Lean on Me

Yesterday, I took my dear surrogate parents to Muir Woods for a hike among the redwoods. They were visiting from Detroit, and this was their one requested activity, so we made it happen.

Since I moved here, I’ve been spending more and more time walking in national parks, which is a beautiful benefit of living in this part of the country. I have found so much life within myself on those trails. Nature is a gifted storyteller, constantly weaving together history and the present with just enough whimsy to inspire dreams and hope for an equally inspiring future.

Nature persists. Despite every attempt to ruin her, she marches the fuck on, and honestly, that’s my kind of protagonist.

I'd be lying if I told you I haven’t daydreamed about gossiping with trees on my walks. They’d make incredible gossip buddies, spilling tea on everything from the roots to the sky. Imagine learning the inner workings of a bird family from a tree:
“She flew off, and the next one flew in.”

There is no way birds don’t have a little mischief in them with all that ability to fly hither and thither. I peep your game, birds.

The more serious lesson is this: if you allow it, nature will talk to you. She will show you new possibilities or hand you a necessary reminder of how to live and survive even the darkest days.

Walking in the woods with your elders creates the perfect pace for listening to nature, especially when you’re lucky enough to be in the presence of people who didn’t just get older but got wiser. They understand that walking those paths places you in a classroom surrounded by gifted teachers. You can walk slowly enough to listen and perhaps even learn something new.

Muir Woods is a collection of redwoods, the oldest of which is 800 years old. That’s a level of sagacity you can’t buy.

It’s spectacular in scale. If you need to feel small, or to be reminded that you, a human, are just one part of the ecosystem that makes this world possible, stand next to a redwood.

At some point deep into the trail, we came across a phenomenal sight.

Across the path from each other stood two trees. One was massive and ancient. The other, much smaller, had started to fall. In one version of this story, it would have dropped to the forest floor and eventually been moved to clear the way for people like me to walk, unencumbered by nature’s goings-on.

But this tree had a different fate.

That big, old, wise tree standing firmly across the trail had, at some point, split into two parts, creating a perfect place for the toppling tree to rest. When I walked up and followed the arc of the tree that looked destined to fall, I saw it was secured just a stone’s throw away by the other tree.

Well. I nearly burst into tears.

There have been more than a few moments in my life when it felt like the circumstances were such that I was being toppled, with no hope of rising from the ground of my failures or life’s random punches. I could feel my feet giving way beneath me, and every single time, I’ve been caught by someone or something. I’ve never been left to hit the floor completely.

Even the tree that split in two, likely years before, had a purpose. What might appear to others as a failure of natural design was, in fact, perfectly architected for a future not yet here. Its value to the community existed, even if it remained unseen until the right moment.

Delayed, not denied.

In this life, I’ve been both the fallen and the catcher. I’ve been split in ways that made me question my value. But playing both parts is a reminder that the ecosystem you were placed in is not random. It is not without purpose.

You are exactly where you need to be to be lifted—and to lift others.

Both roles are necessary.

For such a time as this, your unique value to the community exists.