dined under the trees together and no five-star restaurant was as elegant.

My child invited me in.
I accepted her invitation.
I entered a world that I had long forgotten.
I entered a world that I once inhabited as often as my daughter.

It was a precious place.
It was her place.
It had once been mine, under a different clump of trees.
It had grown too small or else I grew too big.

My daughter was Ma Ingalls cooking for Mary, Laura, and Carrie while Pa played his fiddle.
My daughter was a mommy making dinner for her family.
Rocks of various sizes were her children.
She was a teacher in a classroom and the clump of rocks was her desk.

I never realized the many places her imagination took her under the trees.
I was so glad that I got to see a glimpse of the wonder.
Soon after my invitation, her time under the trees diminished.
Her bike and the tree swing her dad made for her, replaced her special place.

When I saw the figures under the trees this morning, it was bittersweet.
My daughter is in college now.
A new group of children are bringing their imaginations to a clump of rocks under the trees.
Time marches on.

Sticks that were serving ladles are now guns and swords.
Oh, if those trees could talk, what stories they would tell.
A new set of parents will be invited in.
Hopefully, that new set of parents will go.

Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers. But his delight is in the law of the Lord and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers. (Psalm 1:1-3)

The trees have been there quite a while.
This area was once owned by William Penn.
The stone wall that is next to my side porch is the original farm wall.
Oh, if the trees could talk.

Then God said, Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it; according to their various kinds. And it was so. The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seeds according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good. (Genesis 1: 11,12)

The trees have been there quite a while.
The trees stand.
And it was good.
It still is.