A Quotation For Monday

"All things are contained within all other things, and everything in the universe shares a living soul."  Felicity Hayes-McCoy, from her book "The House on an Irish Hillside"

This is a portion of the trunk of a huge Western Red Cedar tree that crashed to earth in a violent windstorm many years ago.  My husband trimmed it up; we used some of it for firewood, but the largest portion we left to nurture the earth it lays on, the forest around it and the little creatures who dwell here. Insects nest in it, Ladybugs winter safely underneath it, birds and chipmunks eat some of the insects who dwell in it, chipmunks and squirrels cache their stores of seeds and nuts in the holes woodpeckers have made while getting the insects, and a tired woman hiking back to her cottage frequently rests upon it, talks to it, and is nurtured by its enduring beauty, its enduring soul. 

(Please be sure to left click on the photo to enlarge it; the colors and patterns in the trunk just don't show up very well in small format).