As a boy, I saw the trees as something larger than life. I always looked up to them. The town my grandparents lived in had big trees along the streets and on the properties. There were so many large trees that there was always shade. These big trees made their city so awesome. It was like being inside a forest!
Our family cottage was on the same property as a provincial park which was primarily forested. The roads through the park had tall trees lining the way. Light fell on the road at funny angles and the scent was something else. This forest had the greatest smells which were constantly changing. The morning was different from afternoon and evening was a bit like morning as things got quiet. There was a scent of heat in summer and of moist leaves in the fall.
We also had farming in our family, at the farm, the maples stood stately along the west lawn. Trees lined the creek as it twisted and turned away from the house in both directions. It was a magical place in the late afternoon and evening, sitting and relaxing as the trees shimmered above.
Our house had young trees as did the entire neighborhood. To be amongst larger trees, we had to walk to Thomson Park or Morningside Park. There were big trees here, some of them had shapes and names carved into the bark. I often wondered if a tree felt special that someone had picked it to carve something on.
The story below is a small sample of the joy I’ve experienced with trees and their greater family, the forest.
(Part One – An Introduction)
A most beautiful journey started in the summer of 2015. This is a story of how trees came to me, telling me their story and the wisdom within.
I began to visit a woodland area that summer in the greenbelt of our city. It immediately invited me into its heart and shared its beauty. I visited this forest many times that summer.
As the summer turned to fall then winter, I continued to visit. Walking the trails and breathing in all that I was offered. This forest had somehow captured my attention and I felt very at home with it.
Over the next few years, I found myself walking many forests near our home in Ottawa, but returning to this forest most often. I walked there when it was sunny and warm and also when it was not as nice. I walked these trials in the rain and the dead of winter. It was as though we had become family, there was a closeness I couldn’t explain or understand.
This place has a rolling terrain, with peaks and valleys. You could look across a ridge and down into the valley, or up from below and sense the strength that stood before you. This place had a character to it just like the kid at school who never really fell into the trap of normal. It was different here.
Being here was like taking a bath, you felt immersed in something like letting tea steep.
I was “taken” on walks and brought places, allowed to listen, and to be silent. Experience the nooks and crannies, or where open space gently merged into density. Watch the trail ahead turn a corner, or vanish deeper inward. To feel the trees as they touch each other high above my head. To hear the sweet song of birds and the rustle of animals.
It wasn’t new for me to feel into the forest, what was new was how the forest connected and led me through its most inner circle.
I could sense conversation in the ethers as I walked. Every footstep was being watched as I traveled deeper within the magic here.
(Part Two – The Song)
In 2019 I was doing what now was very natural for me, walking and simply being in the forest. It was a cold and damp March day. There was a breeze blowing through the upper reaches of the trees with gusts pushing harder at times. The trees were still partially frozen and made strange and eerie sounds as they moved. At one point I was invited to stop and listen.
The sound of bending and twisting above was chaotic, almost like a madman playing a wild and unknown instrument. I knew how unique these sounds were. Listening deeply I heard all the known sounds gradually disappear leaving an open space. It was here, in this opening that the trees sang to me. They sang for a long while and I didn’t move or adjust, letting them continue. When a new and stronger gust pushed the trees their song faded, then vanished.
I was still taking in what had just happened, quietly reaching for my phone. As I waited patiently the song came once more. This time I was recording and excited to know I might have a song to share.
I couldn’t believe what was happening and realized I had lost track of time. I was cold and wet and had been in this spot a very long time. It was time to move along.
Wandering through one of my favorite hollows I stopped to listen several times, the sounds were not the same here. I climbed a small hill bringing me into a grove of giant pines. Stopping here I listened again. These trees rolled differently as the wind pushed them westward, the crazy sound they made was also different. Then I happened, the singing began again!
It didn’t matter that I was cold and wet, what was happening was just too incredible to be cold.
Their song was very innocent and could be heard in every cell of my body. It was one of the most satisfying, calming, and peaceful sounds I’d ever heard. This song was “rich” in depth and flowed like a gentle breeze on loose-knit fabric.
At home that night I listened to the recording I had made, and could barely hear the song inside the crazy bending of trees. It was not the same. This made me sad until I realized this song would play again, and it would play where it belongs, in the forest.
(Part Three – The Beach)
What you’ll see here is more than just trees and land. There is a deep layer of sand beneath the grass and it’s exposed in many areas.
Going back to the last ice age this area was a gigantic ancient beach. Its hills and ridges are ancient dunes. The sand and earth below are fine and seem to hold much information and wisdom.
It took me a while to understand, but just like the calm we feel near the ocean, there is calm here. Deep within the forest is a holding tank of peaceful energy. Unlike a forest with large amounts of peat and decay the sand here creates a unique vibe. It’s like a magic carpet for all that lives upon it.
(Part Four – Voice within)
Walking in 2020 I wondered the age of a particular pine tree.
As I stood looking at the tree, I heard a voice inside me say “Ask it how old it is?” I stepped closer, placed my hand on the beautiful chunky bark, and said silently “How old are you?” Immediately I saw and heard the response as “48.” I said back “Thank you.”
Without thinking I questioned the tree “How do I know you are 48, how do I know you’re not 45 or maybe 50 years old?” An immediate sensation came through me, a massive smile and hug was my answer.
The forest had again stepped in to deepen our relationship.
I spent the rest of my walk asking trees their age and smiling as they responded, not overthinking the answer.
Over the days and weeks that followed I was introduced more deeply to this new concept. The trees had intended to force this interplay and allow the questions that came. It wanted me to get this out of the way.
One day shortly after the age conversation(s) I was offered a new challenge.
They said, “You need to photograph us.” And I responded, “I do photograph you. I’m not sure what you mean.”
They proceeded to break this request down for me as the following. “We need you to photograph us fully. We want you to show the essence of who we are.” I still didn’t understand and asked them to elaborate. They continued, “You see the forest through a bigger lens and this expansiveness needs to be in your pictures, all of it.”
I responded by saying “This is not possible, the essence of a forest is multi-dimensional and cannot be duplicated with a camera.” As I walked on, they brought me to different places within the forest and allowed 2 specific visuals to show how this could be done.
They showed me shooting from the middle outward, capturing all 360 degrees, both vertical and horizontal. The best way to describe these examples is with the analogy of a sunny room with visible dust particles floating gently in the air. And to take a picture of the entire room from within the dust cloud.
The forest wanted me to reproduce its expansiveness, exactly how I had come to see and know it.
(Part Five – The Stones)
Shortly after the message to expand my photographic lens came another bit of advice. These are not messages on paper as words, but more a tickle. Each subtle idea leads to another and finally becomes something of meaning, something tangible to work with.
I woke one Saturday morning with a new idea. To bring quartz crystals to the forest and intuitively place them to be left in the forest. Without giving it a second thought I headed to my office and took out some clear quartz, different sizes and shapes. Over the next several visits, I placed crystals in the forest. There was no advanced knowledge of the location, just a knowing that on my walk I’d be told where to put each stone and this is what I did. The forest knew what grid and program was needed and took care of this.
It sounds crazy, I know!
Here I was, trying to take pictures of multidimensional space and now placing quartz crystals around a forest.
I started to understand slowly what was going on. It was like an advertisement campaign, pictures were needed and the images would hold great energy. The forest I was told, would become an incredible place of healing, where anyone could visit, allowing their physical and energetic bodies to relax and heal.
We were increasing nature’s potential!
On later walks, I would look for the crystals I’d left previously and could not find all of them. I thought maybe they had been moved by animals but intuitively knew people who needed them had found them.
(Part Six – Unity)
Through the fall and winter of 2020, I noticed something new. Many trees large and small, crossed over each other and spun up and around each other. Trees grew together. Other trees grew side by side and halfway up their trunks would touch and then separate again. It was incredible that I hadn’t noticed this intertwined nature before.
During these winter months, I coined the phrase “kissing trees” as many trees touched creating this illusion. One winter afternoon, I stood watching the sunshine sparkle across the snow reaching inward among a group of smaller trees, and heard the word “Unity.”
This forest helped me understand that it could advance the concept of unity. Since then I’ve called it the “Unity Forest” and often see this energy expressed here. This is the calm it holds deep within.
In 2021 more people were walking here. What made my heart bright was seeing the number of moms and dads with little ones. Talking about what they saw and just being in the woods to experience nature.
(Part Seven – The Shaking)
May 2022, the Derecho
(A derecho [deˈɾetʃo], is a widespread, long-lived, straight-line wind storm that is associated with a fast-moving group of severe thunderstorms.)
In the spring of 2022, our region experienced a Derecho storm. The storm traveled from Sarnia in south/west Ontario to beyond Montreal in the east, a distance of over 1,000km (600+ miles).
This storm caused heavy damage to the region, the worst hit were our trees. Selectively and in large groups, trees were ripped from the ground or snapped in half with only fragments left standing. It wasn’t uncommon to see a tree lying on its side with its roots intact and a massive hole where the tree once stood.
The power of nature was indeed incredible!
It was hard to look at the carnage. Whole woodlots lay flat with possibly the exception of a couple of token trees left standing. It knocked over 33 successive hydro poles on the road heading north from our house.
After a couple of days when power was back, and things at home were in better shape I took a ride to see the forest. What I found was unrecognizable. You couldn’t get into the woods, too many trees lay this way and that. The forest lay broken seemingly unrecoverable.
It was a remarkable time. It forced people to understand the value of trees, maybe for the first time. To recognize the beauty that was gone and what needed to be rekindled.
(Part Eight – Renewal)
After the storm, many people, myself included needed to find their way forward. Our park service, known as the NCC (Nation Capital Commission) had a big job ahead.
And here was the conflict. If Mother Nature were in charge, things would be left as it was. But because greenbelt within an urban area is so important as a recreational asset there was a real need to open up what could be salvaged.
When I finally got into the forest I realized the trail system was gone. The clutter of large trees was impossible to navigate. I had my doubts anything reasonable could be recovered.
Heavy equipment smashed its way through these woodlands in the following months, cutting, removing, and restructuring. I purposely stayed away for some time. It bothered me to see these massive pieces of equipment grinding and churning this beautiful sand and soil, sawing and dismantling the trees.
By the fall of 2022, I was back walking with my camera. Stump roots were coming up everywhere and the change of seasons was happening, albeit in a new light.
The forest was open again and it was very different. I came and went, witnessing the work and applauding the NCC. They had taken on an impossible task and had done well creatively managing a new era for this damaged forest. They had left many damaged trees standing, as if a legacy. Many trees that hadn’t fallen looked proud again after the cleanup. Old trails were cleared where possible and some made anew. Portions of the forest that hadn’t been directly impacted stood tall.
It wasn’t the same, not even close, but a smile was here again!
(Part nine – Evolved)
The work I had begun many years ago here in the forest could be hindered but not stopped. The ideas and images are still with us and continue to grow. The heartache felt through unwelcomed change resulted in the grand opening of a new storefront, not better just new.
Many of the larger trees are gone, yet I still see them there along with their old friends. Nature had changed the landscape and through the drama had shown light again.
Trees are graceful in ways we can’t easily describe. The sun twists around them across the hours so we see them differently from moment to moment.
Trees are full of stories and secrets! I sense the same cheerful energy back in the forest again.
It’s up to us to see this beauty and do our best to keep it safe.
TK
This story is an inspiration to review my archives and bring to life photographs related to this beautiful place!
