Treewhispers

We called it the five-finger tree…each massive trunk reaching out to touch the sky.  At 8 or 9, species meant nothing.  In the field behind our house, I’d shimmy up my favorite trunk ensconcing myself high among the branches to watch the older kids play softball.  Scrapes from its knobby bark were my trophies.  By the time I took a botany class in college the five-finger tree had been cut down, so I never found out its species.  It was and is just the five-finger tree, the hand of God holding me.

Contributed by Laura Bertram