Welcome to Gaia! ::

Sitting up, Mana exclaimed, “Nix comes from the word Nichts.” At the last word, she, for a moment, used a German sounding accent. “It means nothing or no. It can also mean a water spirit; Nix is all fiery though, so that can’t be what her name means! That would just be silly. And anyways, when you mix fire and water, you get steam, and it evaporates into nothing.” As she finished explaining, she smiled at Yotta, with an open mouthed grin that plainly showed her state of wonderment.

Mana was elated at Yotta’s reaction, she couldn’t help but giggle. At his question though, she was at a loss. She didn’t really know how she knew such things; they just seemed to come to her. She just picked up little things here and there and they formed connections in her head. It made sense to her, but she wasn’t sure if it would make sense to anyone else. “Um, well,” she began, speaking much more slowly then she had been, “I just, well, pick up things I guess? I notice stuff, and it well, the thoughts, they just pop into my head.”

Mana had lived here all her life and she was old, very old, not that she acted like it. If someone didn’t know better, they would likely compare her to a little kid. The thing was, though, all of her long years had been spent in the wilderness. She didn’t tend to think in exact years or month or days. She could work them out, like if someone asked to meet with her in a day or a specific number of hours, but, to her, that wasn’t the norm; she never really thought of herself in terms of a specific age, it just didn’t seem necessary. That didn’t mean, though, that she was without an answer. Looking about, she spotted, off in the distance, a very tall yew tree. Pointing at it, she stated, “I have lived here since that tree was a sapling.” Tilting her head to the side slightly, she then asked, “How about you? How long have you lived at the Dojo?"

“Wow, so you’re six? I wouldn’t have guessed a day past 5!” Mana replied with a wide smile. Then, leaning towards him, she asked, “How much of that do you remember? I think I remember everything, though, if I didn’t, I might not know that I don’t remember it if I couldn’t remember it…if I remembered not remembering it, would I be remembering it then?” Wrinkling her brow, she moved a finger about as if pointing at some imaginary wall in front of her, “Yeah…I think that’s right…., but yeah, how far back can you remember?”

“How far back can I remember?” Mana wondered aloud, as she leaned back and floated slightly higher. “I don’t really know…The farther I go, the more it blends together. It’s hard to tell what comes before, after, and in between.” Looking around, she noticed two trees growing into each other a short distance away. “It’s like that!” she exclaimed, pointing at them. “The older memories grow together; I can’t really separate them. I still remember them, but they are all one united in time, none come before or after the others.” Thinking about it some more, she added “Whichever is earliest though, would be here, but long ago. I was born not far from here!” Giggling, she added, “It is my grove after all!”

Popping up from her seated, levitating position, to a standing levitated position, Mana replied, “You don’t have to apologize for being here. It might be my grove, but it is everyone’s grove too! You can’t keep a forest to yourself! The forest is for everybody.” She couldn’t help but spread her arms out wide, to punctuate the end of her sentence.

“I have fun!” Mana replied with a grin. “As for family, everyone is my family! Though, do you mean parents? I don’t know if I have any parents, I probably did….I don’t think I just appeared out of thin air….but I don’t remember them?”