The Great-Great-Great Grandmother Tree: A Moment of Sacred Stillness

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Where the Afternoon Became a Prayer

I went to visit Sparrow Hawk Farm near Sabinal, NM where my friend Beth lives, in early December . She keeps bees and makes candles and I went to buy some from her during her annual open house. I was the only customer at the moment. There was hot apple cider simmering on the stove and she graciously poured me a mug full. She mentioned she had to go turn the water off out where the animals were and asked if I wanted to tag along. We walked out the back door into the afternoon sunshine and passed under a cottonwood tree. 

I noticed an old children’s playhouse but didn’t pay much attention to the tree. We went down a fairly steep path that opened up to a grazing pasture that was fenced and inside the fence were more than a dozen chickens and a rooster. The hens were of varying colors and one had about five fairly good-sized chicks with her. There were also half a dozen sheep and two big white dogs, probably Great Pyrenees, but I didn’t ask her about their breed. They were, as she called them, guard dogs. They probably took really good care of the sheep and chickens, but to me they were curious and sweet
A cat sits in the old children's playhouse in the great-great-great-grandmother tree.

Beth got excited to show me the place where she started a blue oyster mushroom growing as she turned off the water. We stood around another minute and then went back up the path. She was telling me about something when I noticed the tree we had passed by on the way to the animals. It stopped me in my tracks. It was so big, so gnarly, so wide, so immense that I couldn’t hear what she was saying anymore and asked her if we could just stop a minute so I could take it all in. It might have been that two trees grew into one. It was so hard to distinguish this, but Beth thought that might be the case. Nonetheless, she called it a great-, great-, great-grandmother tree. I believe it was. I felt this peace come over me. I could feel a sacred reverence washing over my chest like warm water. I couldn’t move and I couldn’t turn my eyes away from it. I felt so still and safe and serene. Finally after a few more minutes I got closer so I could touch it and thank it for being there. Beth thanked me. She said she walks by the tree a couple times a day and hardly takes notice of it anymore. She was glad that I got her to do that. I hated to go back in the house, but we did, but not before turning around on the other side of that tree. Up on a platform her kids used to sleep on in the summers was a neighborhood cat, a stray that hangs out at Beth’s farm. She looked pretty happy up in the great-, great-, great-grandmother tree. I would be, too.  

I left Beth’s soon after that and drove a few miles to a bird refuge and meandered through it slowly, listening for the sound of the cranes flying in to roost for the evening. I wanted to bask in this feeling a little while longer before getting back on the interstate to get back home about 30 minutes away. I was so glad I made the trip up for the candles I use in my meditations, and the whole afternoon felt like one.