A Story of the Giant's Belly

Long ago, when the slow people weren't so slow and the fast people weren't so fast they new how to talk and listen to one another.

In that time, there was a fast person—of the human sort—who lived with her community on top of a small green hill. This fast person was particularly skilled at communicating with the slow people. It was a practice that required great patience, stillness, and very careful listening—one that everyone knew how to do, though few but her chose to actually do it.

Now, the hill upon which this fast person lived happened to actually be a slow person—a giant, in fact. The fast person and her people lived their joys and sorrows, grew their food, and passed their years upon this Giant's kind and welcoming belly.

Feeling especially grateful one day, the fast person sat down, took a long, slow breath, and said (slowly) to the giant:

“Thank you, Giant, for all that you give. You are ground that we stand on, the soil that sprouts our seeds. Without you, we would have no home, no place to grow food, no wind and no rain. You give to us all of these things and more, and ask nothing in return.”

The Giant listened and heard. After a long pause, the Giant answered:

“Thank you for your kind words, my speedy friend. We slow people enjoy giving all of those things to you. We delight in the fast people—your millions of forms and faces, living and dreaming upon us. Through you, we fly, leap, dance, sing, hop, crawl, hoot & holler, run and swim.”

The fast person and the giant both smiled. And so began a long and wonderful friendship.

Yes, they were different from one another, very different. The Giant was slow, as slow as a living being can be. The fast person was fast, not quite as fast as others, but fast enough to make the Giant dizzy sometimes. The Giant slow person loved to sleep, just as much as she loved to be awake. The fast person needed to sleep, but didn't necessarily love it. A slow person's day was a whole year for the fast people.

What can we say about this beautiful friendship between such different people, other than this: that the two comrades loved one another because of these differences.

To show her friendship, the fast person loved to tuck their giant friend in to bed when the time came each year for the slow people to rest. And so it happened on the evening of each fall equinox that the fast person would gently tuck into bed their most favorite giant slow person, wishing the sweetest of dreams upon him. The fast person would pull the cover of leaves up around the giant and they would talk until the night came and the dreaming would creep up into the slow giant's eyes. And the fast person would sing:

Lay, lay thee down, lay thee down now to sleep

Hold, hold these seeds in the darkness beneath

Come, come the sun with the light it will bring

Grow, grow the fruit with the blossoms of spring

One year, after the fast person had seen a lot of life and had begun to weather and grow wrinkled around the edges, the slow giant's time to rest came once again. The fast person pulled the leaves up around his slow giant's shoulders and said as she always had, “You are my very best most favorite friend. I will love you forever. Sleep now and have beautiful dreams of green buds breaking from treetops and bees humming around flowers.” And then oh so carefully, she added “I may not be here when you wake.” And so she sung:

Lay, lay thee down, lay thee down now to sleep

Hold, hold these seeds in the darkness beneath

Come, come the sun with the light it will bring

Grow, grow the fruit with the blossoms of spring

You see, slow people live much longer than fast people. In fact, slow people don't die like the fast people at all, they just change into other forms. And so the slow people watch the generations of faster folk come and go like seasons.

And so the slow person knew this would come. She knew that her best most favorite special friend would one day die. And she had, in her heart, come to terms with this. In fact, she thought it was a beautiful and courageous thing for people to die. And in her joy and gratitude, her large eyes watered, and her teardrops trickled down to become a small pool of water beside her round belly.

The fast person spoke: “Let us make a promise to one another. One that will carry the beauty of our relationship through the rest of your life. In that way, you will always know that I still love you, and my children and their children will never forget to give thanks for all that you give.”

The Giant replied: “I'd like that more than anything. Perhaps your people will do as you have done all of these days, and tuck me into bed with a kind song? In return, I will continue to offer my big belly each summer for your crops. I will send the rainclouds to your gardens and continue bringing warmth to the soil . I will be the solid ground on which your generations will be born and live their lives.”

And so it was, that after the slow giant's best most favorite friend died, the descendants of that fast person continued to tuck in the Giant and the Giant continued to offer it's big belly to them.

Lay, lay thee down, lay thee down now to sleep

Hold, hold these seeds in the darkness beneath

Come, come the sun with the light it will bring

Grow, grow the fruit with the blossoms of spring

Now, a thing happened which is hard to explain. You see, the fast people were fast. But as time went by, they became faster. They watched as each sun of the slow people's day sunk into autumn and then winter, and they felt a longing for the seasons to change more slowly, for life to offer them more time. To make the summer longer, they did things faster and filled their days with much more activity. They traveled more quickly from place to place and soon were heard saying such things as “There just isn't enough time in the day” “Life is too short” “Everything to do! Nothing to get done!” And as time drew on and generations came and went, they became busier and busier with the things that pleased them most. And they were always full of wonder and intrigue, so much so that it became true that they just could not fit everything into one day, or even an entire lifetime of days.

At a certain time, some fast people began to say something radically new: “we need to follow the sun! That is what will give us the time we need to do all the things we dream of doing before we die! Let us chase the sun and create an endless summer!” And pretty soon, some fast people began chasing the sun all around the earth. Time was moving faster and faster.

In very little time, even the descendants of that special fast person were finding it hard to find the time to fulfill their ancestor's promise to the Giant. They were heard saying such things as “I just can't fit it in, can someone else tuck the Giant in this year for me?” Or: “I almost forgot, tonight's the night we have to tuck in grandparent's slow giant friend.” And even: “Maybe we need to try a different chore chart.”

Indeed, what once was a great honor of love and friendship had become a chore. Eventually, the descendants chose to do other things instead of tucking in the slow person. “That slow person can go to sleep just fine on their own,” they said, “they've done it for a million years without us.”

In search of the freedom of the endless day, the descendants forgot altogether about tucking in the slow person. And eventually, as generations came and went (faster and faster), all but a few of the fast people forgot that the Giant—and the slow people in general— ever existed in the first place. They began calling them by new names such as “mountain,” “hill,” and “rock.” Their children grew up thinking that these people were “inanimate,” just dead objects in the world.

The fast people continued chasing the sun relentlessly around the world. They built machines to help them go faster and faster. They built roads from the bodies of the slow people that they had forgotten. These roads got wider and wider and became highways that paved over the world and many of the fast people who were not fast enough. And the highways were built quickly as more and more highways were needed for the multitudes of fast people chasing after the sun.

Was it satisfying? Did they ever reach their goal?

Not really. In finding one kind of freedom, they lost another. As generations were born into the race against the setting sun, finding ever more ways to sustain the increasing pace, more and more fast people felt empty, restless, dizzy. It was like vertigo. Something needed to be different.

But nobody was quite sure what it was...

What? What's that you say? You say we've been forgetting something?