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Tale of two trees,

lower case

This is a story of two trees, lower case, not Ventura’s famous “Two Trees” holding sentinel high on a hillside overlooking the city below.

In the city below, at a public park, grow two trees that are separated not by a few paces, as with our landmark tandem, but by the ball’s flight of a major league home run. Despite their distance apart, the two trees stand united in how they are tended.

Let me begin with the taller tree of the lower-case pair. It is not majestic in height, perhaps twice taller than a man, but makes up for it with an explosion of foliage. This abundance of leaves is surprising, if not almost magical, because the tree rises in a hard-packed dirt field beyond reach of sprinklers.

As you might imagine, recent years of drought were not kind to the tree and it became sickly. In truth, it nearly died. To the rescue, thankfully, came a guardian angel – or, rather, an amateur arboriculturist.

Ventura’s famous “Two Trees” holding sentinel.

This timber guardian is a middle-aged man. He parks his car, ironically often under the shade of a much grander tree, and strolls over to the once-sickly tree. With him he carries a jug of water, sometimes two, which he pours with care at the base of the tree’s truck.

Every time I watch this benevolent act – always from afar, for to intrude would seem like interrupting someone at prayer – it brings birdsong to my heart. Too, it always makes me recall this thought from John Wooden: “The true test of a man’s character is what he does when no one is watching.”

Or, when he thinks no one is watching.

As I observe, the wise words of Nelson Henderson, who died more than three-quarters of a century ago, also come to my mind: “The true meaning of life is to plant trees under whose shade you do not expect to sit.”

Or, to water them.

Exemplifying Henderson’s words even more exactly is a second man. He is a bit younger than the first and is caretaker of a smaller tree; a tree with a thin trunk splitting in two near its base; a tree he actually planted. I know the latter fact because our paths crossed once while he was tending it and we got to talking.

I will not tell you where this tree is specifically located because it is not supposed to be there. Honestly, it looks perfectly placed and the spot would be empty without it. If you ask me, planners of the park should have planted a tree here themselves.

Since they did not, the second man did. Importantly, he did so in memory of his deceased dog that he used to take for walks nearby. Every few weeks, the caretaker comes by and waters the little tree. When need be, he clears away dead leaves. Now and again, he adds fertilizer. One can easily envision the tender love his dog received.

I wish you could see these two men at work – no, at service, for their efforts bring beauty for countless others to enjoy. Perhaps you have seen them during their service. Even when the clouds are out, “their” two trees bring sunshine to my day.

As I said, these two trees are not the grandest by any measure. But the story behind them is as lovely as Joyce Kilmer’s well-know poem “Trees” with the famous closing couplet: “Poems are made by fools like me, / But only God can make a tree.”

And sometimes it still takes a person, or two, to tend them with care.

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

Check out my memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” and my essay collection “Strawberries in Wintertime: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” …

• Personalized signed copies are available at WoodyWoodburn.com

FOLLOW ME ON INSTAGRAM: @woodywoodburn

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Grateful For A Smile,

A Wink, And A Hug

            Do you ever feel like the universe smiles at you, winks at you, even gives you an unexpected hug? This recently happened to me, in order, on three successive days.

I will begin with the smile. It came in Gilroy, which is ironic because ever since the mass shooting last July, passing through the Garlic Capital of the World has made my spirits frown.

Stopping for gas, I needed to use the restroom. On my way to the convenience store entrance, I passed a young man sitting on the sidewalk with his nose in a paperback novel. I guessed him to be in his final teen years, early 20s at the oldest. Too, I guessed him to be homeless.

The air-conditioned chill inside was heavenly on a baking afternoon and although I hadn’t intended to buy anything, I grabbed a cold bottle of Coke.

I wish you could have seen the smile that greeted me when I interrupted the young man’s reading and handed him the soda.

“Thank you so much, sir,” he said, beaming far wider than my small gesture merited. I can see that smile in my mind’s eye still.

The wink came the following day, in Oakland, where my son lives. Overwhelmed by the list of 35 offerings on tap at Crooked City Cider, and with no one else in line, I fell into conversation with the woman behind the counter. She turned out to be the owner and steered me expertly to a tasty sampler selection.

A happy hour or so later when I went to close out the tab for our group of seven, I ordered one final four-ounce sampler. The owner returned with a PINT glass filled so full that surface tension allowed the nectar to bow above the rim.

“That’s a generous pour,” I said.

She winked and replied, “Seeing your family’s joy together made me happy.”

The hug came on Sunday, in Fremont, and for the third time a beverage was involved.

When I visit my daughter, I like to run at a nearby community park of sports fields. In the far corner, there’s a tree under whose shade I always hide a bottle of Gatorade so as to keep hydrated. On the way there this time I stopped at a porta-potty to un-hydrate, if you will. Not seeing anyone around, I left the full bottle outside on the ground.

A short moment later when I exited, an elderly woman was pouring my Gatorade on the grass and putting the plastic bottle in her recycling garbage bag. Seeing my exasperation, she apologized profusely.

I felt guilty for her sincere contrition. After all, it was my bone-headedness that was to blame, not hers. With a trash can only a few yards away, it was only natural she assumed my Gatorade had been discarded.

She offered to fetch a replacement drink from her van and pointed at the parking lot a quarter-mile away. I politely declined despite her insistence, for it was a long walk and she appeared frail. I told her I would hunt for a drinking fountain instead.

Off I ran on a mile-long loop around the fields.

The third time I circled around to where I started, the woman was waiting for me with a new bottle of coconut water. It was an unnecessary act of kindness and I wished I had a couple dollars tucked in my sock to repay her.

Instead, I offered her a sweaty hug which she happily accepted.

That coconut water was even sweeter than the Crooked City Cider nectar, and that’s saying something.

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

Check out my memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” and my essay collection “Strawberries in Wintertime: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” …

• Personalized signed copies are available at WoodyWoodburn.com

FOLLOW ME ON INSTAGRAM: @woodywoodburn

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This, That, Baseball and Batman

Shooting from the hip on a hair-triggered keyboard…

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            Will self-driving cars be programmed to leave turn signals on mile after mile just for old time’s sake?

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For the love of Lou Boudreau! (Google him) I beg Cody Bellinger and all Major League batters to please, when the defense puts on an infield shift, poke or slap the ball to the opposite field and take all the singles you can get until they stop shifting!

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            Add baseball: My much-better-half was watching her beloved Dodgers on TV the other night and after the broadcast duo blathered on blah blah blah even more than usual, in rare total exasperation she sighed, “God, I miss Vin Scully!”

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            Speaking of The Golden Voice and my wife…

Nineteen summers ago was Scully’s 50th season behind the mic and in the press box before a game I asked him for an interview in the coming days.

True to his word, he phoned me at home a couple days later to set something up and my wife answered the phone.

“This is Vin Scully,” the caller said, needlessly identifying himself because his voice was unmistakable. “May I speak to Woody?”

Unfortunately, I was out and more unfortunately had not mentioned that I was expecting the call.

Most unfortunate of all, my wife assumed it was one of my goofy friends imitating Scully and joked in reply, “Who is this really?” and then playfully hung up.

The classy Scully phoned right back, to the great chagrin of my wife, who instantly realized her mistake and apologized before telling him when she expected me home.

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            More Scully. My writing idol, Jim Murray, was receiving an honor at the Beverly Hills Hotel and because of some good luck I was in attendance.

And because of some beverages, I was later in the men’s room when in walked Scully. He greeted another person who was leaving and his trademark voice echoed off the tiled walls as rich and melodic as a cello in Carnegie Hall.

I remember laughing to myself, imagining Scully doing the play-by-play right then and there: “Kirk Gibson steps up to the urinal, takes his stance…”

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            One final Scully memory. At the end of my interview with him in the press box hours before the first pitch, I sheepishly asked Scully to do a play-by-play radio call with me at bat. He asked who I wanted on the mound and without hesitation I said the great Bob Gibson.

Oh, how I wish I’d used a tape recorder for interviews back then instead of notepads. No matter, in my mind’s ear I can still hear the imaginary broadcast as “Woodburn fouls off another fastball and works the count to deuces wild – two balls, two strikes, two out with two men on.”

I still half-expected Scully to impishly have me strike out, but instead my Major League career batting average is a perfect 1-for-1 with an RBI line-drive single to left field in Dodger Stadium.

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            For some of us, who wore a bath towel pinned around their neck throughout kindergarten, today is a super holiday: Batman Day.

This year’s official occasion marks the 80th anniversary of DC Comic’s Dark Knight and will be celebrated around the world. Indeed, the Bat Signal will be lighted in Tokyo, Berlin, Paris, Barcelona, London, Montreal, Mexico City, New York, Los Angeles – and perhaps a kindergartener-still-at-heart’s home in Ventura.

Let me close with this wisdom from a poster that says it all: “Always be yourself, unless you can be Batman, then always be Batman!”

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FOLLOW ME ON INSTAGRAM: @woodywoodburn

Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

Check out my memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” and my essay collection “Strawberries in Wintertime: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” …

• Personalized signed copies are available at WoodyWoodburn.com