My family was long gone, and I had become alone in the wilderness. I felt as if the world was going to collapse in on me. It felt over, like I couldn’t stand to go on anymore. Mother, father, my siblings, uncle, and friend… they were all lost the same way. A cruel fate for them; a cruel fate for me.

I had never once had to live alone. Never had to. I was fearful for my life once my family was gone. They had told me stories of landslides and fires and great bears that could crush anything that stood in its path with one mighty swing of a clawed paw.

I had never seen any of those things, myself, thinking they were just stories the elders would tell to scare the rambunctious youngsters in the dark of night, hoping they would just quiet down for a moment. Smiling to myself, I remembered my own grandfather and his stories, before he passed on to the next life. A natural death… he had a full life.

Sometimes I wondered what the next life would be like. Would it be even more dangerous than this world? Or will it be a land full of food and warmth, where no creature will ever go hungry and will always feel safe. In my mind, I imagined it as a great valley with steep sides, with protected greenery flourishing at the bottom. Perhaps a clear, trickling stream or creek would run down its center, where all the deer would come to drink. And I, along with my family, would watch closely with vigilant eyes.

In my mind, at that moment, I felt as if I should just let go of everything life had to offer me. I was spiraling down towards death anyways. I was alone, and a creature like me cannot live alone. I have not known a time without my family; I am an animal of a pack. I need my companions…

Depressed and lonely, I began to walk. I didn’t know where I was headed, or why I was going there, but maybe I would find my grandfather among these great trees of light and shadow. Sunrays glittered over the pine needle-covered ground and refracted through droplets of fresh morning dew, which distorted images within their tiny globular prisms. The smell of wet wood filled my nostrils, reminding me of the first signs of spring when I was just a pup and the snows were beginning to recede. I remember becoming excited, seeing flowers for the first time, smelling them for the first time.

Spring is like renewal from a cold and dark world. Only if spring would last forever…

The world really is cold and dark, regardless of season, I thought as I continued my course to a place only the earth spirit would know… hopefully she would know. I didn’t.

Was it ok to let go of life? I wasn’t sure if I could stand living anymore.

I came to a clearing where yellow grass grew tall. It was late in the warm season and the snows would soon come. Maybe if I just didn’t seek out shelter, I would be able to see grandfather again…

The ground beneath my paws was made of loose, prickly rocks, easily broken as I crossed the small clearing. There was a lake ahead, and I was thirsty. I knew water would only continue my pain, but a death by thirst seems more painful than living.

Lapping on the shore with ease and slowness, the waves were small and gentle. The sound was quiet, comforting. Just staring at the water, I sat, just listening to everything around me. I listened to the song of the lake as I closed my eyes…

It was a happy lake, content with its condition. It knew others of its kind were less fortunate than itself, destroyed by the very creatures who destroyed my own family, but even so, this lake wasn’t giving up hope. It still lapped happily away at this shore of prickly and fragile stones as if it was the dawn of time. It told me stories, stories about all the good things that have happened to it in the recent times. It has felt a mother fox and her cubs, coming for a drink from the forest. It remembered two happy fawns playing by the lakeside. A young osprey’s first catch of a fish, right out of this lake, and how much he bragged to himself about it… the lake was almost laughing…

It was unnerving. Life wasn’t as great as this lake seemed to believe it to be. There were creatures out there, destroying the homes and lives of many of my kind. They tore down our trees, killed our young, used our fur as their own…

But this is a land not belonging to them, the lake thought out to me. It seemed to know what I was thinking, as if I was linked to it in some way or another.

I tried thinking back to it, knowing how odd this really was. I told it all of what had happened to my family, and how there were creatures who would give my kind no mercy.

The lake seemed to understand, and didn’t try to argue my thoughts. It knew that times were growing harder for many of the creatures of the land, and how forests were disappearing, and how its kin, the lakes, were becoming poisoned.

And still, it was happy.

This land belongs to no one but the earth, it told me.

I didn’t understand.

It said I knew nothing of the world…

I tried to ignore the lake. It was becoming a nuisance to me. Nothing lasts forever. We all die in the end, even the lakes.

I dipped my head down to take a drink. Maybe it would be like biting into the flesh nearing the end of a hunt, where a bite to the throat silences the beast.

The water was cool and fresh, but a familiar and unsatisfying scent came to my nose.

I lifted my head up suddenly, pointing my eyes upwind of me. My heart beat faster, for it was one of the creatures who had took my family away.

It stood upright on its two hind legs. Unnatural. There was hair on the top of its head, not a fur coat like the rest of us wild creatures. It wore odd skins instead of letting its own skin touch the air, as if it would be poisoned by the wild air.

But it just stood there…

Maybe this was my chance to take revenge before I die. I wanted to show it how my family felt when they were lost to time forever. I wanted its pack to feel the same loss I had to, and to prove that the world is a harsh place to live…

Then it turned to look at me, with dark and intelligent eyes. I froze where I stood. Would it pull out one of the fire sticks that were used on my family? Maybe this was my time to die…

The creature sat down on the shore, then moved its attention back to the sky, the lake, and the mountains that surrounded us.

I was stunned. It didn’t try to attack me at all. What was going on here?

Even this creature, one of the kind that destroyed your family, understands the world.

It was the lake again. It continued…

Yes, he knows we will all be gone in time, but this creature also knows it’s the time the earth spirit gives us that we should not take for granted. It is because we die that we need to enjoy all that life has to offer in the little time we have. He knows that despite all the evils in the world, there’s good things, too. There’s mother foxes raising her pups, fawns playing, young ospreys learning to hunt, and learning that the world really is good. This planet has been blessed with life, we’ve been blessed with life. This is what the earth spirit gave us. Use it wisely.

I still didn’t understand. If this creature thought life was precious, why would his kind kill my family?

Not all of his kind is evil, as not all of your kind is wise, the lake told me.

I knew it implied me. It implied I was not wise. It implied I had not treated the life the earth spirit gave me with respect. That I had not used it as it was intended.

Life is wonderful… it was the thought of the creature.

The creature, a shadow of my past, one of a race who preyed upon my family, was speaking of life as a gift.

My heart broke, thinking of how stupid I was for considering letting the cold darkness of winter take me; for thinking even though my family was gone, that I could not live, when in reality, I could be living a life that they will never have.

I should live life for them, if not for me…

Grandfather would be happy if I did that.

I opened my eyes and found myself on the other side of the lake from where I had been. I jumped, not understanding what had brought me to this side in such an instant.

Go! spoke the shadow of my past. Begin your renewed life. Live… you still have time.

And I ran, feeling free, feeling alive. I felt I had purpose to live. And I continued to run, not from shadows, but to life and nature, on the other side of the lake…