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The Portal(Trees)The story begins as a dream which I had when I was about the age of nine or ten. I'm walking in a forest, on a path. To the left of me about three or four meters is a river. To the right of me is a mixture of pine and deciduous trees following a moderately steep slope to the top of a ridge. The sky is a relaxing light blue with white cotton clouds.As I walk along the path, the ridge on the right opens up to to a bowl like valley. I can actually see where the valley comes to the top meeting what must be flat ground and more soft skies. Only a few trees block the view of the top. Shortly I come to an unusual array of trees growing from a small circle center outwards on a slight angle. The trunks don't have many limbs until up higher. Despite the circular pattern, the trees appear to be growing naturally. "That's neat", I think. "I think I'll just stand in the middle, lean against one of those trees and take a break as I soak in the view." Suddenly as I step into the circle, everything around the outside of the trees become a blur of motion; changing colour and even seasons, it appears. The sky is a solid streak, occasionally changing direction and colour. It gives me a sense of spinning and dizziness. Thankfully it stops. But when I stepped out of the circle everything has changed, and yet it has not. It is still the same place. But growth is different, and less dense. The winding path of the river has changed slightly. Then I notice the sky. It is a horrifying orange hue of cloud cover. In the sky I can hear the roar of jet planes, and very distant explosions. I look over to where the valley is and see a tower on top which wasn't there before. Wondering what has happened I decided to climb to the top of the valley. After a leisure five minute walk to the top of the bowl like valley, I see a jet come out of the clouds in the direction of the tower. But the jet is not a commercial liner as the sound might have suggested. It's a fighter plane. I'm beginning to not like this place. Peeking over the edge onto flat ground I can see the rest of what appears to be a small air base with a communication tower. The fighter jet lands as another is taking off. Being a small base it doesn't have much for security. Not even a fence. But I suppose it's not needed since the rest of the area including a small town nearby appears evacuated. I sneak my way into the base. Strange that there are no cameras or anything. Maybe the base used to belong to the locals. Looking for detail on where exactly I am, I find a newspaper in a lunch room. I only read as far as the date when I realize something is very wrong. This paper shouldn't be printed for another few decades. I then hear voices down the hall and around the corner. I dart for the door I came in through. Not looking back I hear one of the voices call to me "Hey!-" as the door closes. To the left of me I hear another jet coming in for a landing. I begin to wonder "Am I stuck here?" Before the voices catch up to me I see a bigger threat. Looking out over the bowl like valley I had climbed, which runs into the river, beyond the distant treetop horizon on the other side of the entire river valley, I see a bright flash of an intensity of a setting sun. It grows instantly like a tree doesn't. And a bowl of light begins to expand outward from the base. Panic begins to take hold because I know that bowl of light is coming this way. And when it gets here, there will be no more 'here". In my idiotic panic, I race down the valley toward the circle of trees as if they can protect me from what is coming. I reach the trees just as the now giant bowl of light nears the opposite side of the river and the valley beyond. Diving into the center of the trees, the rumble of the explosion stops and things around the trees become a blur once more. When it stops I find myself laying in the center of the portal looking up at the blue and cotton cloud sky through the branches of the trees. While still dreaming, ironically I think to myself, "What a relief, it was just a dream". Then I really woke up. And as the day went the memory of the dream became more faded as dreams do. Eventually I totally forgot about this dream until one day when I was about the age of 14; I was walking on a path in a forest I had never been in before. There was a river to my left and the trees followed the landscape up on the right. As I walked along the path I was looking up the slop on the right when I came to view of a bowl like valley. I thought to myself, "Deja vous", "I've been here before". Then I looked ahead on the path and saw the circle of trees. Immediately goose bumps ran up and down my spine as the memory of the entire dream returned. I had to make sure it was just a dream. Hesitating, I stepped into the circle of trees but thankfully nothing happened except relief. I found the circle of trees within walking distance of where I grew up in Lynedoch, Ontario. I later noticed that the air base in my dream was right on top of a plot of farm land and house were a friend of mine lived. I returned to the trees frequently thereafter wondering what the dream meant and what it means for other dreams I've had, or how they are connected to this world or all of existence for that matter. I never came to a conclusion, but I still return from time to time. On one of my last visits, I found one of the trees broken. I thought to myself, "I hope that path of the future is also broken." |