The Mighty Oak Tree

My wife is fascinated by the species Quercus. I have always seen her connection to nature when out on walks and hikes, but the mighty Oak is one she is extremely fond of. They say 2300 species are dependent on the Oak, with my wife makes that 2301.

When I started reading Sean McDonnell’s stories, I didn’t know what I was in for. The first story prompted me to reach out and let him know how much I enjoyed what I had just read, the story was Days Of Hope. (https://automaticwriter.substack.com/p/days-of-hope?utm_source=profile&utm_medium=reader2). After reading it twice on my screen, I eagerly printed it out and stapled my own booklet version.

The story that lead me to this new ‘thing’, Substack, was one of his Instagram posts…a story called Oatho that he wrote, with the phrase ‘Twins. Like God and Jesus. Like the Tree. Like Oatho and Me.’ What on Earth could this be about? …is what I thought. It was absolutely fantastic. I did not print it out this time. Instead, I reached out to Sean about publishing a book of his stories. He said…sure.

Here we are a few short months later. Sean hands me (electronically that is) two stories that have not yet been published online. After reading everything I could of his, I hope you can sense how excited I was to be given this. The stories are Perro Negro and Beneath the Valley Oak.

Beneath the Valley Oak?

Quercus lobata? (Yes hun, I do listen to every word you say!)

I printed both out, waited a few days for my schedule to calm down, made a nice cup of coffee, put on my readers and read away.

I don’t know where I would be right now if I did not happen upon Sean’s post for Oatho and follow the ‘Link In Bio’ instructions. But we are nearing completion on Sean’s first book of six short stories, all western themed…and I cain’t wait!

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