                                Star Wars 

                           Wizard's RPG Stories

          source : http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=starwars/newsarchive
          upload : 10.IV.2006


     A Mother's Memoirs, Concluded

     By Morrie Mullins


     Mother Dariana shares her final observations about her life,  what  she's
seen, and what she hopes for the future of the  galaxy.  What  makes  them  so
final? Find out in this Living Force supplement.

     Twice, Mother Dariana of the Hiironi has allowed researchers to  ask  her
questions to record her thoughts about and experiences in Cularin. She agreed,
last week, to what she refers to as "one final session." Those involved in the
process expressed concern; their concern elicited only the gentlest of  smiles
from the ancient Mother. From behind eyes shrouded by  wrinkles  that  decades
ago grew their own wrinkles, Dariana let the moment pass. There  could  be  no
doubt that their concern touched her, nor could there be any  doubt  that,  at
least for the moment, she intended to say nothing further on the topic.

     I had told them this would be the last of our talks. Even  before  I  saw
the machines with all their flashing  lights  and  their  scrolling,  blinking
numbers, I had told them. Because I remembered. I remembered the sense of  the
unfamiliar that came with those machines. Wondrous as I find them,  remarkable
as they are, that they will record for a thousand, thousand years  what  would
have been passed down  by  my  children  for  generations.  And  I  remembered
thinking, more than once, that such perfect recordings could  never  serve  to
teach. Not truly. Because what is learned, if the lessons come from so far  in
the past? When mothers teach daughters the lessons their own  mothers  taught,
the lessons change. The learner has become the master, but the master  is  not
the same person the learner once was. Much has been forgotten. More  has  been
learned than the lesson itself. The galaxy has changed around the learner, and
so when the lesson is taught once more - - decades later - -  the  meaning  of
the lesson cannot be the same.

     These words will ever be the same, though. What I say today, to this box.
..

     A gentle tapping noise, then the bumping of a  long  nail  being  dragged
across the face of the recorder.

     What I say to this box will sound the same in a thousand years as it does
today. And I wonder whether the things  of  which  I  speak  will  retain  any
meaning. Will my words bring insight, or confusion?

     If you ask my children, they may tell you that this  has  ever  been  the
question. Do my words bring insight, or do they bring confusion? But there are
words, and there are the words beneath them. And the words beneath,  they  are
what matter. I speak, and you hear, and later - - perhaps much later  -  -  my
meaning may come clear to you. Or, rather, the meaning you assign to my  words
becomes clear.

     And when I think that, I think perhaps my words may still bring something
to the galaxy. Assuming my words survive. Assuming the galaxy survives.

     This will be my last time to speak to  the  flashing,  beeping  box.  Not
because I am dying. Because I am comfortable with the box.  I  am  comfortable
with speaking to the thing that is not one of my children, can never be one of
my children. So I must step back. Step away. I must return to the teaching  of
those who wish to be taught, those who  it  is  right  for  me  to  teach.  My
children on Cularin must be my priority. The rest of the galaxy - - if  I  had
more years than the stars, I might never teach all of them  well  enough.  But
for my children of the jungle, I will always be present.

     I should talk about endings. Because this is the end of  my  use  of  the
recording box, and because many other things are ending. The galaxy  will  not
end - - the galaxy never does, it  has  neither  beginnings  nor  endings,  it
simply is - - but much that we know will end.

     And no, this is not an old Mother's way of speaking obliquely of her  own
death. Death has walked the jungle paths with me for years.  Sometimes  beside
me, sometimes behind me, sometimes close enough that I could  smell  its  cold
breath. You do not see so many turnings of the  suns  without  knowing  death,
without moving past your ability to fear it, to see it as anything other  than
a natural part of how things are.

     I will die. We will all die. Whether I  die  tomorrow  or  in  ten  years
matters not.

     My own mother's passing was slow. Death walked with her  for  years.  Not
beside her, not behind her. With her. It held her hand. When she lay  down  to
sleep, death lay beside her. I watched her - - living, still decaying - -  and
wished to help.

     She saw me watching her. Felt me wishing. Waited. Spoke to  me  in  tones
one would use with a daughter not yet fully grown, though I was as adult as  I
felt I needed to be.

     Still, when I looked at her, I felt the child she viewed me  as.  I  felt
lost. Afraid. I felt the loneliness that would come, when she had gone.

     One day, as I sat beside her pallet in the hut she kept at  the  northern
edge of the ch'hala grove, she looked at me and spoke.

     "Daughter?" she said.

     I don't remember my words. Mine were not the important ones being said.

     "Do you grieve?"

     I did. There was no hiding my grieving. Grief cuts sharper than stalks of
kuvu grass left too long in the light of the suns, and I know  my  grief  bled
from every pore. And why not grieve? She was my  mother.  I  expected  her  to
admonish me, to tell me that grieving was wrong. Death  is  the  will  of  the
Force, and all things come to it, and - - well, many of the things I've spoken
so far into the box.

     She did not say any of these things. "Thank you," she said. "Thank you."

     I asked her why she would thank me when we both knew the truth of  death.
Becoming one with the Force is a completing of who we are.

     "Because," she said, and I remember her voice being so tired, so  broken,
that it seemed to melt away from  her,  "it  is  the  grieving  that  lets  us
remember. It is what makes us  alive.  Different  from  the  trees.  From  the
kilassin. They are part of the Force. They are tied to the galaxy just  as  we
are. But when a tree falls in the forest, the other trees do  not  weep.  They
grow, they stretch their roots into the earth where the fallen tree once  drew
its nourishment, they eat hungrily at the sunlight and drink thirstily of  the
water. When a kilassin dies, other kilassin do not grieve."

     I later saw a grieving kilassin, but only once, and suspect  it  was  not
typical of its kind. But I had not, when my mother was speaking, and would not
have interrupted to correct her if I had.

     "The other kilassin are more likely to leave their dead to rot - - or, if
they are the great toothy ones, devour their dead themselves. But no grieving.

     "Our ability to grieve," and her voice hurt her, I  could  tell,  and  it
hurt me to hear her in pain, "is what ties us most strongly to the  Force.  It
is the wondrous web of life, daughter. We know it for what it is.  We  do  not
forget it. We see the life that is part of the Force, and remember that  which
has already gone to join the Force. Just as you  will  remember  me.  Just  as
others will remember you when you have gone."

     There are many lessons I could impart to this strange, blinking box.  But
the words would be no greater, nor any more true, for my having said them. The
lessons I would teach are ones that those who take the time to listen -  -  to
do more than just listen, indeed, who take the time to hear - - do not need to
be taught.

     Reminded, perhaps. But in the end, we are all one  with  the  Force.  All
knowledge is at our fingertips. We need only be reminded to reach... to grasp.
.. and to know.