Articles - by Jim Larsen

TREES AND BRIGHT WATER

What is it with trees and bright water?

What is this hold they have on me...entrancing...captivating...owning my soul? I listen and seem to hear my name whispered among the willows.

The Woods Spirit stands there in the shadows with weathered face and pale blue eyes. He winks a wink of invitation.
"You belong here...yes, you belong here."

He turns and melts into the darkness and waits for me...waits for me to scurry after him through the curtain of pines. But will he wait? Will he give up on me and go on? Life back there is right. It is the place of the rested heart.

But voices about and behind shout, "No! You are one of us! Behave yourself." There is no escaping the land of ticking watches and the nervous drumming of fingers...and the certainty of duty.

So I await Heaven and pray that God knows something of the sudden sweep of cool across the pond at sunset. Does He, like me, understand the thrill of heavy wool jackets and the peace of huddling under a leaning fir in the rain? Surely he knows the magic of lofting a Royal Coachman to the riffles head and tending the line as it dances over the Steelhead's lair. Has he ever gathered wood for a midnight fire by the stream?

Tell me He has. Tell me!

I can wait for that. Can wait to slip my slender canoe through the cattails where muskrats and beaver glide unawares.

Tell me that God is not all bright lights and paved streets in His City of Gold. And don't take away the cold. It is good to need a dancing fire, hot chocolate and warm berry pie. Tell me of frozen lakes and colored leaves that race across the forest floor...and dark old bucks that paw for acorns under distant oaks at dusk.

And if Heaven is a rest from my labors, can I split wood just for the fun of it...and stack it...and take joy in looking at it piled eye-high throughout the winter? Can I?

There is something about plenty of wood and wool.

What is it with trees, bright water and me?

Jim
Feb 1993

(In honor of my father, my father-in-law, my son, my sons-in-law, my brothers-in-law, those grandboys and other guys who hope there is a bit of Oregon in Heaven.)

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