14—Morals to the Story

Lucy went deep into thought. "Can there be more than one moral to the story?" she asked.
"Without a doubt," Great Aunt Nature Walker assured her.
"How do you know if your morals are right?" Lucy asked.
"Well," Great Aunt Nature Walker replied, "if the story teaches you something good and kind or gives you a thought to take with you through your life, then it's right."

Hannah who who liked to think her thoughts without worrying about them said simply,
"Be kind all Dora wood."

"A very good moral, indeed!" exclaimed Great Aunt Nature Walker.

Lucy said, "Everything wood is made out of a tree." And then she sat quietly thinking about this. For it was easy to say thank her mother and father and Great Aunt Nature Walker when they did things for her. But it was hard to know exactly what to say to a tree for all it went through to become a door or a chair or a floor or part of a wall in a house.

"You know," said Great Aunt Nature Walker, smiling at Lucy, "sometimes just looking quietly at trees and appreciating all they give to us and the earth is a good thing. It's also nice to take time to appreciate all the people who work to bring things made of wood to us."
And then they walked around Great Aunt Nature Walker's house looking at things made out of wood and seeing all the Wood Spirits still alive in that wood.

Computer Desk

Deck

Dining Room Table

Floor

"Do you have a moral?" Lucy asked Great Aunt Nature Walker.

"Why, yes," she replied. "Even though I knew Adora Birch's story, I am now
thinking about change in a new way. Maybe a person's life is like Adora Birch's tree. Remember how that tree went round and round in the machine until the tree itself was just a stack of sheets. But even though it is no longer a  birch tree, it is now part of many doors that are being used to keep people safe and warm in their houses. Perhaps even after we do something to help others, it keeps on helping them in ways we don't know."

"But," said Lucy, "I never want to change."
Great Aunt Nature Walker smiled and without a word showed Lucy and Hannah three other pictures.

Lucy

Hannah

Guess Who!

"Well," said Lucy, "maybe some change is okay."

And with that thought, Great Aunt Nature Walker went to the wood box to get Woody the Stove a new log for his lunch. But before she gave Woody his luncheon log, she held it up and asked Lucy and Hannah, "Who do we thank for keeping us warm?"

"A tree," they said together.
"Indeed," replied Great Aunt Nature Walker.

Lucy looked up at Adora Birch and wondered if the little Wood Spirit had a lesson in mind.

Adora Birch at Christmas

As if reading Lucy's mind, Adora Birch said, "You know, I once wished my tree and I could have been a Christmas tree, all covered in lights and sparkly balls and tinsel. But then I thought that would be good for a Christmas tree. But I am a birch tree. And my job in life is to be a good door. Being an excellent door is more fun than wishing to be what I am not."

And with that, Adora Birch smiled out at them from her door and from all the trees that had ever been since the first tree grew out of the Earth over 430,000,000 years before.

13—The Ending of the Very Long and True Story

As Lucy and Hannah sat at the kitchen counter and sipped their hot chocolate, Adora Birch began telling the final chapter of her story:

The log truck rolled away from the forest and traveled through the night. The following afternoon, we
arrived at the factory of the Saw Mill People.

"Were you scared?" Lucy asked.

"It's very hard to explain," Adora Birch replied, "trees don't get scared in the same way people do. We go from being vertical to being horizontal. Do you know what those two words mean?"

"Vertical means up and down," Lucy said. "But horizontal is sideways."

"Exactly right," replied Adora Birch. "And being horizontal for a tree means it has come to the end of its tree life and is on its way to becoming something else. Change takes a lot out of us, just as it often does for people.”

A tear fell down Hannah’s cheek and dropped into her hot chocolate. "Dora
tree gone," she said with a quivering lip.

“Come now, my little friend,” Adora Birch said. “Look at that picture over there on Great Aunt Nature Walker’s wall. It’s your daddy with your Uncle Brian. What would happen if they hadn’t changed?” 

Lucy laughed. “They would still dress funny and not go to work. Then my daddy would not be there with my mother to take care of us. And we couldn't go on vacation to see Uncle Brian."

Hannah was not convinced. “Dora tree change hurt,” she said."Truck big scary."

“Well, now,” Adora Birch said, “perhaps we should ask Great Aunt Nature Walker if change makes her scared.”

Great Aunt Nature Walker laughed. “Oh indeed,” she said. “I remember I was so scared the first day I went to school I threw up my pancakes all over my new shoes!”

Lucy and Hannah laughed.

“And,” Great Aunt Nature Walker went on, “the night before I left home for college, I sat on the floor of my closet and cried. My mother was looking all over the house for me.” She paused. “Now sometimes I wake up at night feeling very worried about getting so old I can no longer walk in the forest or take care of my house.”

“You will never get that old,” Lucy said.

“Oh but I will,” Great Aunt Nature Walker said, then added quickly, “Not for a long time, though, if I continue to eat my vegetables.”

“I was a little bit nervous when I went to pre-school,” Lucy admitted.

“Dora story change!” said Hannah who was now feeling considerably more cheerful and eager to move on.

“Well then,” Adora Birch said, “I will tell you that it was a very odd feeling for my tree and me to be cut off from the Earth and taken away from our Forest. We could not have imagined the adventure of change that lay before us.” And as Lucy and Hannah sipped their hot chocolate, Adora Birch continued her story:

The noise and long bumpy ride on the truck was very different from our peaceful life in the Forest. And I was very worried—especially when we got to the factory of the Saw Mill People and a machine with big metal jaws lifted us off our truck and put us in huge piles. We lay for several long days before getting kerplunked right into a large tank of water.

My tree was just getting very soft and relaxed in the water when we got  loaded onto a machine that carried us through rollers to remove our bark. 

We then were carried along a track to another machine that shaved off all my tree's uneven spots. So then it was a nice smooth log.

After that we got rolled round and round like a paper towel roll. And a very sharp blade started shaving off very thin sheets of wood—just as if you were unrolling paper towels from a roll. Round and round we went until there was nothing left of my tree but a thin rod. I have arranged for a little video of this before we go on. 

I ended up in one of those sheets. And then I got sent with all the other sheets into a very hot oven to dry us all out. After we were all dried out, we got cut into smaller sheets. And would you believe it, I got cut in half right down my middle. Then I got stacked up, one half of me on top of the other half and sent with the rest of the pile to a door factory.

On the way, I was trying to be quite brave and said to myself, "Adora Birch, it's been very nice

knowing the other half of you."
"Indeed," I replied to myself. But the truth is, I did not know how I would live as only half a wood spirit.

At the door factory, there were many doors made out of bits and pieces of very plain boards cut from the blade of a saw. They were waiting to be covered by very interesting and beautiful sheets of wood like me. And what do you think happened! A kind man noticed me in the pile.

"Hey, there, Jeffrey," he called to another man, "will you look at this."
"Well, I declare, Milo," exclaimed Jeffrey, "that will make some lucky person a very nice door."

Milo was very good at matching sheets up to
make nice patterns. And before I knew it, he had matched me up with myself and glued me onto a door. If he hadn't been careful, I would have looked all squiggly and confused.

Squiggly and Confused

Sanding and Polishing

Then after my glue got all dried out in another oven, Jeffrey put me
on a machine that polished me up.

When the truck came to take me to the door store, Milo said, “Well, little wood lady, I did the best I
could for you."
Then Jeffrey knocked on me for luck, "Let’s just hope the people who buy this wonderful door take time to see you and don't just hang you on your doorframe upside down.”

Milo closed the door of the truck, and off I went with the other doors on another long and bumpy journey to the door store.

I missed my tree and was now extremely worried about getting hung upside down in a cold dark place.

The Door Store

At the door store, Steve lined me up with the other doors for customer viewing. The very next day, a man named Alex the Contractor came to pick out a door. “That’s the one!” he exclaimed pointing at me. 

Then Steve drilled a hole in my door for the doorknob, after which Alex the Contractor lifted me into his big yellow truck, and off I went for another ride in the sunshine on a winding road lined with trees. It was not a very long ride before Alex the Contractor lifted my door out of his truck and carried us through the garage of a little white house and into a kitchen

There he called out, “Hello, Great Aunt Nature Walker! You are not going to believe this.”

“Believe what?” said Great Aunt Nature Walker. 

“Will you look at this,” said Alex the Contractor pointing right at me.

Great Aunt Nature Walker 's eyes grew wide with delight as she touched my little face. "I believe," she said, "you have brought me the best door in the whole world." 

Alex the Contractor

And when Alex the Contractor had finished putting hinges on me and hanging me on my new doorframe, Great Aunt Nature Walker said to him, “I think my little Wood Spirit needs a name. What do you think about Adora Birch?”

“I think it is the perfect name,” replied Alex the Contractor.

Well, I was feeling very happy. But then as Alex the Contractor was leaving, he said to Great Aunt Nature Walker. “Now you must paint or varnish your new door to protect it. Otherwise the cold and damp in the garage or warp will mildew it. And the heat from Woody the Stove will warp it."

“Oh dear,” Great Aunt Nature Walker said when Alex the Contractor had driven away, “what will I do. I cannot paint or varnish over you, my new little friend.” 

At first Woody the Stove offered to stop eating wood. But that wasn’t good.

And that night it rained as if to say, "I am rain. This is what I do, and I have no intention of stopping." The next morning, my door was damp on the garage side and became very hot as Woody the Stove burned up his breakfast wood. That night when Great Aunt Nature Walker went to sleep, my door got cold. I was very lonely without my tree around me.

So on the day when Great Aunt Nature Walker went to the store for paint, I was thinking it would be very sad not to be able to look out of my door. But maybe it would be good to have a nice coat of paint to keep me warm.

However, as you can see, Great Aunt Nature Walker had a very good idea, don't
you agree?
Lucy and Hannah laughed and clapped. For Adora Birch's door was the very best door they had ever seen.

"And that," Adora Birch said, "is the end of the very long and true story of how my door grew out of a seed and how I ended up this door."

"You  know," said Great Aunt Nature Walker, "my father was a very wise man. He always liked to say every story has a moral. A moral can be a lesson learned. Or a thought you take with you to help you along the years to change and grow. Can you think of a moral to The Very Long and True Story of Adora Birch?"

12—THUD!

The men wearing hard hats and carrying saws with the big silver blades spread out through the forest. And as they turned on their saws, the forest was filled with a whirring from each saw that all together sounded like a neighborhood full of lawn mowers. Before Lucy and Hannah understood what was happening, one of the Saw People walked up to Adora Birch’s tree and touched the whirring teeth on the blade of his saw to the tree just a few feet from the ground. In two swift cuts, the

saw carved a small wedge into the tree trunk. Then the Saw Person walked around to the opposite side of the tree and just above the hight of the wedge pressed the whirring edge of the blade into the tree. 

The saw’s teeth whirred faster, slicing through the trunk, spewing sawdust as it cut. The tree’s tallest branches began to sway back and forth as in a leafy ballet. Suddenly, a loud crack rang through the forest. Then the saw went silent. And in one slow graceful fall, Adora Birch’s tree snapped at the point where the wedge had been cut, and after a slow fall hit the earth with a thud and great brush of leaves. And there the tree lay, the fragrance of fresh wood rising up from the cut.

“Adora Birch!” cried Lucy.

“Dora tree hurt,” whimpered Hanna who then burst into tears.

If Adora Birch heard and replied, there was no way of knowing. For the forest was filled with the sound of the saws dropping trees—the long metal blades spitting out sawdust followed by the crack, the fall, and one thud after the other until all the trees were down. In a day, the forest that had grown out of hundreds of tiny winged fairy seeds was laid flat.

Lucy and Hannah kept watch over Adora Birch’s tree as the Saw People removed the limbs from the trees and piled the brush high. Then the machine with treads instead of wheels moved in. The machine had a long metal neck with big metal
jaws that picked up each tree trunk and placed it on a long flat truck.  

Adora Birch's tree was the first log to be lifted into the truck. It lay on the bottom to the far left. The kept watch, worrying and wondering:  Were Adora Birch and her tree scared? Had they been hurt?

Before

Soon, the big truck was fully loaded. And as the truck drove
away, the Saw People loaded up their tools and followed. Then
there was only silence. No birds or animals. No sound of wind for there were no leaves for the wind to rustle. What had been a forest was now an empty place strewn with piles of twigs and brush. Where each tree once stood, there were only stumps.  

The Magical Story Room no longer felt magical.

“No more Dora story,” said Hannah, hands over her ears, tears rolling down her face.

After

Lucy was also feeling very sad. And yet, somehow, she knew that out there at the end of The Very Long and True Story of Adora Birch was Adora Birch herself—smiling out of that door.

Great Aunt Nature Walker closed her book. “Let’s take a break for a little snack,” she suggested. And back into the kitchen they went where, sure enough, there was Adora Birch, still smiling. 

“Oh, dear,” said Adora Birch, “why do my little Nature Walkers look so downhearted?"
And then as Great Aunt Nature Walker filled some cups with hot chocolate, Adora Birch continued in her gentle way, "We have not yet reached the end of our story. And an unfinished story is like a house without a door to keep out the wind and rain and all that might harm you. And to close up our story, I have arranged for some little video demonstrations. So relax make yourself comfy."

11—Dancing With Wood

The new page of Great Aunt Nature Walker’s book brought the sound of trucks to the forest now filling the Magical Story Room. Lucy and Hannah turned to see the trucks come to a stop at the far end of the field of stumps behind them. Along

with the trucks was another machine rolling in on heavy metal treads instead of wheels. 

“The Saw People have returned,” observed Adora Birch, and her tree’s leaves quivered.

Men with hardhats, heavy boots, and tools with with long silver blades got out of the trucks. The men laid their tools
on a stack of birch logs, then stood in a group drinking coffee and listening to the man who appeared to be in charge.

“Who are the Saw People?” Lucy asked as she and Hannah drew closer to Adora Birch and her tree.

“Monster,” said Hannah.

“Oh no,” said Adora Birch. “There are no monsters here. The Saw People have come to take some trees to the factories. Trees, you see, have many other purposes than feeding birds and animals and giving them a place to live.

“As you already know,” Adora Birch went on quite proudly, “some birch trees make very excellent doors. Other trees are used for making furniture, lamps, bread boards, tables and even walls and tree houses. Why, some birch trees are even used for making barrels and paper.” As Adora Birch spoke, images of the wonders created from birch trees floated in the air before Lucy and Hannah.

At first, Lucy was merely astonished by the many contributions birch trees made to life. But then she began to think. “Everything made of wood was once a tree,” she observed with no small amount of wonder. 

“Right you are,” said Adora Birch. “Oak trees, maple trees, cherry trees, bamboo . . . ” 

“That’s it!” cried Lucy.

“That’s what?” asked Adora Birch.

“That’s how your door grew out of a tiny seed. Your tree grew out of a seed. And the wood from the tree became a door.”

“A most brilliant deduction!” declared Adora Birch, and the leaves on her tree quivered with glee.

But before Lucy could celebrate her brilliant deduction, Hannah began jumping up and down and pointing at two dark
circles on the side of the bread board suspended in the air before her. “Dora friend . . . eyes!” she cried.

“Wow,” Lucy exclaimed, for peering out of the bread board were two eyes—could it be?—another Wood Spirit just like Adora Birch. 

Then Hannah started running from one birch tree creation to
the other, pointing at the figures swirling through the wood. “Dora friend everywhere!” she exclaimed.

Suddenly, the images of birch tree creations disappeared, and the forest felt alive with a wavy and flowing energy curling and swirling this way and that. Lucy and Hannah danced and twirled with curling swirling energy until at last they collapsed on the ground, laughing and out of breath. And as they lay there, the trees and the space between them also settled into a peaceful quiet. Adora Birch and her tree sighed happily. 

But when Lucy remembered her answer as to how a door grows out of a seed, she sat up. For her mind turned once again to the still unanswered question.

“How do the Wood Spirits get inside the tree?” she wondered out loud. But even as she asked this question, an even larger question occurred to her—Why had no one she knew ever talked about Wood Spirits. Were they even real? Or just something made up in Great Aunt Nature Walker’s book? 

“You know,” Adora Birch said as if reading Lucy’s mind, “some people refer to us Wood Spirits as ‘patterns in the woodgrain.’ And yes, it was true—Lucy had heard grown ups exclaiming as they ran their fingers over a new wood table, “My but isn’t that woodgrain lovely.” 

Out of the air there emerged a diagram of boards that had been sawed off a log. “You will notice here,” Adora Birch pointed
out, “that the wood looks different when you cut on the up and down instead of sideways. The up and down board cut shows what is called the woodgrain.”

Lucy and Hannah looked at the diagram. On the end of the log were the same growth rings that they’d seen on the tree stumps. But the long boards created by the up and down cuts were full of wavy lines.” 

“What you see in the wood,” said Adora Birch, “depends on how you look at it.”

As Adora Birch spoke, there appeared in the air, diagrams showing different ways of cutting a board from a tree trunk. But what could this possibly have to do with how Adora Birch and her Wood Spirit friends ended up in doors and bread boards and furniture?

“Dora swirl story,” insisted the impatient Hannah. And this time Lucy agreed.

“When seeking answers to complicated questions,” Adora Birch advised, “we must be patient like trees that grow with the seasons.”

Lucy and Hannah understood that the need for patience was true and very grown-up—but was also very annoying when you wanted an answer. Still, they quieted down and waited as yet another diagram appeared out of the air. 

“It’s quite wonderful how a tree grows,” Adora Birch said. “The tree drinks up water it needs from the ground and breaths in what it needs from the air.
 Then with the help of sunlight, the leaves turns it all into food that makes the tree grow up and out.

“Those growth rings,” Adora Birch continued, “tell the story of how the tree grew out over the years. But when you cut the wood to show the grain, you are looking at the story of how the tree grew up by reaching beyond its forest for the light. That story is also the story of the tree’s Wood Spirit because the Wood Spirit is the magic that mixes with the air, the water, the sun to makes the tree grow.”

“If a Wood Spirit is magic,” Lucy asked, “how can you see it?”

“Have you ever made a print of your hand in paint or clay?” Adora Birch asked.

Lucy nodded. 

“Well,” said Adora Birch, “the swirls and eyes and faces like mine are the prints a Wood Spirits leaves of itself in its tree.” 

There was a mystery to all this that made sense until you tried to explain it. But before Lucy could ask any more questions, Hannah pulled on her arm. For the Saw People were now walking toward them across the field of tree stumps.

“Today is the day,” Adora Birch said, and her tree quivered. 

And something in the air made Lucy and Hannah made Lucy and Hannah wish that Great Aunt Nature Walker would not turn the page. But just like all of life, stories must go on. 

10—The Sprig and the Spirit

Lucy and Hannah looked at the perky green sprig growing out of the blackened ground beside Hannah’s foot.

“It’s me, don’t you see!” said a cheery little voice. Lucy and Hannah looked at each other. 

"I'm the one on the left."

Was that little sprig talking?

“I’m now what’s called a seedling,” continued the sprig. 

“Dora Tree!” exclaimed Hannah.

Lucy's eyes grew wide with disbelief.“Adora Birch?” she asked.

“Right you both are,” confirmed the seedling. “After the fire, I blew in on the wind with thousands of my fairy seed colleagues. And here is where you will get the next installment of my very long and true story:

“You see,” the sprig continued, “there’s always a lot of work to be done after a fire. And the wind brought us here to do that work. First off, with no trees, the birds are in great need of seeds for food. Deer too. So some of us took root in the sad burned ground and grew into seedlings that will feed the deer. Others like me will grow into trees.”

“Is that because you are the important ones?” Lucy asked.

“Oh no,” replied the sprig, “every seed’s job is important in its own way.”

“What is your job?” asked Lucy who had never thought of a tree as having a job.

“Trees like me,” explained the sprig, “are called pioneers. Most people think pioneers are the first people to go to a new place. Well, we are called “pioneer species.” A species is a type of plant or animal. We are the type of plant that is the first to grow in a land after a fire has burned up a forest and turned the earth black and hopeless. It’s our job to make the burned earth healthy again.”

“How do you do that?” Lucy asked.

We have a very special talent for taking a chemical called nitrogen from the air,” the sprig explained. And as the sprig spoke, a simple illustration appeared in the air. "In our roots," the sprig went on, "there are lumps are called nodules. In these nodules, that nitrogen is changed so that it has the power to heal the Earth from its burns. As the Earth is healed, trees and plants can grow back into a forest once again.”

“How long does this take?” Lucy was asking when interrupted by Hannah who was less interested in particulars than getting on with the story. 

“Dora face in door?” she wanted to know.

“You must have patience, my little Nature Walkers,” the sprigly voice said, “because for me to answer these questions, you must go with me on an adventure of the spirit.”

Before the sisters could say yes or no, the burned out forest flew back into Great Aunt Nature Walker’s book and out of the pages rose a sprinkle of sparkles that came together into a lovely swirl of white light. 

“Are you ready for your Adventure of the Spirit,” said the light in a wavy voice that seemed to be speaking in words that were more like music. As Lucy listened for the words, Hannah swayed to the music.

Lucy

“Close your eyes,” said the wave of light. They closed their eyes. “Look

Hannah

inside your mind,” said the voice. And they looked inside their minds. Inside her mind, Lucy saw her words and thoughts floating like bubbles of different colored lights. Hannah saw colors turning in and over and around themselves.

And then each of their minds turned at once into a tree that was the Idea of a Tree floating in a rainbow of light. The Idea of a Tree was black with delicate green leaves, its neatly round branches and far-reaching roots reaching out into the light. And the Idea of a Tree said:

“I am the Mother of the Great PoetTree. I am the Seed of all Ancestor Trees. I am the Heart of every tree that has ever been. I am the Soul of all Wood Spirits—the magic in every seed that tells that seed how to grow into the tree it was destined to become. You have come to hear one of my very long and true stories. If that is correct, you may now leave your mind and open your eyes to the magic.” 

And when Lucy and Hannah opened their eyes, they were standing among tall birch trees where the forest had been before the fire. The Earth was healed. The air was sweet.

“Welcome, my little Nature Walkers,” said a windily graceful voice, and they turned to see a tall sturdy birch behind them.

But just beyond the tree, a shock—half of the forest of trees sawed off into stumps and in their midst birch-tree trunks piled high. “But then their attention was drawn back to the tree who said, “It is I—Adora Birch here with my tree where we grew up from a sprig and have lived with our forest, feeding the birds and animals and giving nourishment to the earth.”

“How old are you?” Lucy asked.

“Take a look at that tree stump beside you,” said Adora Birch and tell me what you see.”

“Circles,” said Hannah.

“The circles are called growth rings. Trees grow up each year. But they also grow out. Each circle shows how much the tree grew that year. 

The darker circles in the middle are the old

wood. The lighter circles around the old wood are the newer growth. The darker parts
of each of the growth rings, old and new, was formed in summer. The lighter part of each growth ring was formed in summer of that year. If you count the circles, you will now how old that tree was when it was cut.”

As Lucy counted the rings, Hannah studied the tree stump. “No Dora face,” she said.

“Oh but there’s a Wood Spirit in each of those trees, Adora Birch was saying when the sound of big trucks filled the air.

“The Saw People will soon be here," Adora Birch said. "Today is the day,” she added, and the leaves of her tree quivered.

Lucy and Hannah didn't understand what was happening. But they were both beginning to feel quite worried as Great Aunt Nature Walker turned the page.