It was a long time coming. I had been waiting for her all of my life and now she was here. On the threshold I had been longing for her. Had been yearning for her grace. But I did not know the time or the place.

Originally I searched for her all over the world. I traveled to find her only to return home in deep despair. For she was not to be found in any city. And my heart remained faithful to the desire to continue the search.

Others were looking as well, looking for the Pure Witness. They, like me, had paid good money along the way. Given it to well-intentioned authorities that never managed to manifest her.

I consulted books, digested them by the box load and ended up with intellectual indigestion. The seeker that I was foundered on the rocks of pseudo-reality. Was starved for soul food that never arrived.

And then it happened. Out of the blue. Out of the emptiness that seeking had created in me. She waltzed in the door wearing a blue gown and silver slippers. She said nothing to me. But I knew without doubt that it was her.

Before I opened the door, I had been lost in thought, as I had been for millennia. Trying to secure my stronghold in this world. Trying to become something better than I was.

So to my surprise and delight, she did her work in silence. I didn’t have to do a thing but recognize her as the final answer to my eternal question. Of course you know what the question was. She was only the witness to it.

Vicki Woodyard