Semper Eadem

Prelude
I imagine my life stretching back like a river.  From 'slow' and 'deep' currents, memories flow upward, becoming light and nimble,  jumping back up over rocks.  Then shrinking smaller and smaller into a trickle, and to nothing. These beginnings are so vivid to me. They are alive and precious. They define my origin and my foundation. They are like the place the salmon return to instinctively.

So much has changed now. I am old.  The children around me today speak a different language to the one I grew up with.  We were high up in the gorge-lands, were the winter ice was so harsh we would hibinate just like the bears, sleeping snugly together under skins. Deep in the protective darkness of our caves, with stockpiles of food. We lived around the radiating heat of the stone caldron of broth, simmering in the middle of our hearth.  This fire was our life giver, sustenance, light and warmth provider. Only songs, stories and warming exercises releaved the monotony, until the green shoots reappeared with the promise of new birth, vigour and discoveries to come.

Our community always sensed it's fragility.  We knew that we were like small birds, surviving only because the great bear could not be bothered to raise its mighty paw and squash us.  I guess I always knew we were also special, particularly when I discovered other communities to make this comparison.  I think the way my community organised itself, it's traditions and sense of fun was exceptional. Perhaps all peoples have this egocentric, prejudiced view of the world.  We knew we were not perfect at all, just that we were very much better than the rest. But I guess it's when this arrogance is coupled by an ability to get others to do things your way, that real trouble begins.  We were never in that position.  We never had the inclination to impose anything on others.  No other community about us could have felt the least bit threatened by us.  It was other communities it transpired, that could not resist messing about with us.  Suffering in my early days was nothing compared with the experiences in my latter years.  This is why I now tell you this story in a different language to my own.  Indeed, I have not heard my own language for many years. My attire is different, and daily life, though certainly more comfortable, has not got the colour and vitality we shared. As I tell my story however, I feel a  rekindling of  the spirit of my past.  'Looking back' can be the bravest thing anyone does, especially if it is in search of hope.  It takes a similar courage to look forward.  Joy completely outshines the pain of loss.  What has happened can never be repeated.  These experiences are sufficient for that moment.  They are gifts, like flowers, to be celebrated, and allowed to wither away, or sunsets, or rainbows, mesmerising, then gone.  The dances and singing that engulfed us from time to time, with intense feelings of joy and wonder, are what has made my past.  This is why my memories of those days remain crystal clear.  It is a pleasure to unfold them here and now.