After all the cold rain of late, a walk in the woods in our backyard was unexpected. After all, it is February. It wasn’t supposed to be 65 degrees. Walking with Little One, the rare warm February afternoon afforded unique opportunities to explore the world of nature. Still, it didn’t start out to be a wonderfully sad day, but it soon became one when she climbed a tree for the very first time.
A small oak, just off the main path through the woods, was her tree of choice. Usually one of the heartiest trees in any forest, this tree was anything but. Countless storms have graced our area the last couple of years, uprooting many of the trees in our backyard, but not this one. The resilient little oak survived all that had been thrown its way, although not without scars of that survival being evident.
Oak trees, normally with straight trunks, grow to a height of 40 feet or more. Not the tree chosen by Little One to be her first climb. Now the trunk of the oak was barely 10 feet small having been twisted by strong winds and bent under the weight of five ice storms. Once long limbs, broken and shortened by the same storms, were mere stubs less than three feet long.
The tree’s sparse leafing was unable to provide little, if any, shade or serve as a refuge for birds, and the tree wasn’t tall enough to harbor a squirrel’s nest. I was unable to see value in the tree and considered it useless. It was one I had slated to cut down in order to clear a space for a new sandbox, but no longer. To me, the tree was grotesque. But to Little One it was beautiful and perfect. She had seen what I couldn’t. At the moment, the small oak had become the most important tree in the entire forest.
Without any prompting, Little One walked past all the other trees on the pathway and stood before the bent oak. Although different from all the other trees, she alone had seen the hidden value it had to offer. She started to climb.
I stood nearby, half amazed at her climbing skill, and half paralyzed with fear every branch higher she went. Thankfully, a sharp bend in the trunk and the sudden absence of limbs halted her advancement at five feet. High enough when you’re only three feet tall to feel like a great accomplishment had been achieved and definitely high enough for a concerned Big Papa standing nearby.
Watching her climb was indeed a wonderful experience, right up to the point she stopped, looked down and said angelically, “You climb, Papa.”
In an instant I was back on Flamingo Street with my three brothers and all the kids from the neighborhood. I remembered the endless hours of fun we had climbing up trees and riding them back to the ground and of the many tree forts built with any scrap wood we could find. I thought of the rope swings tied to the limb of the giant oak that stood on the near shore of the swimming lake behind our house and having to be rescued by the local fire department after being stuck at the top of a 50-foot tree for hours.
I thought of all these things as I reached for the limb she was sitting on to help her down. The pain of three shoulder operations, two bicep repairs, and one hip operation shot through my body and mind as a stark reminder. Tree climbing is an activity for the very young.
With Little One safely back on the ground, I sadly responded, “Papa’s tree climbing days are over. But let me tell you about a time when your Papa was a young boy and climbed trees just like a squirrel. It was a long, long time ago on a street not so far away.”
[Rick Ryckeley has been writing stories since 2001. To read more of Rick’s stories, visit his blog: storiesbyrick.wordpress.com.]
