Reading How to be Content, we learn that the Buddha spent years wandering through forests and found enlightenment sitting under the Bodhi tree (a type of fig tree). Jesus wandered through the desert, living in a sandier part of the world. I must say, I would rather spend time in a forest, and, as you read this, I will have just finished exploring some of the Redwood National and State Parks. I'll let you know later how that went. How to be Content has advice on forest bathing, an exercise that I wrote about some time ago: "Have you heard about "forest bathing"? When I belonged to the Congregational Church on Mercer Island, a member from Japan introduced us to the concept. This is the explanation from the Shinrin-yoku organization: "[It is] the healing way of Shinrin-yoku Forest Therapy, the medicine of simply being in the forest. Shinrin-yoku is a term that means "taking in the forest atmosphere" or "forest bathing." It was developed in Japan during the 1980s and has become a cornerstone of preventive health care and healing in Japanese medicine." Forest bathing is not about "doing" as much as it is about "being". Breathe in the scents of the damp earth, the green smell of the woods. Let the calls of the birds and the buzzing of the bees calm you. Take time to look at wildflowers and rocks and streams." For a very good article on this subject, click on, or copy, this link: https://thrive.kaiserpermanente.org/thrive-together/live-well/forest-bathing-try?wt.tsrc=email_pih&cat=lhttps://thrive.kaiserpermanente.org/thrive-together/live-well/forest-bathing-try?wt.tsrc=email_pih&cat=l. If the day is too wet or too cold to go out, click on, or copy, this link: https://www.tree.fm/forest/32. You will see lovely photos of trees and hear forest sounds from around the world, recorded by people who live near these beautiful forests. Just click on the word "tree", super-imposed on the photo, to go to another picture and another recording. Aaah....
Even if you don't have a forest nearby, or a park full of trees, there may be some remarkable trees in your neighborhood. I've always been a city girl. I preferred walking on a sidewalk than a forest path. But one day, I discovered a tree. My husband and I were house hunting, and we were drawn to a magnificent Victorian house. Even more than the house, though, I was drawn to a huge, old maple tree. It was calling out (not really, but this is what I imagined) "Buy the house! Save me from death by chainsaw!" We didn't buy the house, but we often walk by it to check up on the tree.
There are tree lovers (or tree huggers) and the kind of people who will engage in lengthy litigation because they demand that a neighbor removes trees that block their view or drop leaves on their property - or sneak onto the neighbor's property to cut down said trees. I sympathize with people who buy a house with a view only to have the view disappear, but which was there first? The tree which, in the way of trees, was bound to grow or the objecting neighbor? When my extended family sold the family house in Madison Park, they created a covenant protecting certain specimen trees on the property. I don't imagine we have any legal recourse if an owner cuts down any of the trees, but every time I am in the area, I drive by to check up on them. Unfortunately, we couldn't do anything about the buyers subdividing the property and building a new house in the area where the blackberry and raspberry canes were!
Along with people who want their neighbors' trees cut down, there are countries that allow or encourage the wholesale destruction of forests. (Brazil, I'm talking about you.) Even Washington State's Department of Natural Resources has a timber harvest plan which allows older forests (100+ years) to be clear-cut when there are younger plantations of trees that could be harvested. The Center for Responsible Forestry claims that if current DNR logging plans continue, these older forests will be wiped out in just a few years.
I hope that if you are a tree lover/hugger, if you care about the interconnectedness of humans and nature, if you are concerned with protecting our natural resources, you will read some of these books. And if you have never felt the pull of remarkable trees, read these books anyway. You will look at trees in a new way. I have included publishers' blurbs to edify and tempt you.
Our Connection with Trees:
The secret therapy of trees / Mencagli, Marco, 582.16 MEN. "Our connection to nature is deeply rooted in the history of our evolution. And yet, we have less contact with green space now than ever, and our stress and anxiety levels are at an all-time high. The Secret Therapy of Trees helps us rediscover the restorative value of our natural environment and presents the science behind green therapies like forest bathing and bioenergetic landscapes, explaining which are the most effective and how to put them into practice to achieve the best possible results."
Walking in the beauty of the world: reflections of a Northwest botanist/Arnett, Joseph . 581.9795 ARN
Wildwood : a journey through trees /Deakin, Roger. 508.315 DEA . In Deakin's glorious meditation on wood, the "fifth element" - as it exists in nature, in our culture, and in our souls - the reader accompanies Deakin through the woods of Britain, Europe, Kazakhstan, and Australia in search of what lies behind man's profound and enduring connection with trees.
Lab girl /Jahren, Hope. 570.92 JAH . “A beautifully written memoir about the life of a woman in science, a brilliant friendship, and the profundity of trees. Terrific.”—Barack Obama
The overstory : a novel /Powers, Richard, F POW "The best novel ever written about trees, and really just one of the best novels, period." ―Ann Patchett. The Overstory, winner of the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, is a sweeping, impassioned work of activism and resistance that is also a stunning evocation of―and paean to―the natural world."
Northwest trees and forests:
Northwest trees : identifying and understanding the region's native trees /Arno, Stephen F. 582.16 ARN
The final forest : the battle for the last great trees of the Pacific Northwest /Dietrich, William, 333.75 DIE . In a riveting exploration of our connection to all that we cherish and exploit on Earth, a Pulitzer Prize-winning correspondent for The Seattle Times examines the human side of the struggle that looms as the fate of our forests is determined.
Ancient ones : the world of the old-growth Douglas fir /Bash, Barbara. J 585 BAS In Ancient Ones, Bash captures the ongoing drama not only of the Douglas fir but of the old-growth forest itself. The book "beautifully affirms the concept of a cycle of life," wrote Publishers Weekly in a starred review. "A wondrous walk through an old-growth forest," said School Library Journal, in another starred review. "Reading Ancient Ones is the next best thing to being there."
Plants of the Pacific Northwest coast : Washington, Oregon, British Columbia & Alaska /581.9711 POJ
Rainforest: ancient realm of the Pacific Northwest/Osborne, Graham . 577.34 OSB . In this magnificent photographic collection, Graham Osborne's breathtaking images depict the many guise of the rainforest--gnarled tree trunks dripping with moss, the spires of Douglas firs reaching into the sky, waterfalls tumbling over time-worn rocks, ice-encased fern fronds in winter, scarlet maple leaves littering the ground in autumn, a burst of wildflowers along a river bank in spring. In his eloquent text, Wade Davis describes the scale and abundance of these rainforests, where redwoods reach nearly 120 meters and read cedars can be 6 metres or more across at the base. Davis also discusses the role of the rainforest in Native culture and mourns the loss of much of this ancient forest through overcutting and other shortsighted forestry practices.
Journey through the northern rainforest /Pandell, Karen. J 578.734 PAN . Through the eyes of an eagle, the reader explores the ancient, but disappearing, rainforest of the Pacific Northwest
A North American rain forest scrapbook /Wright-Frierson, Virginia. J 577.34 WRI . Walk alongside an award-winning nature artist as she observes, draws, paints, and writes about the majesty of the world's largest temperate rain forest. Richly illustrated, evocative, and highly informative, this careful study is an engaging, first-hand look at an ecological treasure.
Save the Trees!
The great kapok tree : a tale of the Amazon rain forest /Cherry, Lynne. E CHE . The author and artist Lynne Cherry journeyed deep into the rain forests of Brazil to write and illustrate her gorgeous picture book The Great Kapok Tree: A Tale of the Amazon Rain Forest. One day, a man exhausts himself trying to chop down a giant kapok tree. While he sleeps, the forest’s residents, including a child from the Yanomamo tribe, whisper in his ear about the importance of trees and how "all living things depend on one another" .
Green inheritance : saving the plants of the world /Huxley, Anthony Julian, 580 HUX . Humans are entirely dependent on plants: we eat them, build with them, burn them for power, breathe the air they maintain, cure our ills with them. Yet, we are destroying this fundamental resource at a terrifying rate.
National Forests:
This land : a guide to western national forests /Mohlenbrock, Robert H., 333.75 MOH . Superbly illustrated with color photographs, botanical drawings, and maps, this book covers national forests in: Alaska, Nevada, Arizona, Oregon, California, Utah, Idaho, Washington
Lookouts : firewatchers of the Cascades and Olympics /Spring, Ira. 917.9 SPR . History of 75 fire-protection lookouts with more than 200 photos from archival and personal collections. Once the most advanced means of fire detection, the fire-protection lookout towers built and manned in the mid- to late-1900s in Washington state are now historic sites and an intrinsic part of the heritage of the Northwest and its people. Lookouts: Firewatchers of the Cascades and Olympics is a complete history of the lookouts and a tribute to the people who often endured challenging conditions from loneliness to forbidding weather while serving as firewatchers.
The big burn : Teddy Roosevelt and the fire that saved America /Egan, Timothy. 973.911 EGA . On the afternoon of August 20, 1910, a battering ram of wind moved through the drought-stricken national forests of Washington, Idaho, Montana, whipping the hundreds of small blazes burning across the forest floor into a roaring inferno that jumped from treetop to ridge as it raged, destroying towns and timber in an eyeblink. Forest rangers had assembled nearly ten thousand men -- college boys, day-workers, immigrants from mining camps -- to fight the fires. But no living person had seen anything like those flames, and neither the rangers nor anyone else knew how to subdue them. Egan narrates the struggles of the overmatched rangers against the implacable fire with unstoppable dramatic force, through the eyes of the people who lived it. Equally dramatic, though, is the larger story he tells of outsized president Teddy Roosevelt and his chief forester Gifford Pinchot. Pioneering the notion of conservation, Roosevelt and Pinchot did nothing less than create the idea of public land as our national treasure, owned by every citizen.