He was a messenger and a shape shifter. Environment absorbed him like a sponge or conversely he dissolved in it like granules of sugar.
He traveled through all life and knew what it felt like to be rocks, animals, trees, flowers, clouds and water.
It was difficult to pinpoint where he was. It was difficult to see him. He was everywhere and nowhere. This is why he was able to carry the message far and wide.
Surprise, surprise, one day, he appeared in all his natural glory. Maple branches bursting with leaves of bright yellow, orange and red colours stood for his hair. Sometimes his hair flowed down his shoulders. At other times it sprang boldly to the skies. But at the time he appeared in front of her, his hair of flaming maple leaves was a solemn wreath. And from it, birds' songs soared.
She was unimpressed. She didn't believe in messengers. She told him that she did not want to talk to him.
From her experience, she knew that messengers had the power to change the message by casting the shadow of their personal doubt over it. They were able to erase from the message the part which was intended to nurture the community. They could not discern that her word was coloured with the passion and unbridled optimism for the well-being of the environment. The colours were bright and this particular nuance represented a large portion of her message.
Knowing that the messengers usually could not see the light of her word, she decided to spread her message the best way she herself could.
But he did not take no for an answer. His eyes shone at her like silver flickers of the sleepy lamp posts in the dark rainy mornings. He asked her questions. He wanted to know why she did not want to talk to him. He just could not disappear into the ground now even if he wanted to. He knew that it was the wind who brought her to the lake, the wind who was his best friend. He wanted her to trust him just the way she trusted the wind.
“Aren't you here because the wind felt to you like an invitation to a dream world” he asked, “because it felt like a mellow touch on your cheeks on this chilly evening, and like a peaceful whisper of rustling leaves in your ears?”
Amused, she reminisced of the wind's strumming the lake into a composite melody of ripples, waves and splashes so that through the seashells inside her ears its water rang bells of a river. As she mused about the wind, the joy inside her heart buoyed on her breath, and she saw sparkles come out of her nostrils and mouth. Rambunctious whirls readily lifted the glitter in the air and then dropped it playfully on the waives' bubbly crests.
While she was looking at the lake, its water poured into her eyes. “My eyes are like two lakes," she pondered. One can be drained so that the king's gold can be mined. The other can be used for the mine waste dumping.”
“Didn't you give in to the wind? Didn't you let yourself be carried on the wind's currents?” he startled her again, and as she turned toward the source of this persistent questioning, the water splashed back into the lake bed.
She did not answer his questions. Yet it was vital to her that he asked them. His stance gave her a pause. And the birds' wings' flutter in the wreath on his head made the moment all the more stunning.
He was fixed in place, waiting.
As they stood in silence, she could feel the colour of his intention. It matched hers. Their shared devotion to the same cause filled the space between them and they remained locked in the meditative silence for some time.
She, finally, spoke the word.
He ran with it.
In no time, the community was in commotion and alarms were tearing the air.
...
The king's decision to build the gold mine by destruction of the lake and its ecosystem was held off temporarily. During that time the heavy mountain fog sank low and settled over the lake, and people in the community could cut terror with their butter knives and spread it on their morning toasts – it was so thick in the air.
The messenger was expectantly perplexed. His work had bought some time for the environment yet he knew that the king's word would ultimately decide its fate.
One early afternoon, he caught up to her. They walked in step, but he whistled around pretending he did not know her. She used the password “Taseko" to focus his attention and open the door to his memory. “Oh yes,” he said, “but I don't see anything in the king's character that would stop him from approving the mine.”
She could see why he would say this.
The king kept the sun locked in the golden chains under the carpet in his bedroom while people lived in perpetual darkness.
...
It was not long after their unsettling encounter that the big, plumpy, yelloworange sun rose in the sky.
All the people in the community came out and carried the big, plumpy, yelloworange sun in their arms.
The next day, it was announced that the king had died of gold dust overdose.
All the most beautiful birds of the world came to dip their wings in the puffy clouds on the lake's glistening surface. Rainbow trout made saltos wrapping themselves in the shiny threads of the sun rays before diving into the crystal blue waters.
Ninety thousand of them.
Water, Fish and the Sun brought Prosperity to the Community and everyone rejoiced in this rich economic base ever after.
