Juniper was alone in the woods. It had no idea how it got there, nor what it actually was. It had no way to see its reflection, and as it was so round it couldn’t see itself, so it set upon a hunt to find its kin.

It looked up at the surrounding trees and wondered if it was one of them, but looked to the ground and realised they were all sternly rooted in the earth and he certainly wasn’t.

It looked to the leaves free fallen on the ground, but they were thin and flat and Juniper was pretty sure it wasn’t that light.

It saw birds flying and considered it was a bird, but as it tried to sing is realised it had no beak.

The clouds came and he wondered if those were his kin. But they shapeshifted according to the breeze and he could not float up to join them.

A dandelion seed wafted past, round like he, but it was so light it could dance upon the wind, and he could not.

Day after week after month he sat watching the creatures of the forest, the plants and elementals, but none seemed to be his kin. He felt alone and helpless, and at the end of his tether reached down into the ground to try and hide his pained self. And suddenly something remarkable happened. Little tendrils shot out of Junipers nether regions into the ground, it was such a shock its skin split wide open with the jolt. And with that came the instant expectation of pain, only it didn’t hurt. It was a blissful relief! Juniper realised his skin had been on so tight it couldn’t think, but now with these tendrils reaching deep into the earth it suddenly knew what to do.

It started to reach up towards the light, towards the sunshine. At first nothing much happened, but after a few days it gained momentum and started to grow. Every day it grew tall and slender, joining the bushes and then the trees in the upper echelons of the forest. And it grew more adventurous and stretched out into great branches from which sprouted huge clumps of rich green leaves. And it felt to crate even more astonishment upon itself, and tiny flowers began to appear. And as the season changed and the flowers wilted fresh berries burst forth into the summer air.

As Juniper saw the berries for the first time he realised that is how he came into the world. He finally knew who he was. And Juniper looked around and realised he was surrounded by other trees just like him, only he hadn’t recognised them from the forest floor. And as the fresh new berries on his own branches fell to the earth, he wished he could tell them what they were, and that they were safe and surrounded by kin. But Juniper had no voice, and he realised that it was better they discover the adventure of self-discovery in their own time, as indeed they would.