Stories

Story: Big Cloud

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 3 Comments

November 5, 2023

Joshua 3:7-17
Matthew 23:1-12

It was a Big Cloud, with a capital B and a capital C. There have been bigger clouds in the history of the world, but this one rivaled the clouds of hurricanes and typhoons. It swept across the Pacific Ocean with a kind of ponderous majesty, with the trade winds gently carrying it along. Other smaller clouds would try to go north or south to get out of its way. If they succeeded, they breathed a sigh of relief. If they failed, well, they became part of the Big Cloud.

It rained on the ocean as it sailed along, but warm sunlight ahead of it raised plenty of water vapor to replace what substance it lost and, in fact, to make the Big Cloud even Bigger. With a capital B.

In the distance it saw Hawai’i Island.

Some clouds accompanying it – after all, what cloud wouldn’t want to ride the Pacific Ocean trade winds? – warned the Big Cloud. “You see those mountains?” they said. “You want to turn aside for those mountains. Bad things happen to clouds that try to go through those mountains.”

The Big Cloud said nothing. It was the Big Cloud, after all, with a capital B and a capital C. What had a Big Cloud to fear from mountains?

“No, really,” they told it. “You’ll rain out on the slopes. You won’t make it through the saddle.”

The Big Cloud coughed, and it sounded like thunder.

“Make a turn to the south or the north,” they urged. “You can do it. Plenty of storms have done so before.”

The Big Cloud was not pleased, and its displeasure flashed in lightning bolts along its forward edges, like a giant electric frown.

“I will go my way,” it said. “I am the Big Cloud, and I go where I choose. I fear no mountains.” And the Big Cloud set its course right between Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa – and actually over both of them, because the Big Cloud was so big it didn’t fit between them.

Rain fell here in Hilo, of course, and way up the Hamakua Coast to Honoka’a and Waipio Valley. Rain fell in Puna, drenching Pahoa and Nanavale and all the way down in Opihikao.

As the Big Cloud rained on the island, it stretched toward the saddle between Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea, with rain thundering down the rising slopes. “I will go my way,” it thundered.

But the other smaller clouds had been right. The rising slopes coaxed more and more rain from the Big Cloud, and didn’t lift moisture from the ocean to replace it. The Big Cloud became a big Cloud with only a capital C, and then a big cloud with no capitals at all. Then it was a medium cloud, and a small cloud, and by the time it got to Kona, it wasn’t a cloud at all.

The other clouds watched with sadness that the Big Cloud’s pride had prevented it from taking their advice.

“The Big Cloud was too proud,” said one.

“It certainly was,” said another. “Now it’s been rained away. Pride goes as the rain falls.”

If you ever hear a human being say something like, “Pride goes before a fall,” well, that’s true enough for people, but among the clouds they say, “Pride goes as the rain falls.”

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories and then tell them from memory – well, memory and improvisation. As a result, the story as written differs from the story as told.

Photo by Eric Anderson

Story: On the Wind

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 2 Comments

October 29, 2023

Deuteronomy 34:1-12
Matthew 22:34-46

He was a recently hatched pueo and he didn’t want to fly.

As far as he was concerned, nest living was plenty good. His father came by with food. His mother got it into bite-sized bits that he, well, bit. He had two sisters in the nest with him and their mother stayed with the three of them. When it was cold her feathers spread over them kept them nice and warm. When the sun got too strong during the day her wings gave them shade. When it rained they were all snug beneath her body and wings.

He didn’t mind leaving the nest. Once his legs were strong enough, he’d hop out and go exploring. So did his sisters. They didn’t go far so they didn’t find much except grass and rocks and more grass, but it made them feel like bold adventurers.

But he didn’t want to fly.

The problem was the wind. The nest was in a spot in the saddle between Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea, and the mountains funneled the wind between their slopes and peaks so that it just howled them. When he’d first stood up to go exploring, a few stronger gusts had knocked him down three times. His legs got stronger after that so it didn’t happen again, but that wind kept going and he didn’t feel any better about it.

“If that wind is going to blow like that,” he said, “I’m not flying. The ground will work just fine for me.”

His mother didn’t quite believe him, so she ignored it when he said this. His sisters took this as an opening to tease him, so they did, but they didn’t take it seriously, either. “Not going to fly, right,” they told him as they settled down to sleep. “You’ll change your mind about that soon enough.”

But as they started to exercise their new-feathered wings, flapping them up and down and front and back, he didn’t do anything of the kind. “This is going to be so cool!” one of his sisters told him.

“Cold, more likely,” he said, “without Mom’s feathers to keep you warm.”

They day his sisters took their first flight, he stayed in the nest. “I’m not going to fly,” he told his mother. “As long as that wind is blowing, the ground is fine for me.”

She might have stayed to argue but her daughters were hopping up and down and squawking about taking their first flight, so she had to pay attention to them. It didn’t take long before all three were in the air, climbing away from the nest.

“As long as the wind is blowing like this,” he said again, “I’m staying on the ground.”

The wind, in fact, blew harder. He had to lean forward into it to stay upright. It dropped to almost nothing so that he stumbled and spread his wings for balance. In that moment the wind blew a great big gust that billowed under his wings and lifted him into the air.

He was so startled that he froze with his wings still extended, rather than folding them right there and getting an uncomfortable return to the ground. He soared higher up, the wind lifting him without so much as a wingbeat. With some small movements of his tail feathers, he turned one way and another, rose up and swooped down.

When he returned to the ground and the nest, his sisters and mother were there. “You’re not going to fly, huh?” his sisters teased.

“The wind is still blowing,” said his mother.

“It lifted me up,” said her son. “I didn’t think it would do that.”

His mother nodded. “Welcome, son,” she said, “to creatures who are held on the wind.”

There are plenty of uncomfortable and even scary things in the world. Some of these things – like God – are much bigger than we are. They may make us feel overwhelmed. And some of these things – it’s best to figure out what they are – will be there to lift us up and help us fly. One of those great powers is God. The Spirit blows as it will, it’s said, and the Spirit blows to help us fly.

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories ahead of time, but I don’t read them when I’m telling them. My memory leaves things out and my creativity adds things, so what you read and what you hear will not be the same.

Photo of a pueo in flight by HarmonyonPlanetEarth – Pueo (Hawaiian Owl)|Saddle Rd | 2013-12-17at17-45-012. Uploaded by snowmanradio, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=30241884.

Story: That’s Mine

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 3 Comments

October 22, 2023

Exodus 33:12-23
Matthew 22:15-22

‘Amakihi are generally inoffensive birds. They fly with other birds, they feed with other birds, and they even allow other birds to get pretty close to their nests – though they’ll chase off a bird that gets closer than, say, about three feet.

One ‘amakihi, however, must have been watching i’iwi, perhaps, or more likely people, because he chose and ohi’a tree and said, “That’s mine!”

I told a story a while ago about an i’iwi trying to protect an ohi’a tree and you might remember that it didn’t work. And I’ve told a story about an i’iwi trying to keep other birds away from a tree in blossom and how an ‘amakihi found a way that other birds could eat there, too. Those trees were in full blossom, with the scent of nectar drawing the honeyeaters of the forest in from all around. This tree, however, the one that the ‘amakihi chose as his? It was not at all tall, and barely had a flower on it. Nobody was terribly interested.

Except for this one ‘amakihi, who told everyone who came near: “It’s mine!”

He ate the bugs from it, and sipped nectar when it blossomed, but he couldn’t really feed himself entirely from this one tree, so he’d forage around the forest. As soon as he was satisfied, however, he’d be right back to his chosen tree, to chase away any bird that was getting “too close,” whatever that meant at the time.

“Why are you doing that?” asked his sister.

“The tree is mine!” he told her.

“How is the tree yours?” asked his father.

“It’s mine!”

That’s an argument you can have for a long time.

His grandfather came by and circled the little tree while he was perched there. He didn’t get too close, so his grandson didn’t get upset. He landed a little bit away in another small tree and called out, “Can we talk, grandson?”

The ‘amakihi wouldn’t even let his own grandfather perch in “his” tree, so he flew to where grandfather was.

“That’s your tree, is it?” asked grandfather.

“Yes, it is,” said the grandson.

“How did you plant it?” asked Tutu.

“I didn’t,” said the grandson.

“Then you must have watered it,” said Tutu.

He hadn’t done that, either.

“Or fed it to make it grow,” said grandfather, but the grandson hadn’t.

“All right then,” said the grandson, “maybe I can’t claim the whole tree. I’ll just claim this branch.” He flew over and perched on it, singing out, “It’s mine!”

Grandfather flew to another branch and said, “You must have done a lot of work to get it large enough to hold you.”

“This flower cluster is mine!”

“Well done for making it blossom!”

The grandson fell silent.

“Even among the humans, grandson, who argue about who owns what among the things of the Earth, and who turn some things into other things and who do make things grow where they didn’t, even among the humans, they know that they didn’t make the land, and they didn’t create the seeds, and their claims to own things are… a problem.

“You’re an ‘amakihi. You’ll build a nest and you’ll raise chicks. Even those won’t be ‘yours;’ they’ll be their own. Let it go, grandson. Let the tree be its own.”

“I think it’s a wonderful little tree,” said the grandson.

“Love it all you like,” said Tutu. “Let the tree be its own.”

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I tell these stories from my memory of what I’ve written. As a result, what I said in the recording may be very different from what I’d previously written.

Photo of an ‘amakihi by Dominic Sherony – Hawaii Amakihi (Chlorodrepanis virens virens), CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=52150186.

Story: The ‘Akepa who Needed Comfort

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 3 Comments

October 15, 2023

Exodus 32:1-14
Philippians 4:1-9

The young ‘akepa was eager, so eager, to fly. He’d been fascinated by the idea ever since he first saw his father fly to the nest with food, and then fly away again to get more. As his wings feathers grew on his wings he got more and more excited, even if they did come in first as greenish-grey, the same color as his mother’s wings, and not the bright orange of his father. He didn’t worry about the color. He just wanted to fly.

His nest was a hole high up in a koa tree where a storm had brought down a big branch long before he was hatched. He poked his beak out from time to time to watch the other birds fly, and from time to time he’d stand on the edge and stretch out his wings and imagine what it was like. When the breeze ruffled his feathers he held his wings out to see what it felt like with the wind pressing against them. So many times he nearly hopped away to take to the open air, but somehow he refrained.

It might have had something to do with his sister, who was an hour older and, sadly, somewhat bossy. I’m an older child myself, and my younger brother would probably tell you that when I was young, I was somewhat bossy. “Don’t you do it!” she snapped at him. “You know your wings aren’t strong enough yet.”

“How do you know that?” he asked crossly.

“Because mine aren’t, and I’m older than you,” she said.

“By an hour.”

“It could be by a minute and they still wouldn’t be ready, and yours aren’t ready, so don’t go hopping out of the nest,” she said, and, well, they bickered.

I’m sure you never bicker with your brother or sister or friends, do you?

Both their parents were away from the nest one afternoon and he was perched on the edge of the hole in the tree watching some other birds when a small group of people walked through the forest below. He didn’t pay any attention to them – they didn’t fly, after all – when one of their cell phones rang. The ring tone was an electric guitar riff.

He’d never heard a noise like that before. It was loud – the phone was at top volume – and fierce, and harsh. Startled, he hopped up and away – but not backwards into the hole in the tree, but forwards into the open air. He desperately opened his wings, but found that his sister was right. He didn’t have the strength for level flight. Flapping desperately, he managed to slow himself down enough to grab some twigs close to the ground. There he huddled miserably beneath some leaves as his sister called from above.

His mother found him there not long afterward. “Get me back to the nest!” he begged. “I promise I won’t try to fly again!”

She looked him over and said, “How?”

There wasn’t a way for her to carry him, or for his father to carry him, or for the two of them together to carry him, and he knew it.

“Will you leave me here?” he asked.

“Your father and I are going to take care of you right here,” his mother said, “until your wings are strong enough to fly – which won’t be all that long. You’ll be less comfortable here than you would have been in the nest, and you’ll have to keep out of sight of the ‘io, but you’ll be fed and you will grow.”

That’s what happened. He wasn’t comfortable. The branch was drafty and the leaves let the rain through and the sun got plenty hot. Plus he could hear his sister calling “I told you so,” from time to time, which wasn’t very pleasant.

But then his father or mother would arrive with something to eat, and with some reassuring sounds, and the warmth of their feathers against his. He wasn’t comfortable, but he was comforted.

A couple days later he could fly just fine, and one more comforting thing happened. His sister, who’d been badly frightened when he fell from their nest in the hole in the tree, said she was sorry for calling “I told you so.”

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories ahead of time, but tell them on Sunday mornings from memory and from improvisation. This is a morning when the telling sounds rather different than the writing.

Photo of an ‘akepa by Tony Castro – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=56759511.

Story: The Loyal Myna

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 3 Comments

October 8, 2023

Isaiah 5:1-7
Matthew 21:33-46

While they were young, a myna and a saffron finch struck up a friendship. It wasn’t all that unusual, to be sure. Mynas and saffron finches hunt and peck for seeds and bugs and so on side by side quite often. Along the way they chat about this and that, that and this, at least until the flock of mynas gets riled up about something and start an argument among themselves.

This young myna didn’t much care for the myna arguments and even less for the major arguments, so she would hop off to one side with her friend the saffron finch, and the two of them would talk about food, and bugs, and the silly things mynas do, and the silly things saffron finches do, and the completely undecipherable things that humans do.

The myna liked her friend a lot. The saffron finch liked her friend a lot. Even when they weren’t talking about anything terribly important, they loved their time.

One of the mynas in the flock became, if not the leader, one of the more popular mynas among them. He was often loud and boisterous, and he tended to win the arguments. But he also got the mynas together. When a cat came by, he was the one who organized everyone to screech at it and dive at it until it went away. He kept an eye out for ‘io overhead and for mongoose on the prowl. If one of the mynas was missing, he’d search until he found them (which rarely took long; they tended to be behind a bush or under the eaves of a roof).

As time went on, he became more and more the leader of the flock, and all the other birds came to value his time and attention. That included the myna who was friends with the saffron finch. One of the things she’d talk to her friend about was the times when he’d talk to her.

“He’s an important bird,” said the saffron finch, before they went on to talk more about which was the best flavored bug that day.

One day, however, the leader myna hopped over to the myna who was friends with the saffron finch. “Hey,” he said, only with more myna screech to it. “I hear that you’ve got a friend who’s a saffron finch.”

“That’s right,” she said.

“No, that’s not right,” he told her. “Your friends should be mynas, not saffron finches. It’s one thing to put up with them – after all, they’re so small they don’t eat much – but it’s another thing to be friends with them. It’s time you dropped her. Tell her to stay away from you.”

“Why would I do that?” said the myna with a saffron finch for a friend.

“Because it’s what you should do,” said the leader myna, “and if you don’t, we can’t have you in the flock.”

At this moment the saffron finch landed nearby. The leader myna told her, “Say goodbye to your former friend. She’ll have her friends among the mynas now.”

“There’s no goodbye,” said the myna. “You’re my friend as long as you want to be.”

“I told you to drop her!” he said.

“You can say that all you want,” she replied. “I choose my friends, not you.”

“We’ll see what the flock has to say about that,” he said, and called them over. “This sad bird has a friend who’s a saffron finch,” he sneered to them. “Are we going to put up with that in our flock?”

The myna looked at her friends. She didn’t say anything. They looked at her, and they looked at their leader.

Unexpectedly, the saffron finch spoke up. “Don’t you have a friend who’s a spotted dove?” she asked one, who nodded. “And aren’t you friends with a yellow-beaked cardinal, and you with a northern cardinal?” she asked two more. They nodded as well.

“Are you going to let this bird choose your friends?” she asked, and all the mynas shook their heads.

That was the end of one myna’s leadership, and the continuation of a number of friendships, because of one loyal myna, and then many loyal mynas, in that flock.

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories in advance, then tell them with a combination of memory and improvisation on Sunday mornings.

Photos of a myna (l.) and saffron finch (r.) by Eric Anderson.

Story: The Best

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 3 Comments

October 1, 2023

Philippians 2:1-13
Matthew 21:23-32

She was the best. Everybody knew it. When young koa’e kea began learning to fly, they aspired to fly like her. She was the best.

Koa’e kea move awkwardly on land, and so did she, but the grace with which she’d take off had everyone gasping with amazement. One moment she was stationary on the ground, the next moment she was in the air, moving as if she’d never been anywhere else. When fishing, she would dive straight down, and only stray to the side to intercept the moving fish in the water below. Her take-offs from the water were as seemingly miraculous as her take-offs from land. One moment bobbing in the waves, the next moment climbing to the skies.

When young koa’e kea tried to race her, they rapidly fell behind. When they tried to turn more sharply than she, they either skittered away or fluttered helplessly down until they’d caught themselves and controlled their flight again. She landed so gently that her legs barely flexed. From time to time she’d gently roll through the air. Those who imitated her went through day after day of struggle, turning this way and that and descending rapidly, until they finally mastered those subtle movements of the feathers. Then they’d roll, but never with the same grace and power.

When she wanted to relax, she’d catch the rising air above Halema’uma’u Crater, soaring in rising circles with barely a wingbeat, higher than any of the other koa’e kea dared to go, a spot of white against the blue sky.

She was the best.

One young koa’e kea was determined to be her successor – in fact, to fly even better than she did. He studied every move she made. He exercised his wings. He spent hours facing into the trade winds and seeing what happened when he moved this feather like this, or that feather like that. He was going to be the best.

There was one difference, though. He announced it.

“I will be the best!” he said at some point during just about any conversation. He knew he wasn’t the best, not yet, but every koa’e kea on the mountainside knew what he aspired to be.

As for the best flyer among them? She said nothing, did nothing, but flew her best over the ocean, and over the pali, and over the mountain. When someone asked her help or advice she gave it (she was a willing teacher), but there was never a word from her about who the best flyer among the koa’e kea was.

There were plenty of words from the younger one. “I’ll be the best!” he said. “I’ll be the best very soon!” And indeed, that seemed like it might be true. He was taking turns almost as sharply as she. His take-offs were almost as magical. When he soared, he rose nearly as high.

So his grandmother took him aside one day. “Grandson,” she said, “I am very proud of you. You are the best flyer of your generation, and you may become the best flyer of us all. I’m so proud of all your hard work.”

“I’ll be the best,” he said.

“But one thing, grandson,” she said, “will prevent you from being the best if you keep doing it.”

“What’s that?” he asked. “Is it the way I hold my tail on takeoff? I’ve been working on that.”

“No,” she said. “It’s the way you keep talking about becoming the best.”

He was confused. “If I’m the best, or nearly the best, shouldn’t I say so?”

“Does the best flyer among the koa’e kea need to say it?” his grandmother asked.

As he thought about it, he realized that she never said a word about it. Even when she was doing something showy – like those rolls through the air – she never did it in a way that upset the other birds. She relaxed through those rolls, and in those rising circles, so that nobody ever thought her skill was a taunt or an insult to them. It was just an expression of her joy in flight.

“No, I don’t think she does,” he replied.

“You’re more than a good enough flyer,” said his grandmother, “that you don’t need to say a thing about it, either.”

It took a while to break the habit – bad habits are hard to break, aren’t they? – but on the day that his soaring circle reached higher than hers, he said nothing about it. She did – she congratulated him on his skill – and the two of them were the wonder of the koa’e kea of Hawai’i Island, rising, turning, diving, and soaring so beautifully that everyone else watched in wonder and in awe.

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories first, and tell them from memory – which means things change. Today that includes the addition of sound effects.

Photo of a koa’e kea (white-tailed tropicbird) by Eric Anderson.

Story: Love Isn’t Fair

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 2 Comments

September 24, 2023

Jonah 3:10-4:11
Matthew 20:1-16

He was the oldest of the three ‘amakihi, so he thought he would get everything the first and the best.

In fact, he did get fed first after he’d emerged from the shell and was breathing deeply for the first time. Getting out of an eggshell sounds easy, but he didn’t find it so. Next to him the other two eggs continued to rock and creak for some time as he ate his first bug from his mother’s beak. It tasted wonderful.

I know you and I might not think so, but he thought it tasted wonderful.

Truly, though, he wasn’t born first by much. His sister emerged from her shell within an hour, and his brother was eating his first bug a half hour after that. Still, he was first. And if you’re the first born – um, first hatched – that comes with some benefits, right? First hatched, first fed – at every meal. First hatched, first flight lesson. First hatched, first singing lesson. First hatched, first… well, everything.

But his parents didn’t seem to have learned that rule.

When they came with bugs for their nestlings, they tended to put it in the first handy little beak. Our oldest little ‘amakihi didn’t like it, but in all the chaos of pushing about in the little nest he thought they were just careless and making mistakes. As they grew, he learned to get his beak in place just a little more quickly at mealtimes, but he thought his parents had figured out how to feed him first. And at singing lessons, he didn’t wait for them to say, “Who wants to sing first?” He just sang first.

Flying lessons, though, were different.

Flying, obviously, has to be taken seriously. ‘Amakihi may be small birds, but gravity pulls them just like it pulls you and me. Mother and father didn’t ask for volunteers or pay any attention to his volunteering. They called on the one who was ready, not the one who was eager.

It made him mad.

“That’s completely unfair!” he shrieked one morning when his younger sister took off before he did. He launched himself into the air, flapping madly (and angrily) and not very well, because he wasn’t paying attention to what he was doing, he was paying attention to what he was feeling. He landed rather painfully in a nearby tree and sulked.

The branch jumped a little bit as another bird landed near him. He looked up to see his mother.

“What’s not fair?” she asked.

“It’s not fair for you to teach the others before me. I was born first. I’m always first. I’m always supposed to be first. I’m first!” he said. And he cried angry tears.

She waited until the crying had settled down some, and said, “No, it’s not fair. And it won’t be fair. Not because being born first, you always go first – that’s not true, son, and it’s about time you learned that – but because love isn’t fair.”

It was a shock to hear that he wasn’t always going to be first, but it was more of a shock to hear that love isn’t fair.

“I love everyone in our family equally,” she said. “I love them equally even when they peck at me, like your sister did yesterday, or when they ignore me, like your brother did this morning. I love them equally when your father eats the bug I was following or when your grandmother tells me how to do something that I already know how to do. If I were being fair, I’d love your sister more when your brother annoys me, and I’d love your brother more when your father makes me angry.”

“And you’d love everyone else more when your oldest son gets mad and flies off in a huff,” said her oldest son.

She didn’t have to reply.

“Thank you for not being fair,” he said.

“You’re welcome,” she said. “Now, shall we work on that takeoff? And landing? And paying attention to where you’re going in flight?”

That little ‘amakihi family went right on being unfair – and loving one another each day.

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories ahead of time, then tell the story from memory. Memory plus improvisation, that is.

Photo of an ‘Amakihi by Bettina Arrigoni – Hawaii Amakihi (male) | Palilia Discovery Trail | Mauna Kea | Big Island | HI|2017-02-09|12-21-50.jpg, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=74674240.

Story: It Starts with Truth

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 1 Comment

September 17, 2023

Romans 14:1-12
Matthew 18:21-35

They were building their first nest together as an ‘apapane couple. An ‘apapane nest is a pretty impressive piece of engineering, taking a week or even a day or two more. That’s a lot of grass and twigs and moss to move.

They weren’t the only ones, of course. In a tree not far away his sister and her husband were also building a nest, their first one, too. They’d got started a little earlier, so their nest was taking shape while the brother’s nest looked pretty ragged. Everyone was having trouble finding the grass and moss and twigs for their nests, and flying farther to find them.

That’s when he got his clever idea.

When his sister and her husband (and his own wife) were away looking for more material, he flew quickly over to his sister’s nest. He pulled out a particularly nice twig that would be perfect for his own nest and flew back. When his wife returned she found him proudly settling that twig into position.

“Well done!” she said.

“There’s more,” he said.

They both flew off, she to search the forest and he to his sister’s nest. Before his wife came back he’d made three trips to it, taking grass and moss as well as another good structural twig.

“Where are you finding this so quickly?” his wife wondered.

“I found an old nest that nobody’s using,” he said.

“Oh, good! Show me and I’ll come, too.”

“I wish I could. This was the last of it,” he told her.

But he went back to his sister’s nest again for more.

He was careful to make sure his sister and her husband were absent. It was clear that they had had a difficult time replacing the things he’d taken. They were still ahead in their nest’s construction, but not so much as before.

He pulled a piece of moss from his sister’s nest and turned around. There, sitting silently on a nearby branch, was his wife.

“Abandoned nest?” she said.

“I’ll stop with this one,” he said.

“That’s not enough,” she told him. “You have to put that piece back, first of all. Then you have to wait for your sister and her husband and tell them what you’ve been doing. Then you have to help them build this nest that you’ve been stealing from.”

“Isn’t it enough that I just stop and let it be?” he asked.

“No, it isn’t. It’s nowhere near enough. You’ve been pulling their nest apart and you need to help them put it back.”

“Couldn’t I just do that? Leave out that I’ve been taking things?”

She gave him a very sharp look indeed. “She’s your sister. Do you think she’d be content with a lie?”

He admitted that she wouldn’t.

“Ask anyone among the ‘apapane,” she said. “We can live together when we make mistakes and make amends for them. We can’t live together with lies. It begins with truth. So tell the truth.”

He told the truth. His sister had some true and truly angry things to say to him about it, but she did accept his help in repairing the damage and, during family gatherings, was sometimes heard to say, “It begins with truth. Thank you, brother, for the truth.”

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories ahead of time, but I tell them from memory rather than reading them. As a result, they change.

Photo of an ‘apapane by Eric Anderson.

Story: Ready

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 1 Comment

September 10, 2023

Exodus 12:1-14
Matthew 18:15-20

We’re back to flight school today. Nene flight school.

The first part of the day had been occupied with eating lessons, because nene believe very strongly in the virtue of a good breakfast. And lunch. And mid-afternoon snack. And don’t get me started on dinner, because a nene is pretty much always ready to start on dinner.

Now, however, the young goslings were ready for some flying time. They were very young, and they hadn’t been going to school very long. In fact, they were still on the first lesson, which is:

Taking off.

That’s kind of an issue for a nene. It’s a good-sized bird, and relative to some similar looking geese, it’s got smaller wings. A nene will fly better than you or I, but there’s a lot to know about getting started.

A nene has to get the hops right, and the wing downbeats right, and the leap and the downbeats timed right, and most important of all: face into the wind.

Face into the wind.

One of the young nene was having a lot of trouble facing into the wind.

Do you have friends who are distracted easily? Any little noise or movement draws their eye? Well, he was distracted by everything. A stray ‘ohelo berry. An unfamiliar noise. A familiar noise. A puff of wind. A stillness of wind. A bug. A waving blade of grass.

So when the teacher lined everyone up, had them face into the wind, led them through a couple of practice hops and a couple of practice wingbeats, she also turned into the wind with them and called out, “Ready?”

There was a chorus of “Ready”s behind her, except for one voice that said, “For what?”

He’d been distracted by a sunbeam on some lava glass.

She got him turned in the right direction, led the practice hops and the wingbeats, and called out, “Ready?”

She got the expected reply. Several nene “Ready”s and one nene “Oops.”

She dismissed the rest of the class back to eating lessons, but asked the ever-distracted-one to stay. “I know you’re easily distracted,” she told him, “but the problem is, you have to get everything ready before you take off.”

“Are you sure?” he asked. “Can we try it?”

“Yes,” she said, “we can try it.”

They tried it. It was a disaster. When he didn’t focus, he didn’t time his hops and his wingbeats, and he fell forward. When he forgot to hop at all, he stayed firmly on the ground. When he didn’t face into the wind and stay that way, he’d tip himself right over.

“How about we try it with me paying attention?” he asked.

A few minutes later his classmates looked up from their mid morning snack to see their teacher and their friend flying gently through sky above them. They cheered.

He paid a lot of attention when it came time for landing.

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories first (it’s what you’ve just read) but tell them from memory. Memory and creative inspiration, that is.

Photo of two nene by Eric Anderson.

Story: Simple Song

/ Rev. Eric Anderson / 1 Comment

September 3, 2023

Exodus 3:1-15
Romans 12:1-8

‘Apapane are known for their singing – the ohi’a and koa forests echo with it during the cooler parts of the day. ‘Apapane are sensible creatures and when it’s hot they save their breath for breathing.

They are also known for the complexity of their singing. They sing high and they sing low, they squeal and whistle, they making clicking sounds, and my goodness can they trill. An ‘apapane concert is often a trilling experience.

Sorry about that.

There was one ‘apapane, however, who didn’t seem to have received the word that he could sing high, low, middle, whistle, trill, click, and squeal. Instead, he sang one very simple song. It was pretty, to be sure, a low note that rose and then flourished into this marvelous little trill. Other ‘apapane really enjoyed his song, and so did ‘akepa and ‘amakihi so on. It was so lovely that it would soothe a grumpy ‘i’iwi, and when an ‘i’wi is grumpy, they usually stay grumpy.

His parents and brother and sister and miscellaneous aunties and uncles and cousins and tutus all waited for his second song. They were expecting something else to thrill the ears – I’m sorry, that should have been “trill the ears.”

But it didn’t come.

When he found ohi’a in blossom, he sang a low note that rose and flourished into a marvelous little trill. When he had just filled up on insects, he sang a low note that rose and flourished into a marvelous little trill. When the sun was bright and warm on his feathers he sang a low note that rose and flourished into a marvelous little trill. When he was just feeling content with life he sang a low note that rose and flourished into a marvelous little trill.

Nobody actually became bored with his song, but they did become concerned.

Parents, grandparents, friends, aunties, uncles, and so forth began to ask him about his one single song. He’d just smile in an ‘apapane way (they don’t have lips to curve up, so I think it’s got something to do with the way they move their head, but to be honest I don’t know), and he didn’t say anything about it. They’d ask about his next song, and he’d smile. They’d ask if he was all right with only one song, and he’d smile. They’d ask what it meant for him to have only one song, and he’d smile.

It was his sister who figured it out. She didn’t peck him with questions (or with her beak, which brothers and sisters sometimes do and they shouldn’t). She just hung out with him, flying from tree to tree, talking with him about nothing in particular, and enjoying his company. He enjoyed hers as well.

She watched as he sang his one song when the sun rose, and when the sky was clear, and when the hot sun went behind a cloud, and when there was lots of nectar, and… that’s when she realized it.

“You sing a song about being happy,” she said. He smiled.

“Nobody else has figured that out,” he said, and smiled again.

“They’re all waiting for you to sing about something else,” she said.

He smiled. “I like to sing about being happy,” he told her.

She smiled back. “That’s a song about everything,” she said.

“And nothing,” he said.

“Everything and nothing,” she said, “is a good thing to sing about.”

by Eric Anderson

Watch the Recorded Story

I write these stories ahead of time, and then tell them without notes. Sometimes that means that the pre-planned puns don’t make it in, as was the case today. You can decide whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing.

Photo of two ‘apapane by Eric Anderson.