The Roots of the Grandfather Tree

01-23-20

 Careless Thoughts

A Bad Memoir of Little Memories

I have tried to write this thought a dozen times now …

                I have failed equally more times than I have put pen to paper. If this story sees the light of day, then you will know I have failed a dozen more times.

                Why?

                                Why am I having such a difficult time writing a tale about a tree?

                I don’t know. Maybe, it has to do with the ghost who lingers in the thought. Maybe, it will bring forth a bit too much … just a bit too much of everything.

                I believe we all have an Internal Mythology where we build our own myths. Sometimes, we build myths about the heroes we are not and those heroes defeat the dragons in the caves of our mind. We can face the trolls hidden under the bridges in these little fairy tales because we are the hero and the troll at the same time.

                We even get to play the villain in these tall-tales. We can dance on the graves of our enemies. We can be the dragon raining fire down on poor souls who have wronged us. We can even be the Dark King ordering the horrors of our minds onto anyone in our gaze.

                We get to be everything in our Mythology because we are the creator and audience of the stories. I, as a writer, am simply trying to share with you my Internal Mythology, hoping you can see you are not alone in the world. (Hoping I can see I am not alone in the world.)

                But I have for a long time in my journals wondered where some of the characters in my head come from.

                I like to see the Sun as a female, the Mother, or the Unattainable Admirer, maybe?

                The Moon as a male, the Father, or the Lover, possibly?

                And both of them forever chasing each other to share in their love. I think it is a beautiful tale of unacquainted romance.

Just as Nyx, the Goddess of the Night is my idea and nightmarish motif of love and art. I love Nyx while at the same time hate her for her dreams she gives to me.

                But I have tracked down only a few of these characters' roots from my life. Where did Nyx come from? My love for painting at night, and the soul-crushing deed I committed which went holy against my strongly held beliefs. She was birth in the depths of Labyrinth by the Minotaur, who is my archetype of ferocious lust.

                At the center of this labyrinthine world that is my mind sits a massive Dogwood Tree with an old man’s face at the center. I have called this tree all my life, the Grandfather Tree. For years, I had no idea who planted this seed into my mind. I knew trees had been a running theme in my life. I often speak of roots and I draw trees all the time. I know why the Dogwood is the tree at the center of my world. I have a great love for Dogwoods.

                There was one sitting in my front yard all my life, and I, for some odd reason, grew very close to it. I cried – secretly – when we had to cut it down.

                But I couldn’t place my finger on why a Grandfather Tree sat at the center of everything until my mother told me a story about myself.

                You see, I have always been big – tall and fat. I was born big. I grew up as a big kid. I had always been a giant around other people, which is why in my Mythology, the hero is normally a giant. I couldn’t and can’t make myself smaller. I could do to lose a few more pounds, but I will still be big.

                The kids in elementary school had no problem pointing out this fact about myself. They would pick on me all the time about my weight along with other things. I started to hate my body, but I was caged in it, which might have been the reason I started to retreat into my imagination.

                One day, at school – I don’t why or how – but they were giving us trees to take home. The excitement for me to take a tree home almost became too much to bear during the day. I came storming off the bus, my mother watching me from the kitchen window seeing me carrying a tree taller than myself, and I went right over to my grandfather’s house. He lived next door to us and did so all his life. He passed away when I was eighteen.

                He saw me coming and started to belly laugh by the time I got to him. I told him we had to plant it, and I knew he would love to do so with me. He was a farmer at heart. So, with his yellow straw hat, a shove in my hand, we went into his back yard to give the tree home.

                It sits there to this day.

                While he was padding the dirt around the tree, I ran over to my mother, who at this point was sitting on the steps watching us and started to cry to her. The bullies at school had been extremely rough to me. They keep calling me fat.

                My mother pointed over at my grandfather, who had a big round belly and an even bigger smile. She asked me if I loved him less because of his belly.

                “No, way.”

                “He doesn’t love you less because you’re big,” she said. “So, next time they call you fat, just remember your grandpa loves you no matter what.”

                There had been the moment the seed had been planted in my imagination. My Grandfather Currie has always been at the center of my world for all my childhood. Some of my greatest memories are with him, and to this day, I still miss him deeply. I still have a hard time talking about him without getting teary eye because there is so much I wish for him to see, but death comes for us all. While he was alive, he had been the orbiting force of my family, and his death had been the encompassing tragedy of my life. And yet, his face lives at the center of the Grandfather Tree smiling and laughing at me.