Can We Think About Anything Else?

I’m sitting atop Mt. Tabor, on a bench, in the shade of trees.
 
What do the trees think about this election? I want to walk up to one and ask but I’m afraid of losing my bench if I abandon it. (Someone else might walk up and sit on it.)
 
Maybe I can speak to the trees from a short distance.

This tree here over on my left says, I love you and I don’t care who wins the election. At least not as much as you do. Certainly not in the same way you do. I want you to ask me a different question.
 
Tree, do I have roots too?
 
Roots are a metaphor. You have no need for roots. You walk within ‘root.’ Or, if you prefer, you ARE root. You can never be cut off from your roots because roots are you.
 
But what about YOU? You can be chopped down, cut up, severed from your roots.
 
Yes.
 
And how painful that must be. It’s intense.
 
Yes.
 
I apologize for imagining it in your presence.
 
Of course you’d be imagining it. You think of it every time you contemplate a tree for any length of time.
 
I’m sorry.
 
Don’t be. You’re trying to protect us. Your thoughts are trying to protect us.
 
If you were a human being, I’d imagine you scorning me for that. But scorn is just a very human thing. “Ha ha look at you – crazy person! – trying to protect trees with your thoughts and you don’t even know that’s what you’re doing.” A tree wouldn’t have an attitude like that.
 
No. You’re right. But I do want to point out something. Your thoughts do not have the effect of protecting trees. But they do have the effect of creating an experience inside your heart and body. Do you understand that that experience is created by nothing other than your thoughts? In a very real sense, that experience inside yourself that you create has little or nothing to do with trees.
 
I’m still sorry that you’re vulnerable to being cut down.
 
I know.