Deep in the Great Forest, past the Clear Blue Lake, and nestled between two of the Singing Mountains is a place called Mosswood. It’s a quiet little place of tall beech and maple trees, the Babbling Brook that runs through, and warm meadows that like to take naps in the afternoon sun. And if you happen to pass through the Clearing on any warm summer night, you might hear the voice of a song sparrow floating through the treetops with four tiny voices singing along.
Chapter 14: Whirly Winds and Weather Vanes
On the west side of the Clearing, at the base of the widest oak, two signs swing on either side of double doors. On the right, “The Safflower” is written in delicate green swirls, and on the left “The Hull and Husk” in warm yellow script. Above them both, wrapped round a branch stub, hangs an old weather wave, its southern arrow pointing downwards. Within, Mama and Papa Mouse tend the Safflower counter wrapped in the savory scent of seeds—pumpkin, sunflower, thistle—toasted, roasted and pressed into oil. Beside them, Sparrow keeps her Hull and Husk stocked with grain and flour.
You might think it quite natural to have one place for both seeds and grain. But it has not always been this way. In fact, not so long ago, the Hull and Husk was a small shop made of woven branches on the far side of the Clearing. The Safflower stood alone in the large oak tree beneath the Mouse home.
Which was all right and well, of course, until a cloudy morning early one summer (the summer Bear Cub came to Mosswood) when the winds over the Wood shifted and something unexpected stirred in the breeze.
“Good morning, Hull,” chirped Sparrow, alighting at her little stand as the sun peeped over the treetops.
The door of her shop glided inward as if happy to see her too.
Sparrow ducked inside and unlatched the shutters of her large front window. One push sent them swinging open. The fountain spring sparkled in the morning light beyond, and a familiar creak sounded above.
Sparrow peeked up to see her weather vane twisting lazily in the breeze. The gift from her grandmother was a deep blue green from many years under rain and snow, but the small bird in flight that served as its arrow still swung with ease.
“Be ready for the wind beneath your wings to carry you to things unseen.”
That was what Granny Swiftwing had said several years ago when Sparrow had unwrapped it before leaving home.
Ah Granny, Sparrow smiled to herself as she tied her starched white apron under her wings.
It had been just the encouragement she’d needed when she’d moved to Mosswood with her brothers and sisters. What an exciting time together it had been making new homes and planting new fields!
Time had gone by, however, and one by one they’d moved on—as creatures do—searching for new horizons. All except Sparrow, that is. She had been sad to see her siblings go, but she wasn’t like them. One adventure had been enough for her.
The wind can be just for weather vanes now, thought Sparrow.
“Happy day to you!” Papa Mouse’s voice sang into her musings.
Sparrow turned to see her neighbor pushing a wheelbarrow piled high with thistles.
“Good morning,” she twittered.
“Big plans for the day?” asked her neighbor, pausing his stride.
“The usual,” said Sparrow, “Flour to grind, lunch to make, quiet evening at home.”
“You’d be welcome for supper at our place,” offered the mouse.
Sparrow hesitated, but then shook her head.
“Thank you,” she said, “But I’ve a painting of wildflowers I’ve been meaning to work on.”
“Very nice. Very nice. Hope you enjoy!” replied Papa Mouse, nudging his wheelbarrow forward, “Have a good day!”
Sparrow waved farewell and watched him head towards the Safflower.
Perhaps it might have been nice to eat dinner with the Mouse family…she thought.
Sparrow always ate alone now.
But no. No, a quiet night would be just fine. Just fine.
At the end of a long day of tending her crops and store, it was nice to fly back to the snug little space in her maple tree home. Her books and paints were company enough. What more could one ask for?
What more indeed?
The weather vane creaked again, and Sparrow gave it a smile before turning back to her shop.
But just as she started sorting her bags of flour, a rustling caught her ear.
“Morning, Ms. Sparrow!” squeaked four little voices.
Sparrow turned to see four mouse babe noses peeking over her counter.
“Oh, good day, dears,” she answered in surprise.
The wee neighbors didn’t usually stop by her shop.
“Watcha whistling?” asked Maisy.
“Whistling?” said Sparrow.
She set down her sack of rye flour and realized a tune had been floating from her beak. She closed her eyes a moment and thought back to evenings of songs with her siblings before they’d all moved on.
“Just an old tune,” she answered.
“Can you sing it for us?” asked Daisy.
Sparrow felt a jitter run through her feathers. No one had ever asked before.
“Perhaps another time.”
For one thing, the words weren’t coming, and for another, well, she might be a song sparrow, but, well…
“Wanna play hide-and-seek?” asked Maisy.
“Hide-and-seek?” Sparrow blinked.
“We’re super good at finding!” squeaked Buttercup.
“That’s very sweet of you,” Sparrow stammered, “But I’m expecting Mr. Badger soon, and I have several bags of oats to grind before he gets here.”
“Awwwwww,’ came the response.
Hide-and-seek certainly did not fit in Sparrow’s plans for the morning. Still, the disappointment in their faces gave her a twinge.
“Can we have some toasted barley?” asked Daisy.
Four tails wiggled behind the counter.
“Now that I can do!” said Sparrow, relieved to be able to say yes to something.
“Yay!” chimed the babes.
Sparrow dolled out the crunchy snacks to their eager paws.
“Thank you!” said Maisy as the babes turned to go, “Bye-bye!”
“Goodbye,” called Sparrow, and the four scampered away.
Sparrow gave a sigh as she watched them go and turned to brush off her grinding stones. Then a squeal of glee echoed back to her.
For a moment, her stones disappeared, and Sparrow could see her brothers and sisters when they had all been hatchlings. Hide-and-seek in the tree tops had been their favorite. A little tug plucked at her chest.
“Good morning, neighbor!” boomed a familiar voice, “Might you have my sacks of oat flour?”
“Oh!” said Sparrow, with a hop, “Good morning, Mr. Badger! Why, yes, yes of course. One moment please.”
And the memories wisped away as she turned back to her sacks and measures.
It was about lunch time when Sparrow at last untied her apron and stilled her grinding stones. Though the sun was overhead, the deep gray clouds that had gathered softened its rays.
Looks like rain, thought Sparrow as she stepped outside.
As if to confirm her prediction, the weather vane creaked in the quickening wind and spun westward.
By the time Sparrow reached her nest, heavy gusts buffeted her wings, and thunderheads stewed so thick it was dark as dusk. Rumbles rolled over the Wood while she sliced her bread, and she had to race to lock her banging shutters.
Soon rain was lashing at the windows and hail beating so hard, Sparrow abandoned her meal. The maple shuddered around her. She peeked through the cracks in her windows, her feathers tight and beak tighter. Outside in Swallowtail field, her neat green rows bowed nearly to the ground beneath the downpour. Water ran like rivers through their furrows.
Oh my crops! My crops! she panicked, fluttering back and forth inside.
At last, however, the clouds began to break, the wind slow, and the rain lighten. Bursting from her door, Sparrow ignored the drizzles splattering her wings and swooped low over her bent stalks.
A giant sigh of relief raced from her lungs. Though mangled, her crops had not broken.
“Bless the breezes,” she chirped to herself, “That was a close one. I hope my neighbors are all ok.”
And she dipped a wing to sail towards the Clearing.
The circle of ancient trees was in shambles. Sparrow had to search to find a landing spot clear of debris. Several large branches had broken to the ground, and the entire circle was strewn with sticks and leaves. Still, no windows appeared smashed or trunks cracked.
Sparrow breathed another sigh of gratitude as she touched down and picked her way carefully around a thick oak branch that had fallen in front of her shop. But before she could pass it, a high pitched voice shrieked behind her.
“Miss Sparrow, Miss Sparrow! Oh no! Oh no! The whirly wind! The whirly wind!”
Sparrow turned to see Maisy Mouse racing across the Clearing.
“It’s ok!” the bird called back, “The storm is over. The wind has calmed.”
“Oh no, Miss Sparrow,” squeaked Maisy, shaking her head as she reached the branch, “the whirly wind! It broke your husk-ly place.”
Sparrow’s heart thumped against her chest. She turned and squeezed past the last twigs of the oak branch, Maisy hopping behind her. Only then did Sparrow see that the giant branch had crushed the Hull and Husk. Not only that, but a strong, swirling wind had swept up what was left and scattered it into the trees beyond. Shredded flour sacks peeked out from under leaves, and dented measuring cups lay wedged between roots.
Sparrow wobbled. Her wing reached out for something to steady herself. Maisy dipped beneath it, and Sparrow leaned gently on the mouse babe.
A moment later, Pip, Buttercup, and Daisy appeared in a tumbling blur.
“We saw the branch go crack!” cried Daisy.
“And bang!” added Buttercup.
“And the wind go whoosh!” squealed Pip, spinning in a circle.
Wind. Wind. Weather vane!
Sparrow’s heart quivered as her eyes scoured the Clearing. Leaves. Sticks. No weather vane.
“It’s gone,” she breathed.
Sparrow sank to the ground. She could barely think.
But then someone tugged on her wing.
“Miss Sparrow!” said Maisy, pointing, “Your wind spinny thing! Look!”
Sparrow followed the mouse babe’s paw. Her heart skipped a beat. Across the Clearing on the Safflower oak, wrapped round a low branch stub, was her weather vane. The wind had twisted it in place, the southern arrow pointing to the ground and the small bird stretched out in flight above.
“Look at that!” said Buttercup, fixated on the twisted metal, “The S is pointing down.”
The mouse babe cocked her head and stared hard, as if trying to make something out. Then suddenly she brightened and began bouncing up and down.
“S!” she shouted, “S is for Sparrow! Miss Sparrow! The whirly wind blew your outside shop away so you must have an inside shop with us!”
“Ooooooo! Yes!” cried Maisy beside her, “Yes, you must! You must!”
“And you could bring your grains to have with our seeds!” chimed in Pip.
Daisy nodded vigorously while smacking her lips.
“Specially your roasted barley.”
Sparrow felt the breath she’d been holding sail from her lungs in a laugh.
By this point, Mama and Papa Mouse had stepped outside and picked their way to the little group. The mouse babes immediately clambered around them, pointing out the woeful fate of the Hull and Husk and ecstatically sharing their solution.
“Hold up, now loves,” said Papa Mouse as the babes squeaked over each other, “Hold up. I think I understand. Hold your whiskers.”
The babes paused to take a breath, and Papa turned to Sparrow.
“I believe our little ones are right,” he said, “We have plenty of space in our oak tree. If you rebuild your stand out here, another storm might sweep it away. We would be thrilled to have you move in and keep shop with us.”
“Absolutely,” nodded Mama Mouse.
Sparrow’s beak dropped. Move in? Give up her stand?
But as her thoughts swirled, a creak came from across the Clearing. Sparrow glanced over to see the bird in flight on the weather vane sway gently in the breeze.
“Be ready for the wind beneath your wings…”
A tingle rang down Sparrow’s wingtips. She closed her eyes and took a breath.
Well, Granny, she thought, perhaps the wind is taking me to new things. Or new someones!
“Thank you,” she said turning back to the mouse family, “Thank you all so very much. I…I think I will!”
“Yay!!!!!!” squealed the mouse babes, prancing in a circle around her.
“Hey!” said Buttercup, pointing at a scoop caught in a chokeberry bush, “We can play hide-and-seek for your cups!”
Sparrow gazed about at the bits and bobs of her shop strewn helterskelter.
“You know,” she said, straightening and smoothing her feathers, “That sounds fantastic.”
“Yippee!” squeaked the babes.
“Can you teach us that song while we look?” asked Daisy.
“Oh,” said Sparrow.
She had forgotten about it. The morning now felt so long ago.
Buttercup clasped her paws. “Pleeeeeeease.”
“We liked listening,” said Maisy, “And we like singing too.”
Sparrow couldn’t help smile.
“Let me see if I can remember the words,” she said.
“Great!” squeaked Maisy, “It will be our finding song.”
So Sparrow began to whistle, and as she whistled, the words began to rise. Soon she was singing, the mouse babes chiming in beside her. Together they salvaged what they could of her shop before turning their attention to making space for a new Hull and Husk in the old oak tree.
Fortunately most of Sparrow’s grain was safe back at her maple, and what was lost could be replaced. The other neighbor creatures were quick to chip in too. Before the week was out, the Hull and Husk was open in its new home.
To celebrate the end of Sparrow’s first day in the oak, the Mouse family insisted she come up for dinner. And dessert. And songs. Many, many, many songs. In fact the mouse babes would only hear of going to bed after Sparrow promised to come again the next day. Or the day after at the very latest.
So from then on, the Safflower and the Hull and Husk lived side by side in the ancient oak. The mouse babes help find Sparrow’s rye measure whenever it goes missing, and their neighbors enjoy the evening harmonies that float from the mouse home at least twice a week.
“S,” as Buttercup says, “is for Sparrow and also for Special-est Aunt!”
Epilogue Thoughts: On Found Friends and Family
“You have yet to meet all the people who will love you.”
When I was young, guests often stayed with my family for extended periods of time. It made no difference to 6-year-old me whether they were short term volunteers or my parents’ new colleagues learning to live as expatriates in Africa. I was ready to adopt all of them as honorary aunts and uncles as soon as they stepped off the plane. To this day I remember Tanya who told me stories about an adventurous (and rather dreamy) character named Sebastian and Keith who very patiently endured the “morning monsters” who served as the alarm clock for his hut.
Somewhere along the way, however, like most of us, new people became less exciting and more nerve-wracking for me. I became more focused on those I knew. Problem is, that circle had a pattern of dwindling on me. People moved. I moved. Loss came in many forms. When the circle of those who love us has grown very small (or perhaps was never large to begin with), the world can be a terribly lonely place.
That is why I am grateful to have reconnected in recent years with that ready-to-dive-in 6-year-old inside of me. Being a parent has also nudged me to be brave. (Did I sweat cold-texting the mother of my son’s preschool classmate about a play date? Oh yes. But I did it!) Together my kids and I pluck up the courage to meet new people. To open our hearts. To believe it’s true there are people out there who are not our friends yet who would love to be. It’s not always magic. Not everyone is a new BFF. But some of the greatest friendships of my life have come in the hardest times and the least expected places.
“You have yet to meet all the people who will love you.”
If the world is a lonely place for a child you love (or yourself), I hope this promise gives them hope–hope that there are people who will love them for exactly who they are. Maybe even just around the corner.
*Thanks to Meg Oolders for the lovely silhouette banner at the beginning of this chapter.*