We live near the base of a canyon that was developed in the 1920s. The main road running up into the hills is lined with old oak trees. On a walk last weekend, mid-morning, a woman in front of me stepped off the sidewalk. She was a small person, maybe in her sixties. She walked up to one of the trees and, without hesitation, wrapped her arms around it, not even circling half of the trunk. Her eyes were closed. Her back faced the sun. Her face, wrapped in a gray bandanna, was turned so her cheek lay against the bark, while her body pressed into the embrace. Walking past, I thought, I wish I was doing that.
Raoul Dufy, Le Parc (1902)
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