Talking Trees

This morning when I looked out at this white bounty bestowed upon our yard, my first response was “What beauty--so lacy and bright white!”  My immediate next response was to notice how my normally upright trees were bowed so low.  Hearing their moans and groans, I ran for a broom to brush burdens from each piece of greenery within my reach.  This was more important to me than shoveling our seventy-five foot drive.   

As I went from tree to tree, some needed only a light touch from the broom to drop their snow.  Others were more stubborn.  I had to shake the branches.  But when the snow finally fell, I could almost hear “thank yous“ as the branches swooped back up to their normal positions.  Unfortunately, even after I removed snow from the evergreen we always decorate with lights at Christmas, its branches have not yet bounced back to their beautiful conical shape.  

And, as Paul and I were shoveling the drive, some snow-burdened branches crashed from tall trees to the ground.  After last night’s snowfall, our back yard looks a bit like a war zone.

This exercise of blogging has gotten me thinking about what I do and why I do it.  Do other people hear trees groan and say thank you?  Am I over-identifying with the trees?  How much of creation is mine to care for?  Am I willing to be shaken to relieve too-heavy burdens?  If only the boundaries on my caregiving responsibilities/opportunities were as easy to recognize as the lines Paul drew in the snow for our shoveling a path in the driveway!