On one of their missions, while it was still dark, they had gone the wrong way and ended up falling down a loose dirt bank into the river. This idea of stone piling would show them the correct direction to travel before the large warm ball of brightness rose, so they could be safe.

Bea is very aware of her job to keep the young ones free from harm. She blames herself for not thinking of this before. But that was then. Sometimes she wishes with all of her wee bear heart she could forget the then part of her life.  

Now she will stop for a short time at Bea’s Golden Path to do her notice exercise. She has to do her talk to the maker about the black stuff smothering her favorite place to stroll, where, she used to dance around leaving pictures of her claws, paws and feet.  

On another occasion, she’d joyfully observed, the black stuff slightly cracked, and plants and trees peeking out. This time, life more than peeks out. The brave trees, flowers and bushes are stretching as tall as they are able.   

These give her an idea to share with Willow. She longed to practice the courage of the bright flowers, the color of the ball in the sky. They seemed to be able to find their way back through the darkness after every cold, icy time. This determined bear wanted to learn how to dig her way out of the darkness she’d been in.  

Bea revealed to Willow she always wondered if the flowers she hoped to see again would be able to return. She happily reported, as it became warmer and brighter, they greeted her with joy. 

The pensive bear wondered if they were carrying a message things would get lighter and better in her life. Bea admitted to Willow, she believed the story those flowers told.

Willow reminded Bea, no one could avoid loss and pain or dark moments. But the maker, and our friends, new or old, would help each other get through the hard times to find answers. 

The insightful tree explained, sometimes those searching for answers would need to carry the questions with them to finally put them down to pick up the answers.

Willow told Bea she did not want to see her dear bear friend become discouraged. She reviewed with Bea the image she had described of herself crawling, with feet, paws and claws, out of the dark empty cave. Bea began to realize she was the only one who could make that possible for herself.

Bea believed the maker would lead her to the right path, where new friends and answers could be discovered. She backtracked to her cave home, with the focus on her stepstooling exercise.  Careful not to drop any, she lifted down the clay jars filled with her “be good to myself” treat.

Practicing that important exercise restored her courage to do her strolling alone. She admitted to herself she had done her exercise alone before.  In fact, most of the time she’d been alone.  

This felt like a different kind of ‘alone’, though. As she walked into the light, she noticed she had a friend walking beside her. She was not really alone after all. Her newly discovered friend danced, twirled, and played hide and seek. When Bea wasn’t looking, her friend hid behind the trees. 

She wondered why, when she asked question after question, there was no response. She noticed there was silence the entire time, which made the curious bear wonder if her sad friend felt lonely too. Bea does not realize she has her shadow following her.

Bea continued to follow an entirely new path leading her across a wooden bridge with singing water beneath it. She felt the maker of fishing rivers wanted her to cross the bridge, to go down to the water, to listen to the stones and pebbles tinkling against each other.

The hesitant wee bear looked at how fast the streams of water between the rocks were passing under the bridge. She did her notice exercise watching the leaves on one side of the bridge which, in the little time it took to walk to the other side of the bridge, were little dots going away from her. 

Bea worries, if without taking extreme caution, she might be like the leaves carried along by the swift stream. She does not understand why the maker of wee bears would ask her to take such a great, dangerous risk.