Do You Climb Trees?

Sitting at a table outside a sandwich shop, hands tucked between my legs, legs crossed on another metal chair across from me. I was waiting for Jess to grab some dinner, and so watching the crowd for her face. I love people watching on sunny days on the Hill. It's like all the weird seeps out of the cracks and we're all more able to realize that normal is weird and weird is normal here. What is weird? What is normal?

A cluster of people came down the sidewalk that day: two femme-ish woman-ish looking people with a stroller (lesbians?) and another person tagging along behind them (poly family? friends?).

They had shoulder-length muddy brownish hair pulled up into some kind of messy half-ponytail. Blue jeans, rolled up to the ankles, well-worn, grass stains. Bare, dirty feet. Light purple backpack. Worn over a grey T-shirt with some kind of eco-something print on it. Piercing blue eyes. They surveyed me - at that time in all-black concert attire, a vest and collared shirt - and made eye contact again. A smile escaped me. They grinned back.

The group passed, and I allowed myself a laugh. I was so drawn to them. Not sexually - there was just something about them. Should I look back? Nah, that'd be awkward. Oh, common. It's been long enough. They're going to be out of sight soon. I looked back and was met with a reciprocal smirk and probably two full seconds of eye contact. They kind of skip-tripped trying to walk while looking backward. I laughed out loud, hugged myself, and giggled. I love people watching on sunny days on the Hill.

A couple minutes passed, and I heard steps behind me. Bluejeans stepped out in front of me and in this strange gutsy-nervous way, said, simply, "Hey, I have to meet you."

"Yeah, absolutely! Adriaan. You?" I offered my hand and they shook it warmly.

They returned with their name. "Do you climb trees?"

"........Yeah! I haven't found any around here. Do you - I mean, have you found a good one in the park or something?"

"Common, I'll show you."

It was a big tree with knots up the trunk for about ten feet before the first big branches. "How do you get up there?" I spoke with the awe and adventure of a kid. Like they were going to teach me how to go to a magic world. I remember when I used to take other kids into the woods and show them magic worlds you had to be really good to climb into. A decade or so might have passed since.

"You just - these knots are pretty good for - and then you just - " they scampered up the trunk and grabbed onto the huge branch - a foot and a half in diameter, maybe - with both hands, wrapping their legs around it sloth-style and pulling themself up with just upper body strength. I was taking off my concert shoes and fancy socks, leaving them in a pile with my vest on a nice patch of grass at the base of the tree.

"What? How do you... Huh." I was having some trouble getting up.

"Yeah, testosterone helped."

"I just can't - ugh." I dropped back to the ground.

"Need a hand?"

"Nah, I think I got - " dropped again. "I swear, it's been years since I haven't been able to get into a tree."

"It's alright. I mean if..."

"No, I'm gonna - " I managed to grab hold of the stump of a thinner branch that'd been broken off and found a well of adrenaline somewhere in me to keep from letting go as I slipped, hanging by just my hands from the branch. After a few seconds of struggling, I finally pulled myself up, grinning to myself.

"Yeah, I bet T helped. How long've you been?"

"Two years."

"I'm supposed to have my appointment in... 26 days?"

"Nice, congrats."

"Family, though. I'm gonna have to postpone a little."

"Yeah, my parents freaked out for awhile. They love me, though. They're conservative Christians and all, but they love me, and things are okay now. I see them every few weeks."

"That's not bad. Where'd you grow up?"

We talked about where we're from, about our parents, about our majors and where we're going to school. I talked about choir, they talked about anthropology. They dropped down for a few seconds to retrieve a blue and green blown glass pipe from the purple backpack and packed some pot into it.

"Woah, your foot's bleeding," they said. I'd noticed, but there wasn't much to do about it. "I don't think I have anything in here to help with that, sorry."

"That's fine. Yeah, my hand is, too, but I'll be okay." They pulled themself back on top of the branch and pulled the little pipe out of their pocket, handing it to me with a lighter.


"Sure." My hands were still shaking from the adrenaline. "Wind doesn't help."

"Here - " I got it lit, passed it to them.

"I've gotten stupider since I started smoking."

"Yeah?"

"I dunno why. I guess it's dependency, not addiction, but... yeah. I don't know why I keep it."

"Mm. People talk a lot about addiction. Even if that doesn't exist chemically, it makes sense that it'd do something to you."

"Yeah."

"You said you're graduating this year?"

"Yeah, had a job lined up, but turns out it's only for students, so it's not going to work out."

"That sucks. I don't know exactly where I'm headed, either, but I'm getting there. You seem like you'd be more at home in environmental studies than in anthro, to be honest."

"Probably. I only discovered it recently. At least I have the minor."

The wind was still whipping through the leaves above me. I always used to have the best conversations with childhood friends in the tree I grew up in. There's something communal about climbing trees, something conversational about the way the breeze moves through them.

"I love how big this tree is. I bet people sleep up here."

"Yeah, probably. It's a good tree."

"You hungry? I probably need to go meet up with Jess at some point."

"Oh yeah. Forgot about that."

"Wanna come with me, meet her?"

"I should go catch up with my friends."

"Alright. Let's see if I can get down from here."

I managed with surprising elegance. Gravity makes it much easier getting down than up, even with a bleeding foot. "Ha."

"You have a phone number to give me?"

"Facebook's easier - my phone's bust. But here, I'll put my info into yours."

"Alright, Adriaan."

"I'll see you soon."

They showed up at the concert I was singing in the next day. I don't know if they knew other people in the choir, but they didn't stay to talk to anyone else. I went up to greet them and to introduce them to Jess, and the first thing she did was to give them a big hug, as she does. They said they'd met her before, and that she was a fairy. Perhaps they'd confused her for someone else, but I love to imagine that she is one. Someone had suggested about them after hearing my story that they'd been an angel. I like that we can seem otherworldly to each other. I love that we can discover otherworldliness right here.