A modern winter fairy tale for adults and childern.
Read the first part here.
Listen to this part's song: the forest, my home.
Without thinking Mina walks on. Step by step without a particular path in mind. The forest grows denser and soon after she can’t hear the city in the distance anymore and the entrance into the forest has disappeared as well. By now she knows this forest well. The trees have become friends and their roots Minas compass. She still can feel the restlessness inside of her and so she continues walking. While walking heavy thoughts dissolve on their own, problems find their solutions and questions their answers. When Mina walks, her whole system starts running smoothly again, it seems. Many times has she tried to meditate in order to quiet down her constantly filled head, but never had those meditations the same effect as walking. Her feet make her thinking patterns come into motion until she doesn’t feel stuck on a particular thought anymore and just is. That is meditation for Mina.
Like in this moment. Her thoughts aren’t stormy and wild anymore, but like clouds that drift softly across the sky. She continues on for another while, her feet have always found their way. At a specially tall oak tree she stops. The trunk is so broad that Minas arms can’t reach around. The tree's bark is rough and the crown like a huge canopee. This oak, lets call her Mother Oak, has to be one of the oldest here as no other tree is as tall. No other tree has roots as thick and overflowing as hers. Mother Oak, too, has gotten rid of her dress made out of leaves and has started her winter rest. Sometimes I wish I was a tree, Mina thinks, I wish I had the stability and the calmness of this oak.
She places herself between two gnarly roots on the soft forest floor covered with moss and autumn leaves, and leans her back against the trunk of the oak. How many times has she sat here already? This place seems to be made especially for her as the form of the tree trunk fits her own back perfectly. There’s a special kind of magic emanating from this place. Although it’s quiet here, it’s never boring. Birds and squirrels are paying Mother Oak a visit every now and then and if Mina sits still enough they might come closer with an obvious air of curiosity. Some birds sing a song for her or allow her to lock eyes with them for a moment. Mina’s nervous system always calms down here. She feel one here as if she belonged. Not far from the oak there’s a little creek flowing down the mountain. If she concentrates she can hear its crystalclear waters in the distance. It’s a well-known song, the song of the water, which reminds her of home.
But today not the creek is her goal, but the oak that gifts her with the quiet she has been longing for the entire day. Away from the city and her daily life it can be found quite easily.
And while Mina rests her back against Mother Oak and lets the minutes pass by, comfortably wrapped in her coat and energized from her walk, she suddenly feels a cool tickling on her nose. She raises her gaze and surpringly sees that it has started to snow. Tiny snowflakes are dancing from the sky. Tentatively at first, but then they become more and more. It’s rare that it snows here in December, even if everyone wishes for it every year because snow belongs to the Christams time like daffodils to Easter. Mina gets up, directs her face towards the sky and opens her arms. She starts spinning around herself, giving herself to the dance of the snowflakes. Like a child she sticks out her tongue to catch the flakes. A laugh leaves her lips. Finally she feels light and filled with joy. Mina dances and laughes and jumps and cheers and all the while doesn’t notice that the snowflakes have started to fall heavier and now are swirling around her quicker and quicker. A literal snowstorm surrounds her, suddenly sweeping her off her feet with an incredible force. Stunned Mina looks around her and can’t recognize anything anymore. Everything has turned white and she feels the snowstorm lifting her upwards, higher and higher, turning faster and faster. She closes her eyes because all the turning causes her vertigo, because she doesn’t know what is happening here and because it can’t be that a snowstorm is able to come from nowhere lifting her whole body up in the air. Something isn’t right here, I must be dreaming, Mina thinks before her fast and loud heartbeat eliminates all further thoughts. A cry wants to leave her, but it’s stuck in her throat. Minas hands start tensing up again. They want to hold on to something but there’s nothing to grab.
As fast as the snowstorm has come, it’s suddenly over. Just as Mina comes to terms with this being her last breath her feet touch the ground with a jolt. The wind quiets down and the snowflakes fall gently and peacefully again. Mina puts her hands to her heart to calm herself down, her eyes still closed. A few weird things have happened to her in this forest and actually that snowstorm shouldn’t have surprised her, but every time something out of the ordinary happens here, something that she can’t explain rationally, she’s taken aback.
Mina inhales and exhales deeply and then opens her eyes. She’s very well still standing in the forest, the old oak ist still here, but that’s how far the similarites go.
Do you enjoy my Advent story? Please feel free to share it with friends, loved ones, family and the children in your life. =)
