hair in my mouth

We stepped outside, and the wind whipped our hair into a mad dance, but we didn't really notice. Our voices were locked in deep combat, all eyes straining inward, intense.

"Yes," I said, not for the first time, "but how do you know it's real? Obviously you think it is, but you can't prove it. It's all words and ideas, all stuff anybody could have just made up. How do you know somebody didn't just make it up? It's just made up, you can't prove it isn't."

She looked at me intently. "It isn't," she said.

"That's ridiculous," I said. "Prove it to me."


"Beautiful, still afternoon," she said abruptly.

"What?" I missed the beat.

"It's so still," she repeated. "I'm glad it isn't windy. I hate the wind."

"It's horrifically windy," I said, and looked at her askance. "What are you talking about?"

"I don't think it really is, though." She was serious. "Prove to me that the wind is blowing."

"Oh no, not a mind game," I groaned. "Can't we just have a conversation? Admit you're wrong and have it over."

"No, really," she said. "Prove it. I want to see if you can."

I sighed. "Alright, fine. It's so freakishly obvious. Just look at the tree branches whipping around, look at the grass bowing down in waves. Feel it on your face. Feel the wind? It's windy."

"I could just be imagining it, though," she said. "I have a vivid imagination, so do you. Maybe we both want it to be windy, we remember the feeling of wind, and we make it up in our heads that we feel it right this minute, when it's not really there at all."

"That's stupid."

"But not impossible."

"You can clearly see the branches moving around in the air, and you can feel your hair getting in your mouth. Clearly not imaginary. And anyway, I feel it and see it all, too - and I'm not bound to your imagination."

"I suppose not," she said. I had her at last. "But maybe the trees were going to move around anyway. I mean, who needs wind?"

Dull stare. "Oh, for Pete's sake," I said. "Trees don't move on their own."

"Why not? It's contrary to their nature or something? Isn't in their makeup? Can't happen? Never in a million years."

"You realize this conversation is going nowhere, I hope," I said.

"You asked a question, and this is the answer," she said. "How do I know the Spirit within me is real? How do I know it's true? I know what I am, and all my life I've observed what I'm able to do. I've seen what can happen, and I've seen what has happened, and the two don't match up. I know the wind is blowing, because it's whipping against my face and rushing into my lungs, and the trees are waving their arms for joy - and trees don't move on their own."