For my cousin, Mitch

In a dense forest, a lone stag wandered through the trees. He had seen many things in his life, but found this place particularly beautiful. The light breeze cooled his body, leaves of orange, red, and yellow starting to fall from the trees. Autumn was slowly starting to come.

While passing by a pistache tree that didn't seem to fit into the forest, he looked up and saw a nest that had been uncovered by the falling leaves. He could see a hawk sitting in it, and tilting his head curiously, he called to the bird, "Hello up there!"

The hawk looked down at him for a moment but didn't reply. The stag noticed that the bird had overgrown the nest - he was a mature hawk but had lived in the nest's safety for a long period of time. "You seem too big for that nest, my friend!", the stag called.

Angry, the hawk replied, "I won't leave this nest. My parents built it and I must protect it!".

The deer shook his head, "That's a shame.", he replied.

The hawk was unsure what the deer meant by that, he felt insulted, "Wouldn't you protect a place your parents worked hard to make?", he questioned the deer.

The stag smiled, "Your parents built that nest for you to grow, you're missing out on a beautiful world outside of this forest."

Turning his head, the hawk let out a sigh, "I guess I'm afraid of letting them down."

The stag shook his head once again, "You'd be letting them down by sitting in that nest for the rest of your life. Come on, fly, see the world." The hawk looked over the edge of the nest nervously, but the stag continued, "Don't worry about falling, I'm here to catch you if you do. And then you just try flying again until you have it right."

Taking a deep breath, the hawk stood and outstretched his wings. He took his first step out of the nest, and gracefully fell from the branch, gliding and flapping the wings for the first time. The stag was right, the world was very beautiful, and there was so much more to see outside of his pistache tree.

The hawk landed on the stag's antlers. "Thank you for the encouragement. But where will I go?", he questioned.

The stag smiled once again, "Wherever your heart tells you to go. You have a new life to live now, so enjoy it to the fullest."

Stretching his wings out once again, the hawk flew from the stag's antlers and vanished over the forest canopy. The hawk and stag would meet again one day, but until then they each lived their own life, setting their own goals and dreaming of their own perfect world.

And much like the stag's words, we all sometimes have to muster the courage to leave our own nests and try new things. We may never know what there is to discover, but with new adventures and horizons, we grow stronger, wiser, and more confident.

End