Moving into the old, single-wide trailer which had been unoccupied for the four preceding years before we rented it on private land in the oak woodland hills of rural Northern California wasn’t at all an easy task. My husband and I worked full, long, hot days for almost a month cleaning, repairing, refurbishing and remodeling the place just to make it livable enough to move into.
You might well ask why we’re willing to put so much effort into an admittedly grungy (in the beginning, anyway), tiny place that doesn’t even belong to us and I might wonder that, too, if I’d never seen it.
If you could see it, however, I believe you’d have to admit that it’s one of the most beautiful, magical, serene and picturesque places that you’ve ever laid your eyes on -- just as my husband and I have.
The gentle, golden-colored hills upon which we live are teeming with plant and animal life but the unrivaled sovereigns of our little piece of the Sonoma County landscape are the oaks: The live oaks, black oaks, leather oaks, valley oaks Oregon oaks and blue oaks which grace the flat grasslands and dot the low, rolling hills or gather in stands in moist, cool glens in-between.
Artfully regal, unmistakably grand, ostentatiously moss-dripped and discernibly ancient; the oaks are all around us. Our trailer sits on the side of a small hill beneath the edge of the canopy of a stand of leather and blue oaks resting in the midst of a shady glen so that all of the windows along one side of the trailer are centered at branch-level -- almost as if one is living in a tree house.
Soon after we moved in, I happened to glance out of one of my living room windows and noticed something unusual about one of the oak trees. There, in the damp, late morning light, I saw what plainly looked like a face emerging from the trunk of one of the leather oaks! Prominently visible in profile were a nose, a chin, lips and indentions where the eyes would be were it faced toward the trailer instead of to one side and the features were strangely reminiscent of an elf or fairy. . .
I christened it with the name “Oakley” and, now, a day doesn’t go by that I don’t stop at the window and bid him good morning.
I christened it with the name “Oakley” and, now, a day doesn’t go by that I don’t stop at the window and bid him good morning.
Oakley changes as times goes by: During the winter months, Oakley takes on a deep, hunter-green hue as the moss that covers him becomes saturated with rain water and, as spring and summer progress, the green gives way to the dark, charcoal-brown of his bark. I began to wonder: Is this “personification” of oak trees merely a quirk in my own make-up or could there be more to it than that? So I began researching the lore of the oak in human history. . .
Throughout history, the oak has been known by many names: Father of the Woods, King of the Forests, Tree of Britain and Jove’s Nuts. The deities associated with it are many: Hecate, Diana, Rhea, Circe, Athena, Demeter, Zeus, Hercules, Pan, Jehovah, Odin, Thor, and Janus.
It has long had an association with the planet Jupiter which, because of its size, has a close association to the Sun. As the ruling planet of Sagittarius Jupiter’s element is Fire and it represents the principles of protection, health and healing, fertility, luck, money, joviality and potency.
I knew that, in California history especially, the oak was revered by the indigenous peoples as the acorn was one of their main sources (if not their main source) of food.
In Chapter Eleven of his book Who Will Roll Away the Stone? Discipleship Queries for First World Christians (Orbis Books, 1994), Chad Myers gives us an idea of the importance of the oak to the native peoples of California:
No matter how far one digs through the cultural-historical strata of this place, the oak is always there. The human history of California began in the shade of her native oaks. Acorn foods sustained many diverse Indian cultures that evolved and thrived among the woodlands for centuries… It is not surprising that oaks were revered by native Californians, held sacred in elaborate acorn ceremonies, and depicted as symbols of fertility, strength, and oneness with the earth... Acorns were second only to salt among the food items most frequently traded among native Californians, and were used as well for medicine, dyes, toys and music. Acorns represented to some tribes the Ikxareyavs (”Spirit People”), and were present in ritual life from birth . . . to death . . .
He goes on to say:
The Druids frequently worshipped and practiced their rites in oak groves (the word Druid was probably a Gaelic derivation of their word for oak, Duir, and meant men of the oaks). Mistletoe, probably the Druids' most potent and magical plant, frequently grew on oak trees and its presence was believed to indicate the hand of God having placed it there in a lightning strike.
In his work on the subject entitled In Worship of Trees, George Knowles adds:
In early Celtic times certain oaks were marked with a protective symbol, a circle divided into four equal parts (symbolic of the four elements - Earth, Air, Fire and Water), this was probably a forerunner of the magic pentacle (an up-right five pointed star inside a circle, symbolic of the four elements plus “spirit”). . .
Other myths and legends involving the oak include “Merlin”, the mystical wizard, magician and seer who helped King Arthur. It was believed that Merlin . . . worked his magic in a grove of oaks supposedly using the topmost branch of an oak tree as his wand.
As I gaze out the window at Oakley, it’s not hard for me to imagine that he “host[s] the energy, power and strength of . . . gods”.
Here in California it is believed that the very first Catholic mass ever celebrated in the state was held under the branches of an oak tree in Monterey and there is an old live oak in the Tajiguas Canyon north of Santa Barbara which locals call “the Indian tree” that bears a carving that dates back some 300 or more years of a Chumash Indian receiving communion from a Spanish padre.
For the Wiccans, the oak plays an integral part in the festivals of the Imbolc, Astara (spring equinox), Beltane, Litha (summer solstice), Lammas and Mabon (autumn equinox).
As a talisman, the oak was much used by the ancient Celts and they carried sprigs of oak on their persons for a feeling of security and protection from harm. Other magical uses included:
*** Two twigs of oaks tied together in an equally-armed cross (reminiscent of the Druid symbol) to protect a person or hung upon the wall to protect their house from evil.
*** Bathing the feet in an infusion of oak leaves and bark in contemplation of a journey to guide them to a successful conclusion.
*** Acorns placed on a windowsill to protect a house from lightning.? Carrying an acorn to aid longevity and guard against pain.
*** Catching an oak leaf as it fell to protect the catcher from colds throughout the winter.
Another name for the oak is “gospel tree” which is probably a reference that harks back to the Druidic habit of holding their religious ceremonies under the branches of stately, English oaks and, after the advent of Christianity, it is said that Edward the Confessor preached his sermons under a particular oak in Hampstead.
After being defeated by Cromwell in 1651, it is said that King Charles II hid in a massive oak tree. When he returned to the throne ten years later, he changed the name of the tree to “royal oak”, proclaimed his birthday to be “Royal Oak Day” and included in the celebrations various adornments of people and houses with leaves and boughs of oak. It is probably these celebrations to which the “Green Man” -- who parades through the streets before taking his “May Queen” bride -- owes his popularity.
In Celtic astrology, most people born during the month of May are considered to be born under the sign of the oak. Oak people are said to be robust, courageous, strong, unrelenting, independent, sensible and disinclined toward change (many of the same traits, coincidentally, also attributed to the Western astrological sign of Taurus, the Bull which rules those born during the first half of May).
But, what Chad Myers has to say about the oak and its relationship to religion, particularly in California, is, I feel, particularly pertinent to the subject at hand:
Perhaps if [Friar Junipero] Serra and his descendants had understood and practiced a fundamental identification between cross and tree, rather than between cross and sword, the history of California would have been different. But that is not how it happened. And today, the locus imperii is no more hospitable to Quercus agrifolia than it is to the via cruces . . . El roble sagrado al centro del mundo [the sacred oak tree at the center of the world]. By it we can practice mesticismo [mysticism], and in its great canopy ‘all the birds of the air can find a nest’.
So it is that I find it most intriguing that I immediately sensed the connection between the oaks surrounding our little trailer here in the “wild hinterlands” of Northern California and the practices of mysticism.Perhaps -- just perhaps -- Oakley might have had something to do with that. . .
So it is that I find it most intriguing that I immediately sensed the connection between the oaks surrounding our little trailer here in the “wild hinterlands” of Northern California and the practices of mysticism.Perhaps -- just perhaps -- Oakley might have had something to do with that. . .
