I'm so grateful we got our coastal fog back, and that people joined in to send love and visions of cool air and gentle breezes when I sent out a message on social media (after hearing from so many people checking in on me) that we had been put on emergency evacuation notice here.  We were surrounded by fires burning out of control, without adequate firefighters to deal with the situation, and more dry lightning storms predicted last weekend.  And now here where I am there is damp fog today, like yesterday, with our redwood trees dripping rain in the garden as usual, thank goodness.

I love the giant redwoods in my garden–and they are so tall (about 100 feet high, and very close to our house) and such gentle spirits.  I felt inspired to buy this house I live in over 30 years ago because of the giant redwood about six feet from one corner of the house–it just felt like the next best thing to living in a treehouse.

A request to care

This past year, a second redwood tree near the border of our property reached out to me and asked me to adopt it.  This came to my attention in the form of a weakened branch falling at my feet one day, when I was standing in my garden about 10-15 feet away from the base of that tree.  The branch was dry and the needles on it were brown, and it had dropped to my feet so suddenly and with such precision (landing just exactly in front of me, as I'd just walked to that spot) that it was evident to me that this redwood sought my full attention.  I looked up at the redwood and asked (in my heart and mind), “What do you wish to tell me?” and that was when I could clearly sense it asking my mind and heart, “Will you care for me?”   I was so surprised and of course said “Yes!” in a heartbeat, and have been giving it love and energy and water ever since.  I felt a bit silly that I'd so long (over 30 years) been assuming that redwood “belonged to the person who owned the neighboring property.”  Obviously the tree is sentient, and obviously (to me anyway) it's health was at risk, and it knows that by connecting to me who will greet and love it every single day that I live here it can quickly come back into balance and health, which it is.  This is not something I could explain to the neighboring property owners, nor expect them to do—and besides, the redwood tree specifically made this request to me.  I see that I'm there with it every day, and others are not–though my rational mind did raise these thoughts, as you see!

I now am just gobsmacked by the realization that this gentle spirit of a redwood tree is helping me recognize that not just wooden fences, but any kind of human-designed barrier or boundary might have some good reasons for existing, but in some situations can probably be best disregarded or even completely ignored, for the best for all concerned. Clearly, there are reasons for boundaries, and I fully intend to respect the boundaries of the fence between my property and my neighbor's.  Just as clearly, some aspects of what we humans think we may “own” we more correctly are here to care for, and there is such a profound and significant difference between “owning” and actually caring.  Since adopting this second redwood tree, I see it now looks visibly healthier and larger–just in a few months time.  Logically, there is no way it could be so much larger in girth after just a few months of loving care, yet I have often seen things dramatically change much more quickly than be explained or understood by classical Boolean logic.

Friends and colleagues checked in to make sure I was alright, while numerous email, phone, and news messages all repeated the warning that dry lightning strikes were anticipated in the next two day period of “Red Flag” alert.  I posted a status update to social media, including mention that I was feeling “positive and prayerful,” and turned away from electronic media and the internet to tune in with the weather systems, and to feel caring, heartfelt love for California.  Hundreds of people blessed me with love, positive visualizations, prayer, and healing energy–which I could palpably feel.  I could also sense the weather systems indeed seemed to be transforming from the expected dry lightning with high winds to no lightning and very little wind, together with beautifully cool, damp, fog.  Through the night I could hear rain falling on my roof, as a redwood tree caught fog and brought it down to earth as rain.