The Woman from the Land of Marshmallow

In the land of Marshmallow, there lived a woman who had the heart of a girl of 16, though on the outside, her skin had grown the lines of having lived through sorrows and joys that were now innumerable.

In her heart of 16, she saw life as an enormous flower, blooming one soft petal after the next, and with each petal that opened, there came with it a sigh from her heart. For the flower did not bloom by its own volition but through the love that was borne in the heart of every individual in Marshmallow, and indeed in the heart of each person on the entire planet.

It took more than 3,000 births, one death, or at least one million "I love yous" to make one petal open.

One day, the flower of life that she knew was always there appeared to her, like a brilliant sun above her head. She stood, mouth agape, at the sight. She was hanging out laundry at the time of her luminous vision, and was so taken aback, that she closed her eyes immediately to the brilliance of it.

No amount of cajoling from her family and friends could make her open her eyes.

So she walked around in her life with a cane and a seeing eye dog. Other people had to describe for her what was on the menu at restaurants or what a particular sunset looked like over the land of Marshmallow.

It was just ridiculous, her family frequently said, though because they wanted to be sensitive, they said this to each other and not to her directly.

One morning, while taking a walk along the bank of a river she knew so well that she had left the guide dog behind, her feet slipped from under her, and she went plunging into the water. The woman, without thinking, instinctively opened her eyes. The brilliance now of the flower of life, which loomed over her like an immense and dazzling umbrella, was unbearable, and she clamped her eyes shut, telling herself that she would not open them, even if it meant drowning.

Just then, she hit a rock, and the blow of the impact was so great, that she opened her eyes again. There, amazingly, on the rock, was her younger sister. Her sister, dressed in flowing purple robes like a river nymph, reached out her arms and pulled her elder sister to safety.

Now this younger sister lived in the land of Whomewatchit. Her sister had moved there only one year after marrying, and the whole family had been in an uproar about it. How could she have moved to Whomewatchit, when she belonged in the land of Marshmallow? But the elder sister, whose heart was still all of 16, knew why her little sister was in Whomewatchit and not Marshmallow. Though she would never be able to formulate this reason into a concrete thought, it was an instinctive knowledge that sisters have of each other -- inexplicable but very real.

And so to find her sister on the rock was a great and startling surprise.

The two sisters hugged, the elder sister soaking the robes of the younger with river water, in a hug that would make even long-lost lovers jealous. In their embrace was medicine from the stars, deep knowledge that came from a place beyond the mind and any human knowledge, beyond matter itself. And because of this knowledge, the love expressed in their embrace was love that was not circumstantial, nor bound to geography or even the body, but was infinite.

In that single embrace, because of the purity of the woman's heart of 16, and her longing that had become in that moment an Understanding, one of the petals of the flower of life opened.

The woman knew, from that moment on, even after her sister would disappear again to the land of Whomewatchit, that she would keep her eyes open. And even though she felt a kind of nakedness before the beauty of her own life -- and the flower that loomed over her like a benevolent protection -- in that nakedness were all of the answers to all of the ancient riddles and all of the questions she had ever asked herself.

So the woman lived out her days, and her eyes grew a deeper color of blue with each opening petal that she had the privilege of witnessing. And people turned to her, because they saw a depth and strength that they could rest in. The woman with the heart of 16 became a medicine for her people.