Michfest, Day 9

Michfest, Day 9

What you find under a tree~

What is there to say about an easy breezy work day?

This town is starting to look like it’s going to have a festival! Pretty much all of the tents have gone up. Set-up strike has made sure that the paths have been covered with wood chips, trees pruned, brush removed. Some of the first short crew members will be arriving tomorrow, and from there, Workerville will just keep on growing until the last of the Festival is over.

With a little free time on my hands, I decided to do one of my favorite things on the land- sit underneath the big Michigan tree.

The feeling I get when I see the Michigan tree reminds me of the feeling I get when approaching Charles Bridge. Walking across Charles Bridge is *the* quintessential thing to do in Prague. Tourists cross the river Vltava in throngs, regardless of whether or not it’s summer or snowing- a visit to this story book city would be nearly impossible without a walk across the seven hundred year old bridge. But the cool thing is that the folks who live in Prague traffic the bridge regularly as well. You can cross at sunrise, flanked by angels and morning mist, or by day when the cobblestone corridor is bustling with buskers, street vendors, and foreigners with cameras. Or at night, when seagulls overhead are illuminated by the bridge lights and seem to vanish completely when they pass into darkness.

One winter day I was out for a walk across town with my friend Jiri, a Czech who’s lived in Prague for several years. As we approached the high stone archway on the east bank of the river, I felt that same unflagging sense of wonder fall upon me. I turned to Jiri and asked, Does it ever get old to see this? She shook her head and grinned fiercely. ‘Never’.

For the first few days of long crew I came to the tree in the morning, muscles tight and veins as yet uncaffeinated, for a half hour session of yoga that left me energized for the rest of the day. I went to the tree for grounding after my first sweat and felt my heart unfurl with crow’s wings and distant forests full of laughing Monet leaves. I’ve danced and drummed and worked beneath those gorgeous branches. I can’t even begin to imagine Michfest without that tree.

On this particular day I felt like I needed some time alone. My heart felt a little heavy, though the day had been light. Luckily for me, the night stage bowl and the best seat in the house were both empty. I sat down and leaned my back against her rough rigged bark. We sat like that for a moment, the tree and I, until I saw someone approaching from across the field. She waved. I squinted. Ah, Amelia! She came to sit beside me and we both stared across the field for a while in silence. She was tired of processing and talking about her feelings and I didn’t particularly want to talk about mine in that moment, either. So we talked a lot of nothing. Threw a few punches back and forth. Laughed a lot. It was exactly what I needed. By the time we walked away from the tree, I felt better. Lighter.

Does it ever get old, this constant return to the same place?

Never.