HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY

It's Mother's Day. My own mother's spirit has long since traveled to that Land which knows no shadow. I know she waits for me there with Sooner, the wolf-dog that once roamed the hills with Mother when she was a young girl.

When Mother visited the harsh home from which she had been taken to spend years in an orphanage, she was surprised her beloved Sooner was still alive. No other human could approach her.

But when Mother kneeled in front of her, Sooner laid her big head in Mother's lap. The wolf-dog finally felt the soft fingers stroke her that she had waited years to feel again. Sooner let out a long, slow sigh. And then, she died.

In my worldview, Sooner went to where she sat in that Land Of No Shadows with wagging tail until Mother walked up to her to kneel once again and hug that big head.

Yes, it is Mother's Day. What do I give? And to whom? I am a story teller. And so I give to all of you a story Mother told me as my double pneumonia grew worse, and the winter shadows deepened in our basement apartment without power. It comes from my Native American/Celtic fantasy THE BEAR WITH TWO SHADOWS. But the teaching tale is my mother's.


The adult Hibbs looked at the pond beside which Estanatlehi, the Turquoise Woman stood. She looked at him expectantly. What was she waiting for?

And then, Hibbs smiled. He knew that look. She expected him to remember. And with that very thought, he did. Time once again reached out from his mind and drew the bear back into his wondrous, seemingly endless, days as an innocent, ever curious, cub.

In the crisp memory, whose embrace swallowed him whole, he was kneeling on the sandy bank of the Snaking River, deep within the deadly wilderness of the Valley of the Shadow. And once again he was staring into the reflection of his river face and wondering if it lived its own life deep underneath the silver glass of the still waters.

Suddenly, a rock was tossed into the middle of the river-face, blurring it in spreading ripples which pushed out one after another, and Hibbs heard the soft voice of GrandMother.

“Always in circles. Never in squares.”

The startled cub bounded to his furry feet and turned around, happiness quickly replaced by nose-wrinkling puzzlement. “What?”

Tall, regal, Estanatlehi walked with the grace of the wind itself given form right up to Hibbs. “The ripples, Little One. You have never seen a square one, nor will you ever. Why do you think that is?”

Hibbs’ nose wiggled in hard thought until, right shoulder hunched up a bit, just in case he was guessing wrong, said, “B-Because that is the nature of ripples?”

Estanatlehi sighed, “The story of your life, O Slow of Thought.”

“Huh?”

She laughed soft. “You are both right and wrong. The nature of Life itself is a circle, Little One.”

Hibbs’ mouth dropped. “Truly?”

Long, icy fingers ruffled the fur atop his small head as whisper-soft laughter swept along above him by the breath of the winds themselves. “Truly.”

“Look up to Giizi, the sun. And remember my moon? See younder the rainbow, half hid by the tree-filled horizon. And think back on our trip to the StarMountain Olympus, where you saw my world in all its beauty and majesty. All are round, like the great hurricane you rode over in my arms last moon.”

Hibbs shivered at the memory. “S-So the circle is the way of Life?”

Slender fingers tweaked his nose gently. “Wiser than you know. From childhood to childhood are the days of all Two-Leggeds. The winter flows from spring to summer to autumn back to winter once more. As my world is a circle, so is all Life.”

Cold lips kissed the top of his little head. “Mystery explained.”

Once more back in the present, Hibbs sighed deep, his muzzle wrinkled in a smile of happy remembrance. "Mystery explained."

Estanatlehi stiffened, her own eyes going back into the mists of the past, finding both solace and loss in the journey.

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May all of you find solace in your memories today and in the days to come.

Roland, a grateful son.