The trees wanted me to remind you

The trees wanted me to remind you of where you come. Of the land from which you are made. Of the way you may think you are alone, and yet are deeply connected in an ecosystem of energy exchange. What worry is keeping you up at night, dear one? Are you thinking about unrealized potential or how to pay rent and the medical bill due next week? Are you worried about how to help your child succeed in school? Or on the sports field? Or in their future? Are you terrified of the monsters in power? The basic human rights being stolen from us? Another system? Another story? A made-up tale of who we are supposed to be and what a good life should look like? The trees want me to tell you every worry on this list was collectively imagined. It does not have to be like this. We agreed on it, and so it is. But the trees know better. The natural order does not require taxes, land ownership, or school districts. It doesn't contain education standards, health insurance, or fascism. Certainly not TikTok, the PTA, or political borders. Even marriage, food distribution, and single-family homes were imagined by the humans who came before us. Do you see? We can make up something different. Maybe I've written this before. Some truths are like that, worn soft from handling, needing to be turned over and over until they stop being ideas and become the way we live. This is a time for experimenting. For reimagining. For play. What is possible? Can we find our own corners of the earth? Create pockets ofrefugia* so that we can live and thrive during (and after) the crumbling of this system? The trees are the first ones who told me to sell my house and choose a less-than-typical living arrangement. I'm not the first to release over half of my earthly possessions to move toward more freedom. Space to breathe. Space for community and care and a lighter footprint. It's hard to give up the story of security and safety even though I know it comes from a structure of colonial possession and extraction. But I'm imagining something different. I want to tread lightly. To tend and gather. To teach and learn and heal and create and dance and sing and listen . . . I want to return. I don't know how. I'm making it up as I go. I'm sure you are too. But I'm listening to the wisdom of the trees and following their lead, even when, especially when, it goes against everything I've been taught to be right or smart. I'm done being smart. I'm here to be wise. I'm so glad you're here,xo.a kitchen table pages is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.