My dad was somewhat of a naturalist and used to teach us about different birds and trees. So did a fifth grade teacher who made a lasting impact on me; to this day, I remember his lessons about counting the needles on pine trees, seeing if they are twisted or straight, and about checking the tips of oak leaves to see if they are pointed or lobed.
It would be nice to find a 'planet of trees and birds' in the space; only trees and birds, millions of different trees and millions of different birds!
Broad-streeted Richmond . . . The trees in the streets are old trees used to living with people, Family trees that remember your grandfather's name.
Hugging trees has a calming effect on me. I'm talking about enormous trees that will be there when we are all dead and gone. I've hugged trees in every part of this little island.
Bluestar blinked. "There are cats who would argue that there should never have been a fifth Clan in the forest at all. Why are there four oaks at Fourtrees, if not to stand for the four Clans?" Firestar gazed up at the massive oak trees, then back at Bluestar. Fury pure as a lighting flash rushed through his body. "Are you mouse-brained?" he snarled. "Are you telling me SkyClan had to leave because there weren't enough trees?
9/11 did not really impact me, but I remember sitting in my 6th grade math class. I remember the teachers just being in a panic and turning on our TVs and I remember the impact in the look of just disbelief and sadness and shock that was on my teacher's face.
Everything is made out of Magic, leaves and trees, flowers and birds, badgers and foxes and squirrels and people. So it must be all around us. In this garden-in all the places.
I did my first play in fifth grade. This same fifth grade teacher asked me several years later what I wanted to do when I grew up. I knew the most fun I'd had was doing the play in her class, so when I told her that, she began to take me to local theater auditions and became my mentor and friend, and to this day continues to be.
Sometimes since I've been in the garden I've looked up through the trees at the sky and I have had a strange feeling of being happy as if something was pushing and drawing in my chest and making me breathe fast. Magic is always pushing and drawing and making things out of nothing. Everything is made out of magic, leaves and trees, flowers and birds, badgers and foxes and squirrels and people. So it must be all around us. In this garden - in all the places.
And the needles of the pine trees, freshly washed to a deep, rich green, shimmered with droplets that blinked like clear crystals.
I remember liking to write stories pretty early on. In fourth or fifth grade, they would give us the beginning of a story, and we were supposed to finish it. I remember liking that. But I didn't think about deciding to become a writer until high school at about the age of 16.
Last century, when the beams needed replacing, carpenters used oak trees that had been planted in 1386 when the dining hall was first built. The 14th-century builder had planted the trees in anticipation of the time, hundreds of years in the future, when the beams would need replacing. Did the carpenters plant new trees to replace the beams again a few hundred years from now?
We did not come to remain whole.
We came to lose our leaves like the trees,
Trees that start again.
I'd love to go back and teach primary school. I used to teach fourth grade and fifth grade. I'd love to spend several years teaching kindergarten or maybe third grade.
I go to schools in L.A., and I teach lessons. I run with the girls and teach them things about bullying and gossip. For instance, we'd play things like telephone, where you can actually see how words get twisted.
I remember being, like, 5 years old, and my dad took me to a Yankees-Mets game. My dad had me on his shoulders and taught me one of the most important lessons about sports. He said, 'Jesse, just remember one thing, the Mets suck.'
I remember when my mother taught me about my menstrual cycle and pregnancy. She, like millions of other mothers before and since, did not have the words or the experience to teach me about the miraculous cycle in my body - the cycle that is responsible for all human life on our planet and connects us to the moon and the tides. Nor did she have the words to teach me about the gift of sensual pleasure that is the birthright of all girls. If she had, my life surely would have been different. For one, I probably would not have suffered from devastating menstrual cramps for decades.