Laurie Klein, Author at Laurie Klein, Scribe

Reflections

Just this, for Holy Week . . .

Yes

I am going to start living
larger, looser—
stripped down
to my sapling self, leaning toward
that leafless tree Messiah loved
enough to die on.

Maybe its boughs sheltered him once,
from pelting rain,
spread shade like a cloak,
dropped one late fig, surprising his palm—
one small story uniting and
easing them both
at the end, on that hill like a skull.

My brow touches the earth.
Moved by hosannas, echoing
still, deep inside stones,
I rise. Then the tight turn,
lifting fingers, limbs,
my bird-soft hair—
all the thorns, delicately removed.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

. . . be like the tree planted by the water
that sends out its roots by the stream.
It has no worries in a year of drought
and never fails to bear fruit.

—Jeremiah 17:8

“Yes,” from Where the Sky Opens, by Laurie Klein

While a Baby Slept: (“I Love You, Lord”)

by Laurie Klein 8 Chiming In

Dear readers, I thought you might enjoy reading the story behind “I Love You, Lord,” a guest post I recently wrote for Makes You Mom.

I Love You, Lord, but: Live in a dorm for three months? At age fifty? What a way to celebrate the Five-O milestone.

No nails or screws. No thumbtacks or tape, even—dorm rules nixed hanging any personal decor. At least the barracks sported fresh paint. Thin walls leaked every sound, each word spoken.

Ancient plumbing simulated banshees with microphones. A dawn shower risked waking the dead. A flush goosed pipes to operatic range. I never saw a drinking glass shatter at a high note but braced for the possibility.

Thin walls leaked every sound, each word spoken. (click to continue reading)

The Outsider, Chosen

by Laurie Klein 14 Chiming In

Chosen for a reason

Talk about an outsider! Connoisseurs of the quirky might enjoy this state champion Camperdown Elm. I do.

This was my chosen site for a recent birthday photo-op (thank you, Bill).

Camperdown Elm, Poulsbo, WA — Camperdown Elm, Poulsbo, Washington

Turning 65 was a tough transition. The elm’s wizened, erratic creepiness made me feel young and lithe.

Viewed from below, branchwork resembles beached octopi. Or Medusa’s headpiece with thrashing snakes.

Come midnight, I imagine it magically uproots itself and lurches along the harbor, limbs writhing in search of victims. [Read more…]

When the Graft Takes

by Laurie Klein 20 Chiming In

He spoke into my life where my parents could not or would not involve themselves: the stunted places, those aching, relational gaps.

Husband of Pat, my beloved Theatre Arts mentor, Dr. Howard Stien entered my life slowly. Gently.

We shared coffee, anecdotes, laughter, the singular pleasures of knowledge vs. mysteries, and the love of writing. We shared our awe for a God who loves to graft stories and lives together.

How does one measure the relational graft that feels divinely ordained—and, finally, organic?

In Tree-speak, a graft can generate something new.

A graft can also repair an injured tree.

When the graft grows

Stien recognized my injured sapling-self. His regard grounded and sheltered me. Oak-steady, he modeled as well as articulated God’s grace in ways I could grasp. His quiet confidence in my abilities renewed hopes, long dormant.

With trademark humor, Stien wore black on exam days. I wish I’d taken one of his Biology classes.

Are you thinking of someone who’s been a spiritual father, or mother, to you? A person this special enters our lives as if sent—even fleetingly—and if we are open, we are indelibly changed.

My stoic Viking in denim was also a soft-spoken apostle for curious, wide-awake living. Kindly and wry, his questions took root in me. Generated ideas. Dropped seeds.

Over the years, he attended many of my performances. During our hug afterward, sometimes he’d say he’d felt nervous for me. Just like a dad.

The graft that “takes”

What will be said about us, after we’re gone?

Are we, like Stien, leaving a vibrant legacy?

Family man and farmer, scientist, pastor, and builder, tail gunner and neighborhood runner, author, professor, and mentor—he feels spliced into my spirit. Part of my extended family tree.

Had Stien been born a tree, I’d picture something oak-ish: resilient, and crowned with shining leaves.

In “Trees for the Forest,” from his book Thoughts While at Bat in the Tenth Inning, Stien writes:

“My intrigue with trees is about as old as I am . . .

[L]ately as I drive down a tree-lined boulevard
or stroll through the ponderosa stand bordering our community
I marvel at the unique individual beauty of these magnificent creations.

It’s like seeing persons in a crowd.”

He adds that while people’s names often elude him, he still recalls genus names from his early studies, like Quercus for oak.

The graft that takes keeps on giving . . .

Leaving Hospice a few days ago, the word terebinth dropped into my mind. Terebinth, often translated “oak” in the Bible, comes from the Hebrew word meaning “mighty.”

I’ve no idea what aftershave Stien wore, but the terebinth’s unique fragrance unites heady balsamic resin with notes of lemon and fennel.

You want to stay near a richly complex aroma. Breathe it in. Absorb its warmth.

Online, I explore Stien’s world, and learning eases my sorrow. I return with these spiritual parallels:

A solitary tree, the terebinth holds its ground on exposed hillsides and in tangled ravines
Substantial roots deeply penetrate soil and anchor the tree
Fruitful, the tree provides soothing oil and strengthening proteins
Valued for its inner treasure, the tree, when tapped, offers a cleansing solvent (turpentine)
Handsome, even in great age, the terebinth is recognized by its subtle blossoms and winged leafstalks

He is nine days gone. It feels like a wing has gone missing.

“Although my father and my mother have forsaken me,
yet the Lord will take me up
[adopt me as His child].”

—Ps. 27:10 (AMPC)

Has someone been a spiritual father, or mother, to you?

Are you currently encouraging a sapling-soul in need of repair?

What dead trees can teach us about faith

by Laurie Klein 12 Chiming In

We no longer felt safe in our own yards.

A few months ago, gale-force winds ravaged our region. Falling trees downed power lines, blocked roads, smashed into homes.

After the storm tens of thousands coped without power for days, in freezing weather. Tree limbs newly weighted with snow continued to snap.

Without realizing it, I’d counted on our trees to stand firm, never questioned my unspoken faith in them.

We lost several trees. Our fifty-foot Douglas Fir fell northward, but it missed the garage.

For weeks its dead weight pressed against other, smaller trees.

Would they recover? Or were they already maimed for life?

An early thaw exposed roots shockingly meager for an evergreen this size, a joke of a rootball. No wonder the tree toppled.

Viewing the damage, I wondered: Am I sufficiently rooted in my faith to withstand potential upheaval?

(Or, metaphorically speaking): Is this dubious root system a self-portrait?

Three months later

Today the work crew arrives. Young and seemingly fearless, their courage has likely developed, over time, through shared experience plus faith—in their tools, their trade, and each other.

They start with a different tree, a Ponderosa pine still standing but past saving. One fellow shinnies up the trunk, and he lops off two-thirds of the limbs.

I do not see him heft the chainsaw above his head, but I hear the almighty crash. I look out the window and see the massive treetop covering our lawn.

How did he brace himself against all that force spreading down the trunk?

How much nerve plus skill plus faith ensured that the plummeting treetop cleared our roof?

And how would the roots of this tree compare to the pitiful root system of our Douglas Fir? (The pine stump remains, so I’ll never know.)

Another scenario

Rather than cutting the remaining two-thirds of the trunk into firewood, suppose the crew turns it into a telephone pole.

Utility workers would later bury one-third of its length in the ground (visually, the equivalent of the lopped treetop).

That hefty third would anchor the height with a far better percentage than our Doug Fir’s wannabe rootball. In its new life as a pole, the skinned pine would likely stand for another fifty years.

Maybe endurance is partly a matter of proportion.

Will efforts to better ground my life deepen my faith?

Better by far to be grounded deep in God’s faithfulness.

An enduring faith

Deeply embedded, this utility pole looms over fallen boughs. Standing tall, it keeps doing its work, the faithful bearer of power and light.

This will sound crazy, but: If I were a power pole, roughly twenty-two inches of me would be safely interred in the dirt. You’d see me from middish-thigh to the crown of my head. (Goodbye, leg-shaving razors and dancing shoes; hello, bedrock security.)

Unmoved by raging winds, I’d be anchored, grounded, and grateful: a glad bearer of God’s power and light.

Is that your desire? You may feel maimed, even stricken past the point of recovery.

No matter what’s shaking your hope, or uprooting your peace, take heart. The apostle Paul’s advice stands, even today:

“. . . continue to live in [Christ],
rooted and built up in him,
strengthened in the faith as you were taught,
and overflowing in thankfulness.”

—Col. 2:6-7 NIV

MAKING IT PERSONAL:

If you were a tree, what form would you take? Why?

Yes