Tag Archives: the forest

Sky tantrums.

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sky tantrum

The forest and the sky above it can get very angry on occasion, the past few days have exhibited that anger a great deal. Furious winds swept through trees and pulled branches and leaves and sharp rain cut through the dirt of the forest floor, turning it into untraversable plots of gritty mud. From my experiences, this kind of sky tantrum is common when the temperature of the forest climbs down from its summer tower and begins to calm itself leading into the more humble autumn. I have been through a great deal of sky tantrums myself, and I know all creatures in the forest have their own ways of handling these events.

Most creatures, particularly the tinnier ones, tend to hide under logs, rocks, human caves, dumpsters, and other creatures to protect them from the unnecessary anger of the wind. How birds carry themselves through sky tantrums is a bit of a mystery. I have never seen a bird successfully fly during one, but I also rarely see them perched among trees, their alternative to their routine flying. Maybe they hide with the other creatures? Maybe all birds crash into trees during these sometimes terrifying acts of the forest and then new birds are born from the remains the very next day? I hope that is not the case. That would be strange/scary.

I like to walk through it for as long as I can. I squint my eyes and grit my teeth and dig my claws into the ground as I make one laborious step after another. It feels refreshing to do this right after a blazing summer day, and there is something freeing about letting the rushing wind toss through my fur, despite knowing that at any moment that same wind could turn on me and hurt me.

That actually happened during this particular sky tantrum. The wind carried a very large, very pointy, very unsafe branch from a tree and hurled it directly at my face/ears/nose. It was not a pleasant feeling, and, for the briefest of moments, I thought I had met my end to the vengeful acts of the violent wind (I certainly do not blame the branch as it must have been just as terrifying for it to be carried so forcefully by the wind). It hurt, and as soon as I processed what was going on and realized that I was still a bear and not no longer a bear, I galloped back to my cave. I carried the branch with me. I was certain it, too, needed protection. From there, I rested on a cold rock and watched the water from the rain continue to attack the forest floor throughout the night, occasionally gnawing at my guest branch, which might have been rude but I never asked. It would be fun to nap in some of the puddles tomorrow, I thought to myself, and then I continued to chew on the branch.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? 

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on the book of faces.

You are a bear. Do not get ants in your nose.

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You are a bear. Living in the forest provides you with an array of fascinating smells, sights, and food. You live for the eclectic forest experiences that you collect on a daily basis. Every tree stump, abandoned cave, riverbed, bushel, and strange human structure offers a unique, amazing sensory overload.

Among these fascinating structures: an anthill.

You have never licked, smelled, clawed at, or even thought too deeply of anthills. Before today, you had never even seen an anthill that was idle, without ants. This anthill currently has no ants rummaging around the top of it. It is idle.

Without ants. At least ones you can see.

It is a very nice anthill.

You choose to…

I am afraid of being eaten and so should you.

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snake food (2)

There are many dangers in the forest. Angry berries can poison your belly. Pointy, sharp sticks can pierce your fur and skin and paws and tongue. Rocks might fall on you from above. You can trip into the river and get mocked by a deer. You can get sad. The sky might fall from itself only to consume you and embarrass you. A very unfriendly squirrel might ask you a question you cannot answer.

You can get eaten.

Being eaten is the really scary one. There is no telling when or even if a thing might want to eat you or whether or not that thing will actually decide to really eat you. It is a constant threat in the lives of all things in the forest. I have seen many things get eaten. I have even eaten many things (sorry, things I have eaten). I once saw a cluster of ants devour a bird who was very still and not very bird-like in what must have been a brief moment of bird weakness. The ants plucked away every bit of the bird’s outsides, leaving tiny innards and bones behind. As if the devouring was not enough to damage the weakened bird, another larger bird dropped from the sky and plucked the remains of the shattered bird, chewing and swallowing the bits and bones as it flew away.

That bird was eaten. And I am sure that bird was not fond of being eaten.

The image of that helpless bird being torn apart and spread out through different creatures of the forest haunts me and fuels my constant worry of being eaten.

Nothing thwarts that worry. I live in a constant state of not wanting to be eaten, and I am sure that almost everything else in the forest feels the same. After all, who is not vulnerable to being eaten? This becomes even more of a difficult concept for me to wrestle with when I consider all the things I eat. Berries, twigs, fish, the moss on my cave, flies who get very close to my nose, and even plastic bags I find all live in a similar state of fear because of me and other creatures who want to eat them. They all, too, probably invoke that fear into the things they eat. The forest perpetuates a strange cycle of anxiety through everyone being food for someone else. It makes me wish that eating, despite how fulfilling and lovely the act is, was not necessary. I wish we could all be the things we are without having to eat other things that the things they are.

But that probably is not going to happen, so maybe acceptance of the inevitability of being eaten is the next best option. It is not that easy, though. I do not want to be eaten. Nobody does, and even though I know it will probably happen one day, I really hope is does not. Until it does, though, I will probably obsess over it. I will spend too much of my time worrying about the possibility of it happening and the potential gory details that might result from it. It is silly to fret over something that is so wildly out of your control, but there is no helping it. I will always want to not get eaten.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? 

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on the book of faces.

PS

Please look at this bear thing that @lirien made. It talks what Bear talks:

I am very proud of my stick structure.

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stick structure (2)

I spent a very long time today creating a stick structure. It was made out of sticks. It was also made out of several other crucial building materials to ensure the integrity of the structure’s build (rocks, tiny rocks, dirt, leaves, some excess fur, and the uplifting encouragement of a buzzing bee who kept me company for awhile).

I had a great time creating my stick structure, and when it was completed, I felt incredibly proud. It sat in the cool dirt, taller than most of the blades of grass that surrounded its base, reaching for the lovely blue sky as its graceful design towered over the ants who were climbing into it, nipping at the leaves that supported the sticks.

Oh, there were lots of ants, but that did not diminish my love for the stick structure I had created. Even when they took a very important supporting twig that rested in the middle, tens of them gathering around it and carrying it off in baffling efficiency, I was not deterred from my lovely stick structure. As the top level sticks and bits of branch tumbled toward the bottom, making the whole structure much smaller than any blade of grass, I still admired it. I still adored how it managed to simply be even under the pressure of an insect invasion.

There was the mud, too. The mud got everywhere as soon as it began to rain. As the soggy, gritty dirt got thicker and more menacing, it swallowed up the bottom of my stick structure. The whole thing sunk into the ground, slowly but surely.

Still, I loved my stick structure. The top sticks might have fallen and the bottom sticks might have ventured underground and the middle supporting stick was long taken, but even all dilapidation taken into account, I still loved my stick structure.

Even as it sunk into the ground and the rain water washed it away into oblivion and it practically become nonexistent, I still loved it.

It was my stick structure.

And it had no practical use and it was actually more of a hindrance to create and try to maintain and even watching it fall into disrepair was upsetting and emotionally draining.

It was all of those things, and it was mine. I made it. Well, I helped make it (I suppose the forest did most of the original creating for the sticks and such).

Thank you, stick structure I made today. You were strange and, frankly, quite useless, but I liked you all the same.

 

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? 

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on the book of faces.

Ants probably crawled in my nose, and I do not know why I let that happen.

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What have I done (3)

Anthills have very neat smells. I know this firsthand because I have smelled an anthill.

It smelled very lovely. The stinging aromatic bits of organized soil shot into my nostrils and, for just a brief, limited lovely piece of time, I experienced the many pleasing and eclectic smells that anthills have to offer. It was nice. I do not know if it was nice enough, however, to merit the much longer, seemingly unlimited horrible chunks of time that plagued my nose and mouth and face and other parts of me I cannot identify but can definitely feel.

The pain that irradiated throughout the face area of my body was only fueled by the anxiety and worry I felt about what was going inside of the face area of my body. What was going on in there? What or who was burning what part of me? Are there ants in me? Will they stay in me? Am I now a furry anthill for ants to live in forever and ever? Not relevant, but how many ants would it take to lift me like they lift small twigs together? Can they do that from within me? I hope not.

After a little bit of time (horribly long feeling time), I realized that the face area of my body was probably okay, and I most likely did not have ants in my face, making me a fuzzy, hair and skin based anthill. The feeling that settled in after I made this conclusion: embarrassment.

I did this. I made a choice to sniff an anthill. I knew what anthills were and what was inside them and the risks that came with smelling an anthill. I knew all of these things, and I still chose to sniff the anthill.

Why did I do that?

I am not sure what goes into decision making processes. Do I do things just because I am a bear and those things are just things that bears do? Do I do them because they need to be done and doing them keeps an important balance in the forest of which I am not aware? Do I just do things for the sake of doing things, and those things are determined by me and my motivations and thoughts?

I have no idea, and no matter how long I try to figure out which one of those answers makes the most sense, I am not able to figure it out. I do feel responsible for sniffing the anthill. I controlled my sniffing and everything else involved in making the decision, but beyond that, I am not sure why I did it and why I chose to do it knowing the consequences.

Regardless, I have to live with the aftermath of sniffing an anthill. The good and the bad of that action are mine to hold and understand, even I cannot do either very well.

Hopefully if there are ants in me, they at least like being there.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? 

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on the book of faces.

Why waiting?

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Waiting (2)

Shadows are a normal part of the forest, but they are still intriguing to study and stare at. I, admittedly, do not completely understand them (which is why I occasionally spend time staring at them). If there is one thing I do understand about shadows, however, it is that they take a long time to do anything (well, the one thing they can do as far as I can tell: move).

Whenever I find myself sitting by a shadow and trying to understand it, I begin to think about what I am really doing as I stare at the mysterious, blackness on the ground: waiting. I am waiting. Of course, I tend do a lot of waiting for all kinds of different activities on a regular basis, but nothing really forces me to actually consider waiting like staring at shadows.

So I think about waiting while I wait for the shadows to reveal their more personal characteristics (which they have not done so far). What do I do when I wait? What does it mean to wait? Why bother waiting? Why not stop waiting and start doing something else that does not involve waiting (leaving, eating, smelling, etc.).

When I wait, I am forced sit alone with my thoughts. That can be a fun thing to do, but it can also be a horrifying thing to do. For every thought that is about licking moss or getting to know a tree, there are just as many thoughts about getting attacked by something larger than myself or deer. It is easy to get lost in thought while waiting. In fact, that seems to be the main thing to do while waiting. I suppose the bad thoughts are important, anyway. After all, getting to know your bearness is just as much about the good thoughts as it is the bad.

That leads me to think that waiting has two crucial functions:

  1. Waiting is a way to pass time until an expected or hopeful event occurs
  2. Waiting forces you to spend time with yourself, which forces you to try to understand your bearness

Waiting is a tough thing to convince yourself to enjoy, though. When you are not waiting, you really have no desire to wait. It is really something you do only when you absolutely have to do it, but the more I think about waiting while I wait for something, the more realize that it is a crucial part of being a bear and (likely) being an anything else. Trees seem like they only wait, and they are by far the wisest things in the forest (that is probably because they are perpetually thinking about their treeness, so they understand themselves (and themselves are essentially the everything of the forest) better than any other thing in the forest).

I do not understand shadows. I do not know why they are here and how they got here and whether or not they like me. That is okay, though. They make me wait to try to understand them. And that waiting helps me know me a little better.

I do hope they like me, though.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? 

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on the book of faces.

I do not want to feel helpless.

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I wish doing things to make everything better for everyone in the forest was as easy as thinking about doing things to make everything better for everyone in the forest.

It is not, though. In fact, it is actually very difficult for me to do things in the forest that feel like they affect anyone or anything beyond my bearness or my immediate forest surroundings. I have tried, certainly, but the things I want changed seem to stay the same, no matter how much effort and dedication I put toward the changes I want to see.

That is one of the more frustrating aspects of this: the one thing I do have control of (my bearness and the surroundings of my bearness) are the only things I can effectively change. However, changing my bearness does not make the terribleness of the bad things that can happen in the forest change, go away, or get better. What I can change does not matter for the things I want to change.

Sometimes I wonder if I should mind my bearness and nothing else. I wonder if it is possible that all creatures of the forest are meant to simply mind their own personal creatureness and that the forest can maintain a particular balance of non-terribleness if that is done. Maybe my only part of that particular non-terribleness balance is making sure I keep to my bearness and that is all. Maybe I am not supposed to help others with their otherness or stop others from hindering others’ othernesses. I am a bear, and I can only control my bearness, and I just have to accept that and move on with my bearness.

But…

I do not like that. 

I know that not everyone can tend their everyoneness, and sometimes they need help with tending their everyoneness. Some things fight just to make others feel like their otherness is wrong, bad, and worthless (these kinds of perpetrators are also called deer). And some things actually hurt and destroy the otherness of others, which is not fair or nice or necessary.

I have to be a part of all of those relationships of the forest. I cannot just tend to my own bearness while others’ othernesses are hurt or hindered or hushed. If another creature cannot be the creature it is or wants to be because it is being unfairly stopped or even hurt, how could I not intervene? How could I watch as that creature loses its creatureness because of a disregard for creatureness in general?

Of course I cannot stop most of things from happening. The change I can affect is limited, but I have to try, even if I feel helpless. 

What if my bearness were to be hurt or hindered or hushed? I would want someone or something to help me. So, I suppose, even if I feel like I cannot, I should keep trying to change things. No matter how helpless I might feel. 

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? 

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on the book of faces.

I hope I have useful skills for forest living.

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so many useless (2)

I can fit so many leaves in my mouth, and when I see my full-faced reflection on the surface of the river, I feel very proud of myself.

Of course, the deer across the river usually spots me doing this and always tells me that fitting any number of leaves in my mouth is a useless feat fit for those who are more interested in being dead in the forest than being alive. His aggressive and blunt tone aside, the deer has a valid point: what was the purpose of being about to store so many leaves in my mouth at one time?

How is this a useful skill?

I can never think of a way that this skill (which I hesitate to even call it now) would benefit me while I live in the forest.

It does not feed me.

It does not keep me warm.

It does not make me safe.

Fitting many leaves in my mouth is fun certainly, but it seems so useless no matter how much time I spend trying to rationalize its presence in my life.

But I like it.

I like putting leaves in my mouth, and I like putting so many leaves in my mouth that some fall out and I have to nip at them to get them back in even though I know that they would just fall out again.

I like that.

I like everything about putting many leaves in my mouth. I like a lot of things that do not feed me, make me warm, or make me safe. I like rolling through dirt and smelling myself afterward, I like staring at the sky and trying to figure out why it never comes to visit me even though I feel like I am always visiting it by staring at it (but maybe it is staring at me and feels the same?), I like trying to figure out the moon even though I do not think it is possible to figure out the moon, I like knowing how many pinecones there are even though I always lose count, I like knowing what moss smells like, and I like thinking about all of these things that are considered useless by the deer (and probably others) in the scope of my life in the forest.

Thinking about these things makes me happy just like doing these things makes me happy. And when I am happy, I do not worry about feeling hungry, warm, or safe. Feeling happy is enough.

I wonder how many pinecones I can fit in my mouth…

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? 

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on the book of faces.

I get lost in the forest.

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lost (2)

Occasionally (and perhaps too occasionally), I get lost in the forest. It is never a pleasant experience, and it is something that should not happen to me as often as it does, but it does happen, and I do not like it.

I am rambling.

That is because just thinking about getting lost in the forest gives me such an empty, hollow feeling that I gain a desire to fill that nothingness with something, even rambling thoughts that lead to nothing. The emptiness and loneliness and desperation are hard to combat, so the words do not really help.

I have to learn to avoid that void instead of fill it, so I have to understand where it comes from.

A distraction is what usually starts it. I chased after a napkin covered in a delicious looking sauce the other day. I ran after it for a long time, hoping to catch it and lick it and enjoy whatever sauce was smothered on the sides of it. It got away. The wind carried it to a very excited raccoon, and I lost the napkin for good. I also lost my way. I looked around my surroundings and tried to get a feel for where I was or from what direction I came.

I could not do it, though.

I spun in circles for almost as long as I had chased the napkin, hoping to get some sense of where I needed to go to get to familiar territory. Could I follow a smell? Could I follow some leaves I had stepped on? Would the raccoon be kind enough to point me in the right direction (after all, I had just let him have a very lovely napkin)?

Nothing worked, and I became anxious and frightened immediately.

And dizzy. I became dizzy from all the spinning.

After a nice nap to let the dizziness wear off (I found a very comfortable pile of leaves under a tree), I got up and began my search for home again. I began to wander, hoping that just as easily I had gotten lost I would be able to find my way again. Everything simply began to look more and more unfamiliar.

A very sincere part of me just wanted to stop where I was and begin living there. That would be an easy solution, I figured, and I even began the initial actions to begin such a proceeding (getting familiar with the smells of the area, trying to ask a opossum what it thinks about trees (hissing noises), etc.).

Then I saw the napkin I was chasing. The raccoon had abandoned it. It still had a small amount of delicious looking sauce!

I chased it again, a distraction from the predicament that was caused by the same distraction. At the time, I was unable to see the loop of distraction based maroonedness I was setting myself up for. I was far too distracted by delicious looking sauces.

So I ran again. And again, the napkin was captured by another creature (this time, a bird (do birds even like sauces (of course they do, all things like sauces))).

When I stopped, I was no longer lost. I was right back where I had originally found the napkin that led me astray originally. I wandered back to my cave and took another. I was still a little dizzy, and even though I was home, I was still upset I did not get my sauce.

I guess I should be avoiding distractions? I do not know. But being home is nice.

 

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? 

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on the book of faces.

It would be nice to be fed.

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worm food (2)

Food is the most important thing in the forest (besides trees and the sky and maybe dirt because it seems like it is everywhere and something that plentiful has to be important). Luckily, many things count as food. Leaves count as food. Sticks count as food. Fish count as food. Anything you can fit into your mouth can and you have a desire to eat can and should be considered food.

It would make sense, then, to assume that gathering food is quite easy since just about everything is food. This is not the case. Food is not easy to gather. It never has been. Even a simple yet lovely meal of leaves, sticks, and fish can take long, exhausting hours to procure and prepare. That perfectly chewable plastic jug might make a wonderful breakfast, but it is not going to scoot (or whatever motion jugs use to get around) itself to your cave entrance.

You have to earn it.

You have earn all food.

Unless you are a baby bird.

I recently saw a tiny nest atop a tree outside of my cave. I could hear tiny baby birds chirping for something. Out of curiosity, I climbed another tree nearby to see if I could get a good look as to what was causing so much noise. I stumbled upon a mother bird feeding the baby birds. One at a time, she mashed up worms she had retrieved and spewed them into the baby birds’ mouths. As each one cried out for its turn, it was quickly silenced by a warm feeling of content.

It looked nice.

It was a feeling I wanted to have. I cannot remember anyone feeding me crushed up worms from a loving face (and that seems like something I would remember had it actually happened).

I asked Rob (the squirrel) if he would be willing to feed me crushed up worms, berries, leaves, or anything if I were willing to return the favor.

He shook his head at me in a way that made me feel bad about myself.

Then I thought about what I was asking… Surely I could handle my own chewing. Nobody needs to chew for me.

I asked Rob (the squirrel) an amended question: would he be willing to just bring me food every once in awhile if I would be willing to do the same. Or, even better, would he be able to drop food into my mouth?

He stared for a moment and then ran.

I did not know who else to ask. I tried the moldy rocks in my cave, but, in a way, they already give me lots of food by being moldy and delicious. Also, they do not talk (shy?).

It would be nice if something or someone was willing to feed me. I suppose, in a larger sense, the forest does. The forest gives me what I need, I just have to go get it. I hope the baby birds appreciate it.

I am a bear.

If you would like to try being a bear, why not read some of the bear adventures available on this very site? 

For any questions or comments directed at Bear, feel free to write to him using this email: justasinglebear@gmail.com

You can also now use Tumblr to address questions to Bear. Also, you can find bear photos and such on Bear’s Instagram, and don’t forget to “like” Bear on Facebook.