Being Gonwid.

I’d like to point out that, as autobiographical as Gonwid is, I’m not aware of having had any flatulence problem as a young cub. That was put in simply to make a point, the point being that I do have vague recollections of my parents and other adults using me as bait to get laughs occasionally. The thing that made me growl loudest, however, was being tickled. I found it a gross violation of personal space and it made me very angry.

He’s an interesting point, though. I’ve been reading about Carl Jung, and it seems he has something enlightening to say about my difficulties in maintaining close relationships with my parents and the women I’ve lived with. They simply didn’t live up to the archetypes I had stored in my unconscious, apparently. It was all about my standards being too high. Oh good; that’s OK, then.

Gonwid: the Prequel.

Just in case Gonwid the Bear should find himself the subject of another allegorical anecdote one of these days, I thought I might say something about his early life to flesh out his character a little.

As a very young cub, Gonwid had a noted propensity for flatulence, and his parents used it to raise their stock with the other bears in the valley. They would take little Gonwid a-visiting, saying ‘Meet our one cub gasworks. We call him Gonwid the Wind.’ The other bears would chortle heartily. ‘Ha, ha, ha,’ they would exclaim. ‘Like that. Gonwid the Wind. Nice one.’ And, having attained the enviable position of Valley Comedians, even if only briefly, the parents would bask in the warm light of social approbation.

Gonwid, however, was already possessed of a virulent – and sometimes violent –dislike of mockery, and responded to his parents’ habit of climbing socially at his expense by developing a precociously deep growl that was wondrous to behold. He also disowned and abandoned them as soon as he was old enough to realise that men with murderous metal tubes were usually American tourists, and rebelled against all convention by living alone in the hills, becoming vegetarian, and making friends with unlikely creatures such as caterpillars instead of other bears.

And this is why Gonwid now has a reputation for grumpiness and well practiced avoidance of his own kind, although he is much given to expressing random acts of kindness to children and the rest of the animal kingdom, rarely having to try too hard since such acts are fundamental to his nature. His only regret at having turned vegetarian is that his conscience won’t allow him to eat American tourists bearing murderous metal tubes, but this is just one of many complications that provide him with an endless stock of things about which to grumble endlessly.

The Tale of Gonwid.

A very short story, as promised.

*  *  *

Gonwid the bear lived in a small cave which was set high above the river valley where the other animals lived. The other animals didn’t have much to do with Gonwid; some feared him a little, but most just thought him ugly and possessed of strange notions which they didn’t understand and therefore considered silly.

One day at the end of summer, when the air was turning cooler and the greens were becoming tinged with a little yellow and brown here and there, Gonwid was strolling alone along a woodland path. He saw something move ever so slightly nearby, and walked over to investigate. A caterpillar was sitting on a fallen tree, and every so often it moved ever so slightly.

‘Hi,’ said the caterpillar.

‘Hello,’ returned Gonwid.

‘Do you have any friends?’ continued the caterpillar.

‘No.’

‘Me neither. Would you like to be my friend?’

‘Yes please.’

‘OK.’

And then the caterpillar crawled into a hole in the log and disappeared. Gonwid waited, calling ‘Hello’ at respectful intervals, but the caterpillar only said ‘Mmm…’ now and then, and remained hidden. He did hear the sound of rustling as his new furry friend moved around in its dark little place, but of further sighting there was none, and so he went home.

Gonwid walked along the path often after that, always stopping to call into the hole with a general greeting, or a remark about the weather, or a muse on the deeper meaning of life. Sometimes the caterpillar would poke its head out and answer with some perfunctory remark of its own, but mostly it just rustled.

‘Strange friend,’ he thought. But he persisted in his avowed intent to be a good companion through the winds and rains and snows of winter, always stopping to talk to the caterpillar, always listening for the rustle, always reminding himself that a strange friend is better than no friend at all. And then the rustling stopped.

Spring had arrived. The browns were filling with green again, flowers were appearing along the fringes of the path, and the sun cast shorter shadows at noon. But no sound came from the log. Day after day he called and listened and waited, but in vain. Until, that is, one day when the sun was high and hot and another creature was sitting where the caterpillar had sat.

‘Who are you?’ asked Gonwid.

‘Butterfly,’ said the creature.

‘You’re very beautiful.’

‘I know. I’m a Peacock butterfly. Don’t you see my many iridescent colours and the big eyes I have on my wings?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well there you are, then.’

‘Have you seen a caterpillar around these parts lately?’

‘No. Caterpillar’s gone.’

‘Gone?’

‘Gone.’

‘Gone where?’

‘Just gone.’

And then the butterfly stretched its wings and rose into the air, joining myriad other butterflies racing to feast on the multitude of flowers now filling the neatly tended gardens in the valley. Gonwid turned and looked at the hole in the log. He called one last time, but only the searing sharpness of silence came back to him. And Gonwid never saw the caterpillar again.

Clueless Tonight.

Still a bit under the weather, but I have to say something some time, don’t I? So let’s stick with the tried and trusted:

The Shire tonight: cold, windy, damp, dark. Somebody flashed their headlights at me, though I haven’t a clue who it was. I waved anyway, just in case I was supposed to.

The beer tonight: Bulldog Strong Ale (6.3% ABV) which says on the label ‘Imported from England.’ It gets odder. The next line says: ‘Birra doppio malto da consumarsi preferibilmente entro.’ I’m drinking it anyway, even though I haven’t a clue what it means. You don’t care when you’re depressed.

Tonight’s activity: writing a very short story. Since it’s so short I’ll post it here, even though you won’t have a clue as to what it relates. It’s called The Tale of Gonwid. Sounds Arthurian, doesn’t it? Doesn’t it? Oh. That's OK; it isn't.