Rethinking my totem tree

July 5th, 2024

“What is your favorite tree?” my mom asked me as we walked in the garden.

“The oak” was my assured and quick answer.

“Well, for me, I think it is a birch tree,” my mom said. “I remember when,” she started retelling the story she had already told hundreds of times (bless her heart) “I told your grandfather how I liked birches, and then the next day he brought a small but already beautiful birch tree from the woods and planted it right here in the garden.”

And there it was, a fully grown birch in our garden, about 40 years old and growing strong. And I got thinking — is really oak my tree? It seems obvious and so naive to pick the oak. Of course, there are reasons for it — the way oaks are steeped in the folklore and mythology around the world, the way they grow — all mighty and expansive and ancient in each gnarly knot on the branches. I think my answer was too simple and easy, like I was conditioned to answer that through all the compendiums of myth and ancient lore I read in my life. Thinking about it, I started in my mind to go through all the trees I knew and could recognize and pay attention to while in the woods. All that thinking navigated me back to the conversation with my mom, and the birch tree in our garden and birch trees overall. And the realization was sudden and overwhelmingly clear — it is not an oak for me, it is a birch tree as well. A birch as in a favorite and particularly special tree in my emotional understanding. And for my family as well, or at least for my mom as well, and that is enough for me to make a sweeping generalization. A glance at some web pages about birches in folklore and mythology told me that the birch tree is a symbol of constant wonder. I don't know who and how came to that conclusion, but it works for me just fine. And I don't think I am changing my totem tree at all now. I think I have just finally realized which tree is my totem tree. That feels like a good thing and a major discovery.