THE RAINBOW BRIDGE

I started by crawling on my hands and knees before I progressed to taking a few faltering steps. However, I never strayed far afield and I always returned back home to the safety of my mother, whom I still felt part of.

Eventually I grew in courage and became more ambitious but, even so, I always returned home to her again. I would spend my time walking under the canopy of the forest, following the path of dead leaves, the fallen dreams, until I came to a rainbow bridge that crossed over the River of Forgotten Origins. Even though I often went there to look over to the other side enveloped in mist, I still did not feel ready to cross it.

And so it went on, day after day, month after month and year after year until, without me realizing it, I had turned old and grey and my mother was no longer there for me to return to. I found myself cut off from all that surrounded me, an alien wandering in a foreign land.

What I needed was to reconnect with what I had been part of, to rediscover the knowledge that I had been born with, that everything lives and that all things are related so that if I hurt one of my relatives then I hurt myself. And the only way to renew my link was to cross over the rainbow bridge to the other side.

I took strength from my helper the panther. I climbed on to his back and felt his power under me as he took me back to my starting point. But from there I had to go it alone. So I closed my eyes tightly and started the crossing, to a place where I could never feel alone again and where I would be comforted by all my family – like the threads of the spider’s web, all interconnected. All I had to do was to cross over and the illusion of isolation would come to an end.

Now, every minute of every hour of every day, I try to hold on to my vision. For every time I inadvertently let a thread in the web snap, I am disconnected from the life force and vulnerable again.