Episode 2: The Owl Who Lost His Light

A Forest Without Color

In a quiet corner of the forest, where the wind hummed through the branches, lived Wylie the Owl. Once, his world had been filled with wonder—the rustling leaves, the golden glow of sunrise, the way the stars danced across the night sky.

But now, everything felt... gray.

Wylie perched in his tree, staring at the horizon. The stars didn’t twinkle anymore; they just hung there, indifferent. The laughter of the forest animals sounded distant, like echoes from a place he could no longer reach. Even his wings, once eager to fly, felt heavy as if weighed down by something unseen.

“I don’t belong here,” Wylie whispered into the empty night.

It wasn’t one thing that brought Wylie to this point. It was many little things—small disappointments, unanswered questions, the feeling of being misunderstood. They piled up inside him until they became an unbearable weight.

The Plan

One moonless night, as the forest lay in silence, Wylie made a decision. If he couldn’t feel joy anymore, if the world no longer held color or meaning, what was the point of staying?

He decided he would fly to the farthest edge of the forest, beyond the cliffs where the sky met the sea. There, he thought, he could quietly disappear, and the forest would go on without him.

Wylie waited until dawn, not because he wanted to see the sunrise, but because he wanted to leave without anyone noticing.

The Unexpected Companion

As Wylie prepared to take flight, a soft voice called from below.

“Where are you going, Wylie?”

He looked down to see an old turtle named Tova, her wise eyes peering up at him. Tova was known in the forest for her slow, steady nature and her ability to sense when someone was hurting.

“Nowhere important,” Wylie replied, hoping to end the conversation quickly.

Tova didn’t move. “Sometimes ‘nowhere important’ is where we go when we’ve lost ourselves.”

Wylie’s wings faltered. He perched again, unsure of what to say. Tova climbed up to a nearby rock, closer to Wylie’s level.

“Will you sit with me a while before you go?” she asked gently.

Reluctantly, Wylie agreed. He wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was the way Tova spoke, or maybe it was the exhaustion weighing down his wings.

The Conversation

They sat together as the sun rose. For a while, neither of them spoke.

Finally, Tova broke the silence. “It’s hard to carry something heavy on your own, isn’t it?”

Wylie looked at her, startled. “How did you know?”

“Because I’ve carried my own weight before,” Tova said, her voice calm. “I’ve seen the world grow dark and felt the earth shift beneath my feet. But you know what I learned?”

“What?” Wylie asked, his voice barely a whisper.

“That the weight doesn’t disappear overnight,” Tova said. “But it gets lighter when you let others help carry it.”

Wylie shook his head. “No one can help. They don’t understand. I’ve tried to explain, but the words... they don’t come out right. And even if they did, what difference would it make?”

Tova nodded slowly. “You’re right—it’s hard to explain. But even when words fail, sitting with someone can make the weight feel just a little less crushing.”

Wylie felt something shift inside him, a tiny crack in the wall he’d built around himself. He didn’t know what to say, so he simply sat there, letting Tova’s presence fill the silence.

The Light Returns

As the day went on, Tova stayed with Wylie, sharing stories of her own struggles. She didn’t try to fix him or tell him what to do. She just listened and reminded him, in her steady way, that he wasn’t alone.

By the time night fell, Wylie still felt heavy, but the darkness didn’t seem as suffocating. He didn’t have all the answers, but for the first time in a long while, he felt a glimmer of something—hope, maybe, or at least the possibility of it.

Instead of flying to the edge of the forest, Wylie returned to his tree. That night, he looked up at the stars. They still didn’t twinkle the way they used to, but they didn’t feel quite as far away either.

A New Beginning

In the days that followed, Wylie began to reach out—not just to Tova, but to others in the forest. He found that many of them had felt lost at some point, too. Slowly, he started to understand that his feelings didn’t make him broken; they made him human, or rather, owl.

Wylie’s journey wasn’t over. There were still days when the world felt gray and his wings felt heavy. But now, he knew he didn’t have to face those days alone.

The forest, he realized, wasn’t just a place; it was a community. And in that community, Wylie found not just a reason to stay, but a reason to keep going.

Lesson: You Are Not Alone

Wylie’s story reminds us that even in our darkest moments, there is always a way forward. It’s okay to feel lost, to struggle, to wonder if things will ever get better. What matters is reaching out, letting others in, and giving yourself the time and space to heal.

No matter how heavy the burden feels, you don’t have to carry it alone. Like Wylie, you are part of a greater forest—a community that values you, even when you can’t see your own worth.

End.