A Memory of Childhood

I am young --- somewhere between 8-10 years old -- and I am sitting in one of my favorite places on earth, on a bluff overlooking my river back home. To my left and just down the hill slightly from me is a very tall, old pine tree that has withstood many storms that have felled lesser trees and even some that seemed greater. It must have very strong roots buried in the soil covering the rock of the bluff. While the roots cannot grow down perfectly straight because of the angle of the hill on which the tree grows, the trunk is straight and gives rise to many lush branches which produce many cones that are its way of reproducing itself. I love that tree.

I sit just over the crest of the hill so that I can't be seen unless someone walks close to the edge of the bluff and looks. Just from the road or even from the monument on the flat ground away from the edge of the bluff I can't be seen. That is fine with me; this is my secret place where I can hide in plain sight, where I can sit alone yet not entirely alone. I have the river, the tree, the birds and grass and all of nature to keep me company. I live in a small town and don't fear violence or danger because everybody knows everybody else and crime just doesn't happen there. I'm glad I grew up in that kind of safety.

The river below fascinates me with its tides and changes. Uncle Roy, who lived on the bluff several miles away, taught me to look at the river and see the ebb and flow of the tide without looking at the sandy beach below. He taught me to see the areas of red tide and the eddies where the rocks were close to the surface. I had already learned to see the imaginary white horses that rode to shore when the winds blew and the storms were coming and to listen to the gentle rush of the small wavelets as they lapped against the shore, pushing shells, bits of seaweed and other flotsam against the sand. I can't always hear the river's sounds from my perch on the bluff but hearing by the ears isn't always the only way of listening. I watch the color of the water change from blue to brown to gray and back again, not every time I visit it and certainly not changing color as quickly as chameleons and geckos can. Still, it happens and it reiterates that the river is a living thing, changing according to circumstance and reacting according to outside situations.

As I sit near the tree and look out at the river, I feel the soft leather of the book I brought with me. I bring it quite often when I visit this spot and even if I don't have it with me, parts of it are engraved on my brain and come to mind easily. I was given the white book on a special occasion and was told to treat it respectfully. Somehow taking it with me to the bluff didn't seem to be disrespectful; after all, what better place to read the Psalms, the book I usually chose to read, than sitting alone in the midst of creation with God's creatures around me. Sometimes I read to the tree, sometimes just to myself -- and God. It was very easy to feel God there, probably easier than almost anywhere else I have ever been. It is my childhood "sacred space," more sacred even than the church I attended every Sunday and sometimes during the week for rehearsals, Bible study or prayer meeting. It was my very own church and I loved being there.

The last time I went home it had changed. I could no longer sit where I had so often as a child and watch the river because the hillside had been covered with gigantic vines with huge leaves that blocked the view while, I suppose, "stabilizing" the soil of the bluff so that it did not erode and endanger the monument. Still, my tree was there, looking older and a little more tired as if competing for nutrients the vines stole from the pine tree's reserve was becoming too hard a task. The river seemed to watch the struggle but could only observe from its bed, the part of the world God had carved out for it. That was some years ago. Does the tree still stand? Has someone cut some of the vines so the river can be seen again? Have human beings "improved" the whole area so that it seems more natural and more stable? I don't know.

I only know that I have the memory of the safety and comfort of the place I love best in the world. For me, that will be what "home" is: the river, the bluff, the tree -- and God's presence.