I remember how it was as though it was yesterday: My shadow is long as it stretches over the sand. It’s early morning. The chairs and chaise longues are not out on the sand yet.

Waves come in, washing away sand and leaves and bubbles left by the previous wave. My shadow stretches ahead over the sand, long and lean.

The dog approaches. He stands in the waves. Then he jumps this way and that.

Where’s his owner? I look around. No one is paying him any attention.

No collar.

He comes closer. He’s read more

It’s early March. Our friends emailed that they’d cancelled their flight to Toronto scheduled for April.

I stood behind someone in the pharmacy who had bought about twenty bottles of hand sanitizer.

Christian went out and bought us masks (expensive ones) and disinfecting wipes.

We didn’t use the masks; hardly anyone in the airport had them on. But the minute we reached our seats in the airplane, we pulled out the wipes and started wiping down the arm rests, the tray table (open and shut), the read more

Patricia Hawkins Hiss and I used to sing together in the Vancouver Bach Choir. A wordsmith and craftswoman, she writes haikus about trees.

In spring, trees wear gowns

Of primavera green lace

And soft silk sunshine

And here’s another.

Wearing new sweaters

Mustard, saffron, and crimson

Trees celebrate fall.

Narda Pitkethly is the founder and CEO of the Nardagani Reading Program and author of Nardagani: A Memoir – Finding Light in the Shadow of a Brother’s Disappearance. Here is the thought she offered me when I asked her to reflect on her feelings about trees.

I decide to go out on our back deck to talk with my favorite tree. She is a tall aspen. Often I see faces in the curves of her branches with her heart-shaped leaves as eyes. The tree and her many faces often comfort me.

Silmara Emde of the Orange Lamphouse Studio is a photographer and visual storyteller. When I was ready to have some new headshots taken, she is the professional I chose for the job. Her quote is encouraging.

Trees and people are the same in the way they both contain in themselves the great potential to grow into all their magnificence.

Andrea Courey, medium and author of Conversations with Chloe and Magical Thinking, has some basic advice.

How to stay grounded in a crazy world? Just ask a tree.

Barra is a horticulturist.

Trees are like people—you never know what’s happened to them.