Melting
By: Serena Bian
Tags: Reflections, Trees, Life

The second moment happened to me while I was walking, early evening, along the reservoir close to home, listening to Taylor Swift’s Folklore, facing a cold winter air head on. I felt joyful to be surrounded by this alive winter breeze, welcoming the wind and her dynamic expressions as they whipped past my ears, travelled down my neck, and loosened pieces of my braided hair carelessly onto my shoulders. I felt gladly alone. I stood in sweet, ambitious solitude. I felt livened by the trees surrounding me, each without a care for human emotions, peering up at the expansive evening sky. I pressed onwards, moving my eyes between the sky, the trees, and the ground, weary of the ice that had developed over the grass.

Once I reached the end of the reservoir loop, rather than crossing the street to head directly home, I turned around to re-walk the loop, challenging myself to notice new features of a path that I daily encounter.

I found myself tracing the footsteps of large, heavy boot tracks moving in the opposite direction. To my delight, these thick boot tracks were superimposed with playful, rambunctious puppy paws. I sensed in these steps an independent, yet loyal canine — though she roamed to the edges of this spacious trail, her paw prints never strayed so much as an inch off-trail. She seemed to draw the limits of her exploration around her anonymous owner, around those steady, dense steps… I suddenly caught the story my head was developing about these nameless, fascinating characters. I beckoned myself out of my mind, and back into my body. My feet continued to trace those steps home.

As I rounded the last corner, another sudden, cool breeze surged past me from behind, shooting upwards to meet the neighboring forest. My meditative body-in-motion lurched to a gentle halt. I stood there, hands warmly tucked into fuzzy coat pockets, and turned to face a grove of lanky pine trees, staggering themselves across a flat field of forest brush. The wind was singing to my body using the towering trees as its instrument.

My eyes fixated upon a shorter, willowy tree, tucked behind several layers of taller trees. She stood 20 feet from me, elegantly in the distance, with layers upon layers of graceful, arching, dark-green arms. She appeared to be shimmering with the wind! Every branch was dancing, bopping up and down at times, swaying side to side during others, all the while holding a strong, firm core. All the forest winds seemed to be converging around her ornamental body, as though they were as enraptured by her presence as I was. In a sea of grey bark, her dark brown trunk and unabashed dance felt sacred. She whispered, “stop thinking”; she offered, “start feeling”. So I felt. I felt the strength of her roots, the playfulness of her limbs, and the beauty of her emerald green hair.

Why was I so taken by her? I think she reminded me of my future self. Who, having melted like ice, and danced like wind, I would miraculously become someday. A wave of admiration swept over me. I prayed for her — I prayed that she receive my love, my excitement, and my dreams. I longed to see what she saw, and to be what she embodied. I wanted to discover why I felt so proud of her. Caught in this longing, I soon realized, she was praying for me too. She sent me her compassion and benevolence. She sent me her quiet confidence. Her radiance, unadulterated. Her open wounds had been licked clean — her scars still apparent, but smoothed over with sweet sap, fertilized with community, and watered with grace.

Standing there, in a 24-year old body facing a forest of Jeffrey Pine trees, I knew that I was participating in something much larger than myself. Something connected to the trees. To the stars. To people. And to my past, present, and future self.

Eventually, I moved on from that moment, away from the trees, and continued along the path home. Fresh pinecones had appeared since I first crossed this path. I lightly kicked them out of the way, clearing a path home for myself.