Week 7 of the Lemurian tour — A Special Tree April 3, 2007
Posted by Barbara in Helpers of the Land, Lemurian Grand Tour, Barbara’s Journey, Appeasement, Myths. add a comment , edit post
I keep a special tree in my memory and also a special story about my tree. When I was young, I played under my tree every sunny day. I set up a woodsy home between the trunk and some nearby bushes. It was a child’s sweet home, infused with magick and mythical folklore.
And I was told many stories by the magockal faeries that lived in the tree. A story was passed down from the Native People of this land about when they began their preparations for the sugar season. (As a child of 6 or 7, I was certain the mythical tree was my house tree.) It is widely known that the maples run in March. Since this winter was late, the sap ran later, and it is running now in early April, running as I write.
This is the traditional myth, with some adaptations by the story-tellers of the tale. One day Wenebojo, the Great Grandfather of the Clan, stood under a large maple tree. As he stood, thinking about his people, drops of maple syrup fell from the tree upon him, covering him with a sticky goo. Wenebojo, knowing a good thing when it fell in his face, found a flat thick board of birch bark and caught the syrup. He filled 4 buckets with the sweet liquid.
Then he thought a bit. “This is perhaps too easy and so no one will appreciate the sacrifice of this great maple.” He threw the syrup behind a boulder and simply told his Clan that he had discovered a sweetness in the tree. But he told them that before the Great Good Mother would give them the syrup, they must fix a grand feast for the tree, perform a dancing ritual, and offer the tree a gift of appeasement and of thankfulness.
Nakomis, who was the very elderly, but very wise grandmother of Menejobo, was the respected crone of the Clan. She beckoned Wenebojo to her home. Quietly and secretly, she showed her grandson how to drill a hole in the tree with a sharpened stick, and then attach a small tube into the hole. The syrup ran into the bucket and it filled quickly.
When Memejobo tasted the liquid from the Maple Tree, it was thick and deliciously sweet. But Nakomis shook her head. “My clan should not receive this syrup unless they are made to work for it. Otherwise, they will not appreciate the Maple’s fine gift.” So Wenebojo climbed to the top of the Maple with a bladder of water slung over his back. When he was at the top, he opened the bladder and sprinkled rain water over the tree. The water dissolved the syrup. Instead of the syrup running into the buckets, the sap dripped slowly and Nakomis smiled and nodded her head. “Now my clan must cut firewood and build a grand fire; they must fashion large cups from clay in which to store the syrup; then they must patiently collect the dripping sap and finally they must boil the sap until it turns into the sweetness of maple syrup.”
So not only did the clan of Nakomis make syrup every late March, but they also learned the benefits of hard work.
After this story, I was always asked to help my grandmother stir the home-made applesauce or hand my great-grandmother clothespins to hang our clothes to dry or to sweep the sidewalks. There were many little tasks a 7 year old could do. And I think I did nearly all of them.
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