The Free Radical

Look at the hips on that Rose!

I have long been a partaker of rose hips. They’re nutritious– especially high in vitamin C– and really quite delicious. They will also persist well into the winter and even into the following spring, offering food in times of relative scarcity. Whenever I start a batch of apple cider from the apples harvested from the trees at home, I always include a few pounds of rose hips in the brew. They tend to really fill out the flavour in a unique yet complementary way, as roses and apples are actually closely related.

As this has been an intense foraging year, I had occasion to notice that a very high percentage of the rose hips I was nibbling on were inhabited by tiny wriggly maggoty things. They could be found in most of the fruits I was eating– the proverbial worm in the “apple.” Naturally (or not), I have chosen to avoid eating the maggoty things when I find them. For this, I was chastised by the Invisible Bear.

The signs of the Invisible Bear’s presence have returned. Apparently, he is actively in search of precisely the maggoty things and their creepy-crawly cousins, overturning rocks along the way. Bear answers to no one. He makes his choices and lives with the consequences. He is the sovereign of the forest.

“You have been well conditioned to turn away from your own greatest treasures,” began the Invisible Bear. “The hidden parts of yourselves– your untapped skills and abilities– will appear to you as ‘maggoty things.’ How do you suppose I regard the ‘worm in the apple?’ It is a treat! It is a bonus… a nutritional boost! I wouldn’t ever dream of discarding the maggoty things.

“I am sovereign. I bow to no one… but I have remained ‘invisible’ this season as a teaching. You too are sovereign, but you have not known it. You have been taught subservience in order to fracture your immaculate Will. First, you must reclaim your treasures in order to discover what and who you are. Search in the very worst places you can imagine… and there you will find the estranged pieces of yourselves. You have been given a perspective which teaches you are small, ugly and mostly inconsequential. Your view is upside-down.

“You are beautiful and powerful beyond measure! As you reassemble your Will, your sovereign nature will become most apparent. Cherish the maggoty things hidden away in the darkest corners– for they are you… and soon will render you quite visible to all of Creation.”