I Need a Mistake Tree
I am usually a bit behind the curve when it comes to keeping us with the latest trends and popular things. I really don’t remember how long it has been since I saw a current movie at the cinema. Usually I rent something months after it has been released on DVD. I finally have seen the movie “Because of Winn-Dixie”. It was a good movie, uplifting, humorous and it brought back memories of growing up in a small southern town.
One of my favorite scenes was when the character Gloria Dump takes the young Opal out to see Gloria’s “mistake tree”. The tree is covered with bottles and other containers tied with strings and hanging from the massive tree’s branches. I had forgotten about seeing those when I grew up. I never really knew much about them. My parents were very conservative and chose not to talk about the “sins of the flesh”. Odd that I can remember noticing mistake trees in the yards of people known to have had a hard life.
For Gloria each bottle served to remind her of a mistake she had made. A bad thing she had done. The bottles kept away the ghosts of her mistakes. Opal seeing the hundreds of bottles tells Gloria she is not a bad person and Gloria responds, “Yes but I have done bad things.”
Maybe I need a mistake tree. God, and a lot of other people, know I have done bad things. Some of my mistakes would need very big bottles to keep away my ghosts. Maybe I need to be able to sit under the tree seeing the bottles sway back and forth listening to the gentle noise as they softly brush against each other making the sorrowful music of guilt, sadness and remorse.
As the bottles move I can see the ghosts that would want to come and haunt me back to depression attempting to slip between the movement. The ghosts knowing that as they drive me deeper into the dark hole I am more likely to do bad things. Yet every time they are brushed back. Sent to some far off place where they are unable to harm me ever again. Sitting there, I can rest determining to change what I can about my life and myself. Finding ways to live so I may hang progressively fewer bottles.
The pastor part of me theologizes the mistake tree and my thoughts. I begin to understand the tree as another tree I have preached and taught about. The analogies develop. Analogies of mistakes hung and held away from me no longer allowed to haunt my thoughts. My mind begins to do its racing thing, formulating sermon texts, visualizing how to use the movie image in a worship service, planning when it would be most effectively used in my parish. And I realize I may need to get another bottle.
That’s the nice thing about mistake trees. They can calm and center someone. The realization that what is happening may need another bottle helps refocus thought. And just in case there is still a need to step back to what is real you can walk out under the branches of that tree and remember each of the bottles hanging from the long strings.
I imagine the members of my congregation wouldn’t quite understand if I began hanging hundreds, thousands, of bottles from the large oak trees that surround the church buildings and my house. It’s a small community after all and people would begin to talk. What kind of preacher do those guys have if he has done that many bad things? So even though I think I need a mistake tree it probably won’t happen here.
I can think of that other tree. The one my hero Martin Luther writes about and encourages me to gaze at and meditate on. I have one in my office. I found it stored in a closet. Somehow that is appropriate. Now it hangs on the wall sort of above my computer and next to the calendar. A place I tend to look at a lot.
As I look at that tree I can see my mistakes. I can see the ghosts of the bad things I have done trying to get to me. But they keep being pushed back. I’m glad and somehow I know that today will probably not have any regrets.
Now if I could just figure out how to hang a bottle on it…..
One of my favorite scenes was when the character Gloria Dump takes the young Opal out to see Gloria’s “mistake tree”. The tree is covered with bottles and other containers tied with strings and hanging from the massive tree’s branches. I had forgotten about seeing those when I grew up. I never really knew much about them. My parents were very conservative and chose not to talk about the “sins of the flesh”. Odd that I can remember noticing mistake trees in the yards of people known to have had a hard life.
For Gloria each bottle served to remind her of a mistake she had made. A bad thing she had done. The bottles kept away the ghosts of her mistakes. Opal seeing the hundreds of bottles tells Gloria she is not a bad person and Gloria responds, “Yes but I have done bad things.”
Maybe I need a mistake tree. God, and a lot of other people, know I have done bad things. Some of my mistakes would need very big bottles to keep away my ghosts. Maybe I need to be able to sit under the tree seeing the bottles sway back and forth listening to the gentle noise as they softly brush against each other making the sorrowful music of guilt, sadness and remorse.
As the bottles move I can see the ghosts that would want to come and haunt me back to depression attempting to slip between the movement. The ghosts knowing that as they drive me deeper into the dark hole I am more likely to do bad things. Yet every time they are brushed back. Sent to some far off place where they are unable to harm me ever again. Sitting there, I can rest determining to change what I can about my life and myself. Finding ways to live so I may hang progressively fewer bottles.
The pastor part of me theologizes the mistake tree and my thoughts. I begin to understand the tree as another tree I have preached and taught about. The analogies develop. Analogies of mistakes hung and held away from me no longer allowed to haunt my thoughts. My mind begins to do its racing thing, formulating sermon texts, visualizing how to use the movie image in a worship service, planning when it would be most effectively used in my parish. And I realize I may need to get another bottle.
That’s the nice thing about mistake trees. They can calm and center someone. The realization that what is happening may need another bottle helps refocus thought. And just in case there is still a need to step back to what is real you can walk out under the branches of that tree and remember each of the bottles hanging from the long strings.
I imagine the members of my congregation wouldn’t quite understand if I began hanging hundreds, thousands, of bottles from the large oak trees that surround the church buildings and my house. It’s a small community after all and people would begin to talk. What kind of preacher do those guys have if he has done that many bad things? So even though I think I need a mistake tree it probably won’t happen here.
I can think of that other tree. The one my hero Martin Luther writes about and encourages me to gaze at and meditate on. I have one in my office. I found it stored in a closet. Somehow that is appropriate. Now it hangs on the wall sort of above my computer and next to the calendar. A place I tend to look at a lot.
As I look at that tree I can see my mistakes. I can see the ghosts of the bad things I have done trying to get to me. But they keep being pushed back. I’m glad and somehow I know that today will probably not have any regrets.
Now if I could just figure out how to hang a bottle on it…..
posted by Pastor Bluejeans at 10:07 AM
3 Comments:
I've never heard of a mistake tree. I have seen native "prayer trees" which have quite a different purpose. Pieces of paper or cloth representing petitions are tied on to tree branches, and when the wind blows, the Holy Spirit carries the petitions to God.
nice blog
LF
It makes sense for the movie, but in general I'm not sure how most ppl would view a tree with bottles hanging from it with the understanding that it was a "mistake tree". To me, such a symbol of the sins of the ppl has southern penetacoastal undertones.
In the rural south you might see some mighty strange things on ppl's yards. Just the other day, driving on a rural roadway in S.C. I passed an old, weather and time beaten house where on it's porch were about 30 dolls. All were white and they were either clothed or unclothed. All were decorated with christmas related ornament things. What was interesting to me was this house was in the part of the town old timers would say was "colored town".
Maybe it was nothing but an innocent attempt to celebrate christmas, but to me it was as if someone was making fun of the white folks. Who knows?
Beautiful. I like how you tied the mistake tree to "the tree" of the cross--it helps me visualize my sins hung there, taken away by Jesus...and I do hope you use this in a sermon sometime!
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