Some of you have been asking for #Storytime. So here goes:

There is a story the bees used to tell, which makes it hard to disbelieve. #Storytime

There once was a village of people who lived at the top of a mountain. #Storytime

The people were happy, for they lived well. The mountain was high, and the air was clear, and crops and livestock thrived there. Most of all, the sun always shone, for the summit of the mountain rose high above the belt of cloud. #Storytime

At the foot of the mountain, there lived another community. These people were very like the first, but they lived in the mountain’s shadow. #Storytime

The sun never shone on them, for the clouds were thick around the mountain-top, and the air was often smoky from the fires that burned on the summit. #Storytime

Their water was filled with the filth and the leavings of the folk who lived on the mountain-top. And they were often hungry, for their crops and livestock did not thrive, but suffered from the smoky air, the cold and the lack of sunlight. #Storytime

One day, a man from the mountain-top journeyed into the valley. The misery he found there moved and troubled him deeply. #Storytime

He spent a year with the valley folk, sharing and noting their sufferings, and then he returned to his own kind, filled with plans for improvement. #Storytime

He went to the elders of his village, and explained what he had seen. “The smoke from our fires, the filth from our streams is causing others to suffer,” he said. “I have here a list of changes to make, to ensure that we meet our responsibilities.” #Storytime

The elders listened to the man with surprise and disbelief, saying; “How can we be responsible?”
#Storytime

Once more, the man tried to explain. “In the valley, there is great misery,” he said. “The water is filthy; the air, filled with smoke. Even the sun cannot shine there.” #Storytime

“Then why do they not live elsewhere?” said the village elders. “We have no such problems here. These people are living in squalor and filth, and they envy us our prosperity.” #Storytime

Once more, the man tried to explain. But the elders viewed him suspiciously. Over the course of a year, he had changed beyond recognition. #Storytime

Where once he had been strong and well-fed, he was now wasted and painfully thin. And where once, his skin had been golden from the perpetual sun, he was now pale as a man who has spent all of his days in a dungeon. #Storytime

“See how they mistreat our kind, these strangers of the valley!” they said. “And now they dare to send us demands! We should see this as a threat, and deal with it accordingly.” #Storytime

And so they poisoned the stream below the outskirts of their village; and they made bonfires of green wood, so that clouds of acrid smoke descended on the valley. #Storytime

And when the man protested, they said: “If you care so much for these folk, then go and share their misery, and leave the mountain forever.” #Storytime

Angry, the man left his village, and began to walk down the mountainside. But as he approached the belt of cloud, his courage began to fail him. #Storytime

He thought of his friends and his family; the warmth of the sunshine on his face. He looked up at the meadows of sweet grass, all woven through with flowers. #Storytime

Then, he looked down at the belt of cloud, now dark and stitched with lightning. The closer he came, the less he believed that anyone could survive below. #Storytime

“After all,” he told himself, “We didn’t make this mountain. We didn’t make this belt of cloud, or this ring of lightning. A higher power did all that. We should trust Their authority.” #Storytime

The man sat in the warm green grass and repeated this to himself several times, and found that every time he did so, he felt a little better. #Storytime

He looked up at the clear blue sky, where eagles screamed and circled.
He closed his eyes and enjoyed the scent of a thousand meadow flowers.
And the longer he sat there in the sun, the more resigned to his fate he became. #Storytime

“One man is powerless,” he thought, “Faced with the grandeur of Nature.”
Then he walked back quietly up the path to his village.
#Storytime
The end