No one loves my ancient cottonwood but me. It really is a country tree but its been here before those houses were and it gives every indication it fully intends to stay. It had squatters rights and I for one am happy to claim it. I talk to it when storms are impending asking it to cause no harm. It seems to understand for when it drops large branches from time to time it’s been careful to do so in such a way no damage is done.

I always bless it before a storm and I’m careful to thank it for its gifts of fresh oxygen and shade from the summer sun.

I believe that all living things posses a level of consciousnesses and that we can communicate in some inexplicable nonverbal fashion. It amazes me to no end when I see how quickly the green nations take over any corner of our world left its own devices.

Some say that if we humans all left en mass, it would be no more that a few years before the memory of our presence was erased.

One has only to see an abandoned lot to know how quickly this can happen especially in climates that have no winter.

It’s as though nature herself is just waiting in the wings to erase all traces of the human race. Even now they are things growing in my garden that I didn’t plant. They are strangers to me. I do not know their names. So I let them grow and wait to see what sort of blooms they will offer for me to admire. I like it that way.