Bear in The Blueberry Patch

This picture, (I didn't take it) captures the spirit of this little teaching story.

When Grandmother eased her shoulders and cocked her head in just that way, everyone quieted knowing a story had been sparked. When Grandmother heard this story she had been a girl at the knee of her Grandmother who spoke out of a distant past.

Then, more than now the tribe had followed the rhythm of the seasons, moving winter camp from inland closer to the continental waterways with their thousands of islands full of ripening huckleberries, strawberries, and blueberries. As they had traveled they crossed paths and joined forces with other tribes heading for the Lakes in the Woods and the Numberless Islands. Blueberry Island was renowned among the islands covered as it was half way around with a skirt of blueberries from crown to shore. On a hot day the smell of ripened blueberries reached Great Sky Spirit.

Little Star was holding herself away from the picking women, not joining the chatter, finding the edge of the ring of women as they moved along the hillside. Her sisters and cousins had been snubbed in their efforts to include her and they thought her not worth their efforts. The elder women recognized the signs of a woman who had thrown herself away.

Little Star was the beloved only child of an elderly couple who had filled her every wish. As she had grown toward womanhood she knew little of self discipline often drawing the disapproval of the grandmothers. Her beauty and gifts of spirit, including a genuine kindness, insured that what her parents couldn’t bring to her, she brought to herself without thought about what was for the good of the whole.

It had started at the last camp. Little Star had wanted and found she could not have the host, a handsome warrior and man among men Moves The Wind. When Little Star at last understood that she would not be having her way she was shocked and hurt. That was when it happened; Little Star saw herself hurting out of deep and true love forgetting the twitch between her legs that had initiated this incident. The willfulness that her parents had applauded turned itself on Little Star creating a cloud of discontent over she who had everything. The gregarious good natured self involved young woman was replaced by a discontent self involved young woman.

Though Little Star picked blueberries in body she was lost in thought of ways to get her way. She knew she had hurt her cousins and friends and she held herself away telling herself they knew nothing of her pain. As she moved along she was oblivious to the new and obvious signs of broken and trampled blueberry bushes. Before a warning shout could fly from eyes to the mouth of the nearest woman to witness, a She bear stood on two legs and grabbed Little Star in a bear hug, shook her as if to awaken her, and then let her body drop to the ground.

The picking women had not collected themselves to respond before the She Bear stepped away from the cliff edge where she had been cornered by Little Star and returned to forging as if she had been there first. And so it was. Little Star crawled back to the ministrations of all her relations wearing a new scar on her forehead that her ancestors wear to this day.

It was long moments after grandmother stopped speaking, during which many blueberry stained hands surreptitiously reached to forehead, before grandmother broke the teaching spell she had wove, with a chuckle.