"Is the hood broken, Madam?"
Wicca didn't even answer. She asked him to check the car over for her, and while he was working, the two women sat and drank hot chocolate in a cafe across the street.
"Watch what the mechanic does," Wicca said, looking across at the garage. He had the hood up and was standing, staring at the engine, not even moving.
"He's not touching anything. He's just looking. He's done this job for years, and he knows that the car speaks to him in a special language. It's not his reason that's working now, it's his intuition."
Suddenly, the mechanic went straight to one particular part of the engine and starting fiddling with it.
"He's found the fault," Wicca went on. "He didn't waste a moment, because between him and the car there is perfect communication. Every good mechanic I've ever known has been the same."
"So have the mechanics I've known," thought Brida, but she'd always assumed they behaved that way because they didn't know where to start. She'd never noticed that they always started in the right place.
"If they have the wisdom of the Sun in their lives, why don't they try to understand the fundamental questions of the Universe? Why do they prefer to fix cars or work in a bar serving coffee?"
"And what makes you think that we, with our path and our dedication, understand the Universe any better than other people?
"I have many students. They're all perfectly ordinary people, who cry at the movies and worry if their children come home late, even though they know that death is not the end. Witchcraft is merely one way of being close to the Supreme Wisdom, but anything you do can lead you there, as long as you work with love in your heart. We witches can converse with the Soul of the World, see the point of light above the left shoulder of our Soul Mate, and contemplate the infinite through the glow and silence of a candle, but we don't understand car engines. Mechanics need us as much as we need them. They find their bridge across to the invisible in a car engine, while we find ours in the Tradition of the Moon, but the bridge connects to the same invisible world.
"Play your part and don't worry about what others do. Believe that God also speaks to them, and that they are as engaged as you are in discovering the meaning of life."
"The car's fine," said the mechanic, when they went back to the garage, "apart from a hose that was about to burst. And that could have caused you serious problems."
Wicca haggled a little over the price, but she was very glad that she'd remembered the proverb.
They went to one of Dublin's main shopping streets, which also happened to be the location of the shop that Brida had once had to visualize as part of an exercise. Whenever the conversation turned to personal topics, Wicca would respond vaguely or evasively, but she spoke with great verve about trivial matters--prices, clothes, rude shop assistants. Everything she bought that afternoon revealed sophistication and good taste.
Brida knew that it wasn't the done thing to ask someone where she got her money, but so great was her curiosity that she came very close to violating that most elementary rule of politeness.
They ended up in a Japanese restaurant, with a dish of sashimi before them.
"May God bless our food," said Wicca. "We are all sailors on an unknown sea; may He make us brave enough to accept this mystery."
"But you're a Teacher of the Tradition of the Moon," said Brida. "You know the answers."
Wicca sat for a moment, absorbed, looking at the food. Then she said:
"I know how to travel between the present and the past. I know the world of the spirits, and I've communed with forces so amazing that no words in any language could describe them. I could perhaps say that I possess the silent knowledge of the journey that has brought the human race to where it is at this moment.
"But because I know all this, and because I am a Teacher, I also know that we will never ever know the ultimate reason for our existence. We might know the how, where, and when of being here, but the why will always be a question that remains unanswered. The main objective of the great Architect of the Universe is known to Him alone, and to no one else."
A silence fell.
"Right now, while we're here eating, ninety-nine percent of the people on this planet are, in their own way, struggling with that very question. Why are we here? Many think they've found the answer in religion or in materialism. Others despair and spend their lives and their money trying to grasp the meaning of it all. A few let the question go unanswered and live for the moment, regardless of the results or the consequences.
"Only the brave and those who understand the Traditions of the Sun and the Moon are aware that the only possible answer to the question is I DON'T KNOW.
"This might, at first, seem frig
htening, leaving us terribly vulnerable in our dealings with the world, with the things of the world, and with our own sense of our existence. Once we've got over that initial fear, however, we gradually become accustomed to the only possible solution: to follow our dreams. Having the courage to take the steps we always wanted to take is the only way of showing that we trust in God.
"As soon as we accept this, life takes on a sacred meaning, and we experience the same emotion the Virgin must have felt when, one afternoon in her otherwise very ordinary existence, a stranger appeared to her and made her an offer. 'Be it unto me according to thy word,' said the Virgin. Because she had understood that the greatest thing a human being can do is to accept the Mystery."
After another long silence, Wicca again took up her knife and fork and resumed her meal. Brida looked at her, proud to be by her side. She wasn't bothered now by the questions she would never ask, about how Wicca earned her money or if she was in love with someone or jealous of someone else. She thought about the greatness of soul of the true sages, sages who had spent their entire life searching for an answer that did not exist, but who were not tempted to invent an answer when they realized there was none. Instead, they carried on humbly inhabiting a Universe they would never understand. The only way they could truly participate was by following their own desires, their own dreams, because that is how man becomes an instrument of God.
"So what's the point of looking for an answer then?"
"We don't look for an answer, we accept, and then life becomes much more intense, much more brilliant, because we understand that each minute, each step that we take, has a meaning that goes far beyond us as individuals. We realize that somewhere in time and space this question does have an answer. We realize that there is a reason for us being here, and for us, that is enough.