Shaman Stone

For the past several months I've been walking past a stately old Oak.  I would say, "Good morning" and "I love you."  "You are beautiful and it's nice to see you."  Its hard and knobby roots are exposed above ground so you have to walk on them to get past it yet it doesn't seem to mind you stepping on its toes.  When I'm by this tree I will put my arms around its girth and tell it how much I appreciate it.  How much I enjoy having it there as I will occasionally step under it to get out of the heat.  I've encouraged it to thrive and grow, to fill out its dense canopy, which it has.  Trees are wonderful companions that shelter and shade animals and humans.   Well, just the other day, on my routine walk, I spied what appeared to be a stone sticking up from between a small opening in its roots.  It wasn't laying horizontally but was sticking vertically up and out of the ground.  Maybe it was vertical because as the tree grew, its immense root system had thrust it upward.  I looked at it with interest for a minute and concluded, "Nah, that can't be a stone."  "I mean, how uncommon, how interesting that it is sticking up out of the ground and the fact that I've been walking over and around this tree for years and I've never noticed this before."  I stared at the "stone" but decided it would have to wait another day to examine it and pry it out.  I think I was tired and just wanted to get in the house.  The next morning I headed straight for the tree.  I apologized for stepping all over its toes again as I located the stone then bent down and gently pulled it out.  It was embedded in dirt that covered it to about 2 - 3" and it didn't offer any resistance.  As I placed the stone in the palm of my hand, I almost couldn't believe what I was beholding.  The stone is unique, to say the least.  It is not round but more oval in shape and honed smooth by what one could surmise is water.  It has a nice feel to it and is softly grooved on one side so you can hold it with ease.  This whole area I'm living in used to be underwater thousands of years ago so that makes sense why the stone would be so smooth.  If you look at it under a magnifying glass it closely reminds one of the universe with a myriad of stars and the outline of the Big Dipper and tiny Nazca-like lines crisscrossing it.  It is a soft gray, green and brown (earth tones) but the slender intersecting lines are a deep black.  The most remarkable thing about this stone are the two eyes and a mouth. What an exquisite  experience this was.  I just witnessed, with my own eyes, an Oak Tree giving birth to a stone.  Was this poignant discovery in direct response (a communication of sorts) to my outpouring of love, gratitude and concern for this green giant that it responded by opening up an esoteric doorway, exposing a wondrous hidden realm?  Or, was this just simply a thank you?  This stone is a treasure.  I now sleep with it under my pillow.  Perhaps one day (when the universe deems it is so) this stone will reveal its magical secrets and reunite, introduce me to my Native American ancestors, and the soldiers of the American Revolutionary War, as I prepare to take the long walk back into the deep dark forest.   

Shaman Stone 6/19/14