The Bumblebee Circle

The first 3 books to read this year. Santa knows me well...

Wow! 10 years ago my FB feed read: "What would happen if we all voiced what was on our hearts 100% of the time, getting to the heart of the matter with each person in our life on a daily basis?" - - - Curious, now that it's 2020 if we've come any closer to this manifestation?

We are the savior we've been waiting for. If you wish to see it, 'bee' it. That's how it works. More kindness? Sprinkle that stuff everywhere. More connection? Reach out and bee there for someone. You get the idea.

While this post may not have anything to do with bees, other than the fact that BEES = JOY! I'm sharing a post I wrote up on my personal page (and made public) because I think we could all use some Christmas cheer these days and it's too good not to share.

The 2020 beekeeping season was hard for my bees. I saw brood diseases in the summertime that one typically finds in the early spring. Jun-uary and Jul-cember brought more rain and cold than characteristic = unfavorable weather for honeybee flight & foraging. Several of my queens stopped laying. Had I not spotted the queen, I would have diagnosed my hives queenless as no eggs, no brood in any stage was to be found. Why had her majesty stopped laying? Poor forage. Not enough... pollen coming in. Bees need 13 different amino acids from a diverse pallet of flora for healthy brood development. There was simply not enough ‘good stuff’ coming into the hive. The queen stops laying in times of dearth and malnutrition. She may also slow laying (from her typical 1000-2000 eggs a day to much less). She instinctually knows what is necessary to thrive. These lockdown orders and lists of ‘cancellations’ of extra curricular activities, gatherings, celebrations, group events and meet-ups of all sorts feels like a dearth in my being. I suppose it does to many of us who thrive being ‘buzzy’, who are nourished from our connections to others, our networks, routines, the work that we do that requires connections, networks We are, after all, creatures of community just like honeybees. Alike the queen bee, my fertility wanes my creativity slows under the ‘limbo’ lockdowns bring, alike bees locked within their hive during inclement weather. The uncertainty of what is possible, when we are told what is not possible daily, puts a stop to dreaming (as dispirited as that sounds). As per the problem of cancelled fertility, her majesty’s creative spark of life within the hive the beekeeper (aka myself) was needed to intervene. Pollen and sugar syrup supplements and substitutes introduced. As per the problem of fertility of my own accord what can be done? Where to turn the focus of creativity when thriving to ‘bee-come’ seems challenged? When we are not getting what we need from outside of us When our role as community being is being told to cease functioning When our innate drive to ‘pollinate’, to create life and presence around us is challenged What can we do to remain fertile in our thoughts and actions? How might we nourish ourselves from the inside out = to be the royalty we truly are, co-creators in the human hive, divine sparks of creativity, integral community beings? My starting place is this: Bee-autiful things can happen when we bee-lieve.