The whisper was soft — young, innocent, and unsettling.
I was sitting cross-legged on the hardwood floor, meditating. My wife had left for work, and the kids were still asleep. There shouldn’t have been anyone whispering to me.
Focus, I told myself. Breathe.
“Focusing makes it harder, doesn’t it?” the voice said again.
I opened my eyes. Nothing. A pale sliver of twilight leaked through the curtains. The room was empty.
This wasn’t one of my wandering thoughts. I’ve heard my own inner critic before — the one that says I’m not good enough, that every success is just luck. I even gave it a name: Yin, the dark half of my own Tai Chi.
But this wasn’t Yin.
“Nice room,” the voice said again.
I froze. My heart raced.
“Who are you?” I asked silently.
Yin’s familiar tone sneered in the background. Who are you talking to now? Great, we’re losing it.
“I am a cell, a stem cell,” the soft voice replied. “That’s what my nerve cell friend told me.”
I blinked. A cell? Talking to me?
Two options came to mind:
I was going insane.
I was talking to something alive inside me.
Neither felt safe — but curiosity won.
“How do you know who I am?”
“I don’t,” the voice said. “But I’ve heard of someone called Kun. The name appears in the cells’ Bible. Are you God?”
“Hardly. My name is Kun… but I’m no god.”
“Then maybe you’re a saint,” it said, as if that made perfect sense.
I exhaled, still unsure whether to laugh or cry.
“Tell me more about this cells’ Bible.”
“It’s not a book,” the cell explained. “It’s a memory — carried mostly by nerve cells, passed down through generations. They tell the story of how our world began.”
I closed my eyes again, listening.
“In the beginning, there was a garden — not of soil, but of water and darkness. Millions of cells swam happily in that world until the snake appeared.”
My pulse quickened.
“The snake promised a great apple waiting at the end of its tail. Only the brave would taste it and understand the meaning of life. Many cells refused, afraid of being eaten. But one brave cell — Adam — swam into the snake’s body and found the apple, Eve. When Adam bit into it, the apple consumed him, left the snake, and the Big Bang began.”
The cell’s voice trembled with awe.
“The apple split again and again. New generations formed — blood cells, bone cells, muscle cells, nerve cells, stem cells. Billions of us were born, and our universe began. Until one day — after about ten human months — God grew angry. We were no longer pure. He expelled us from the garden.”
I sat in silence. My skin tingled. The serpent. The apple. The garden. It was Genesis — retold from inside my own body.
“What’s your name?” I asked finally.
--To be continued--
08/04/2024 St. Louis
This Substack is reader-supported. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
