Before computers and video games consumed the carefree hours of youth, we had trees. Big ones. Climb-worthy ones. Trees with engaging personalities who invited kids, big and small, to wiggle up a branch and stay awhile. Horse farms and rolling green hills may give Ocala her heritage, but it is our grand trees that give us our story.

And, sometimes, trees wait patiently for us to grow up in order to appreciate the tale.

When I left home for college — heck bent on finding a life outside of Ocala — one of my professors referenced my hometown in his lecture on preservation.

“Ocala is a place who understands the value of a tree,” he said almost wistfully before waxing on about a trip he once made to the place I was trying to forget. The multitude and beauty of Ocala’s trees “captured him” he said.

How odd a comment, I thought, for a teacher of higher learning in a metropolitan city. Sure, the live oaks in Ocala were great and all, and, yeah, I spent many childhood afternoons lounging on steady limbs while pretending to be the Queen of Someplace Else, but Ocala as the bastion of progressiveness?

Then, I went to graduate school in another part of the state, far away from Central Florida’s oaks and magnolias and citrus groves. I lived among perfectly manicured palm trees which I always viewed as the nouveau riche cousin who comes to dinner and feigns disdain at the lack of a really good place for sushi.

I missed my trees. I missed the place the Timucuans called “Ocali” believed to mean “big hammock” which, indeed, it still is, quite amazingly, in a state of condos, asphalt, and zero-lot line residences.

So, I returned to Ocala. When someone asks for directions, I use trees as my landmark. “Go just past the large magnolia on Seventh, then turn left by the tall pines.”

Works every time.

Weekends are good excuses to take leisurely drives to Lake Weir with the window rolled down to let in the citrus scent from the surrounding dotted orange tree vista. We take a different route home — the children’s favorite — through lush green pastures of horses, Spanish moss, and granddaddy oaks… our own Hudson River painting a la Marion County.

When I grew up and life and wisdom merged, my husband and I moved into our first home with a stately oak in the back yard, perfect for hanging a wood swing on and hiding Easter eggs in its low-hanging branches. Then we moved again, this time to another home with beautiful trees. And another move with other trees captivating our admiration.

Most days, I find myself driving down Fifth Street, a road known for its famous stretch of old oaks on both sides whose branches intertwine like an old lady’s fingers letting the sun filter in through the canopy.

Home, at last, to the place where I am Queen of Right Where I Belong.