Mary was really happy on her journeys through space, but she was even happier when she could live in some strange place for a while.
They were experiences that always gave her something to think about, and with help from the Fairy Pauline, she was able to understand and give a meaning to everything.
It was already late in the morning when she stopped to look at the water lilies floating gently in a pond.
All around her there were the sounds of the forest: twittering, the movement of branches made by the animals running around and so many different noises that filled the air with the sounds of nature.
Fairy Pauline was strangely silent; she watched the pond as if she was waiting for something.
Mary didn’t know why, but she was paying great attention too. She felt that something was about to happen.
Suddenly all the sounds stopped, the only sign of life was the gentle movements of the branches and the leaves on the trees.
The sun’s rays were reflected on the water of the pond and the water lilies.
There was a sense of expectation.
Of what?
Mary moved nearer to Fairy Pauline and sat down without asking questions, she felt that something was about to happen and was getting closer.
The silence was suddenly filled with the croaking of a toad that appeared on the edge of the pond: it was big, quite awesome and gave off an incredible force.
Mary had seen many toads, but never ever one so majestic as this one.
Fairy Pauline smiled with satisfaction: what she was waiting for had arrived. She got up very calmly and moved away.
Mary stayed where she was gazing spellbound at the magnificent toad.
Then something incredible happened: the toad was thinking!!!
Mary was convinced because she could clearly hear this thought: “What a pretty child there is today on the edge of the pond! I wonder where she came from?”
Mary replied with this thought ”I come from outer space”
“What is outer space?” was the toad’s reply
She couldn’t believe it! She could communicate with the toad and they understood each other perfectly.
She turned around to ask Fairy Pauline for an explanation, but she couldn’t see her.
“So please tell me outer space is.” Insisted the toad, not at all surprised that he could communicate with Mary.
He was used to always interact with the other animals just with his thoughts, and Mary for him was just a different kind of animal.
For Mary it was a completely new experience: she had never communicated just with her mind, she had to always speak and it wasn’t always easy when other people spoke in languages she didn’t know.
“Well then. Don’t you want to answer me?” insisted the toad.
It was hard for Mary to reply keeping her mouth shut. She tried hard and formulated a reply: “ Outer space is an immense place beyond the Earth, I travel it holding hands with Fairy Pauline who explains everything to me, and helps me understand things that I don’t know about.”
“Why do you need to understand?”
What a strange question. She had never thought that there was someone who didn’t feel the need to understand things.
“ It is strange that you ask me this, all human beings want to understand”
“ I am a living being too” thought the toad “ but I don’t feel the need to understand everything, I am happy to live every moment naturally.
“ Oh no!” Thought Mary ”You asked me about outer space, that means that you are curious too, you want to know and understand.”
Silence, no thought came from the toad.
“ What an ugly dimwit, he doesn’t know what to say now” thought Mary irritated.
“ Why do you call me an ugly dimwit?”
Mary felt awful, she had to control her thoughts, she felt helpless and there was nothing she could hide anymore.
Mary felt lost without Fairy Pauline: if only she was there she would have explained what was happening and maybe taught her how to stop the toad from reading her thoughts.
“ Why don’t you want me to read your thoughts, what are you worried about? That I might be offended? We animals of the forest, the air, the sea of all the Earth are never offended, and we understand that you are the beings most fragile and complicated on this planet.”
Mary didn’t know what to think, she was afraid to have a thought that might be wrong, so she forced herself not to think at all.
Just then Fairy Pauline returned, she looked at the toad and smiled thanking him for the lesson he had given Mary.
Mary didn’t pick-up the Fairy’s thought, only the toad’s reply: “ I really like this child, there aren’t many that are able to communicate with me even if I am the official communicator of all the toads. My brothers know that I have developed this ability so that I can interact with some human beings, the most perceptive and evolved.”
Mary looked at Fairy Pauline, and with a tiny voice asked: am I perceptive and evolved?
“Yes” replied Fairy Pauline, “ You have within you the right sensibility to understand nature.”
Mary knew that there was a lot to meditate about this, but at the moment she was tired and hungry. She promised herself that she would go back and think about it soon.
She said goodbye to the toad with affection, and was surprised when she heard his thought: “ You are remarkable Mary, carry on growing up like this and we will surely meet again”