December 17th, 2024
I love waking up and turning the Christmas tree lights on before any other light comes up in the yard or house. I begin my day by sitting quietly in the soft light of the tree and let myself meditate and marvel in the sheer idea that I am in the presence of a tree!
A tree in my living room!. A tree! Think about it! Christmas trees are planted and cultivated just so that they can be chopped down at a very young age, adopted for a short time, adorned, and admired. It is a unique encounter.
We all have protocols around getting the tree. For years, I asked my good friend Adriane, who is Jewish Orthodox, to join me for this event. Because she grew up without this ritual, she helped make it all the more special. Together, we would go from lot to lot to carefully choose the best tree by tilting it up and giving it a little shake to see if it measured up. Last year, I took Adriane all the way up to PA so she could experience chopping one down on a Christmas tree farm! When we finally found the tree, we paused, held our hands to it, and said a special prayer of thanks in Hebrew, whereby she chanted the prayer, and I repeated it. After surprising the people around us, we mindfully placed it in my big family car and headed home with the car packed with the smell of pine and its huge evergreen aura.
My friend Adriane moved last January to Israel, making at last her Aliyah: her great return to her homeland. For as long as I have known her, Adriane and her husband have saved and held the life long dream to retire to Israel and be with family. This dream was so strong that they moved to Israel even in the midst of war and great turmoil. Now, she is the one transplanted, and I am the one left with a hole in my ground that is hard to fill. In missing, and I admit worrying about her, I asked my daughter Maya if she would take her place and go with me when she got home from college. Most years, my family seemed a bit too busy and indifferent to go with me for a tree, but this year with ease and perhaps a little nostalgia, Maya, on her first morning back, woke up in her own bed, threw on some sweats, ate a THB bagel, jumped in the car and a new ritual began.
We all have our traditions around going to get our tree. We delight and often argue about how to decorate it and relish discovering each ornament and sharing is history. For 30 years whenever we went on vacation, we would take a moment in some store or another and pick the perfect ornament to remember our trip. Our tree is a story tale packed with mermaids, trolls, fairies, and angels, all hand-crafted by the local artists of the region. When we unpack the big ornament box, we look forward to sharing and passing these fragile memories from hand to hand and look forward to the different people who will pop in and sit around the tree with us. Often, we will say, “It’s a good tree. A good tree.”
There are not too many plants that experience this magical interaction with humans. What other plant plays such role on such a wide scale? Science can now measure the biofields and sounds of plants, the way we can do EKGs and MRIs on the body. They watch and see how and where the plant lights up when its caregiver comes into the house after being out and coming home. They also observe and note how it lights up right before it’s watered and fed and quites down satisfied. These studies prove that plants reach out toward us, shake and wiggle even hum in our presence. They acknowledge us. They consider us. On some level, they know that, like them, we are alive. Like them, we are sentient beings. “A “sentient being” is a creature capable of experiencing feelings and sensations, meaning it can perceive and respond to stimuli like pain, pleasure, joy, or fear, essentially having the ability to feel emotions and have subjective experiences.”
When we take a tree that has been in a field of other trees, and we disconnect it from its web of life and sustenance, we pull it into our field of light, into our complex human web of life. We make it holy. We honor it! We ritualize it! This is a unique relationship and with a little mindfulness and imagination, we can make it an even more magical encounter.
So this year, along with just watering your tree and complaining about pine needles, put your hand gently just outside of its branches and say a gentle, energetic “hi”. When you walk by take a moment and feel how it reaches out and touches the edges of you, how it hums. In return for the gift of its life, bless the tree, thank it, and whisper from deep in your grateful heart, “Do you know what you are? You are a Christmas tree!” Taken from Bonnie Tarantino.com
