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It's getting on late into the evening, but there's still a fair amount of foot traffic in the Aboretum -- people come and go, tending the plants and looking after the tree. While it may not be traditional per se for guests to help out in the arboretum, this person apparently was.
She sits leaned against the trunk of one of the smaller trees; the trowel and hand spade she'd been using sit on her left, along with a small pile of pulled greenery. A padded lunch bag and a reusable water bottle (emblazoned with an image of Godzilla rampaging through Tokyo) sit on the other side of her. She's holding a book in her left hand, reaching into the bag with her right for slices of cheese and ham, dipping them into a small container of aoili inside of the bag.
The woman in question has long, dark hair gathered into a loose ponytail that falls over one shoulder, and wears a grey t-shirt printed with large black cross surrounded by rainbow rays, sturdy and worn jeans, and Birkenstocks. She's tall and slender, and as her left thumb turns a page in her book, a black metal engagement ring with amethysts and a matching wedding ring sparkle in the arboretum's light.
Mei drops by the Arboretum fairly often, especially any time that her work takes her around that part of town and she can spare the time. There's something about being in the presence of the tree that just speaks to her, helps steady her. That's why she's here now, striding in with her common getup of leather jacket, black jeans, and boots.
She pulls her sunglasses up, then pulls them off and hangs them from the collar of her shirt as she looks around. When she spots the unfamiliar woman leaning against a tree she does a bit of a double-take, then cracks a smile and starts a casual saunter toward the stranger.
"Hey there," she says, tone as casual as her stride as she lifts a hand and waves by way of two raised fingers getting cocked to one side. "I don't think I've seen you around before. Visitor, or just someone whose path I haven't crossed?"
She closes her book (Same-Sex Marriage in Pre-Modern Europe) and sets it aside, turning a smile up toward Mei. "Hey," she answers, reaching for the cloth napkin in her lunch bag and wiping her hands off so she can wave in response without having spicy mayo all over her fingers. "Visitor. I come through every so often," she admits, "when I come to try to visit my sister out in Lancaster." A wry little smile, there. "Naomi Milner. I'm grateful for the hospitality of the Children and the local Mysterium. It's nice to be able to take a breath."(edited)
"Ah hah!" Mei responds, delight broadening her smile as her tone grows in enthusiasm. "It's nice to have guests. I hope this has been a good visit for you so far? Is there anything I can help you with?" Then she realizes she hasn't introduced herself yet, which makes her pause and then laugh. "Sorry, I'm Mei Lee. I'm one of the Children of the Tree, just stopping in to see what's going on and say hello to the tree."
"Quite all right! I'm the guest, here." She rests her hands in her lap and tips her head toward her bag. "I've got plenty of cheese and ham if you're hungry." Ansatz's smile is gentle and contented. "Well, I wouldn't want to keep you from the Tree. It's a fascinating thing. I'd love to have permission to study it someday... well. And the time," she admits with a laugh. "It's good to meet you, Mei Lee."
A pause, and she circles back. "Oh, I don't know if there's anything I need help with. Company wouldn't go awry, but, like I said, don't let me keep you from anything more pressing."
Mei shrugs and responds, "the tree will still be here later, and probably long after you've left town. Neither of us will suffer for it if I wait to pay my respects until a bit later." She holds up a hand in polite refusal of the offer, though. "I'll pass on the ham, though. I'm not always the best Jew at keeping kosher, but I do avoid eating ham, at least. You're welcome to eat your meal, though. I'm not going to be offended if you eat in front of me, if you're hungry."
"Oh! Of course," agrees Ansatz. She pauses, tucks her book into the outside pocket of her lunch bag, then, after a moment's pause, reaches back into that bag to take out slices of cheese. "There is cheese also, but I can't guarantee I haven't gotten ham onto it." An awkward little shrug of her shoulders. "I went to a market out in Lancaster and got really good stuff. Homemade cheese and all. Little treat." A small smile. "How do you reconcile your Jewishness and magic, if you don't mind me asking? Not that they're essentially in conflict, but it does always fascinate me to discuss this sort of thing with other religious Mages."
"Ugh," Mei faux complains. "That sounds so good, but I'm going to pass, just in case of cross contamination," she says with an appreciative smile, hopefully enough sign that she's really not bothered by not being able to share. "Sounds like a nice treat for yourself, though." She gestures toward where Ansatz had been sitting. "I suppose I can join you for a bit and we can talk about that, if you'd like? I love that kind of discussion too, as long as everyone's respectful, and usually in this community they are."
The smile that Naomi offers back has Big Youth Pastor Energy, and she leans a little bit to pat the grass on the other side of the pile of tools and greenery she's made. "Well, I'm still starving, so I will definitely take you up on not being upset," she laughs a little, and then grabs another piece of cheese. "I'd love that, yes. That's why I asked." Her nose wrinkles up a little in amusement.
Mei moves to take a seat on the grass where Naomi pat it, and sits with one leg stretched out in front of her and the other knee pulled up. "The easy way to put it is to say that I honestly didn't really find there needed to be much reconciling between my Jewishness and magic. It mostly means that I'm obligated to do more than I was before, because I'm capable of more than I was before."
She considers that for a moment. "I'm glad it worked that way for you! It took me a little while to mentally reconcile the mythology of Atlantis with being a Christian, though probably some of that has to do with my specific upbringing which I was still trying to shed at the time," Ansatz admits. "I like the latter idea very much, though, and it's very much what I think, too. What I can do now is more, so I have greater obligations."
"I was raised less culturally Christian than a lot of people in the United States are," Mei starts explaining with an edge of curiosity, a hint that some kind of query is coming at the end of this. "My parents are both from Hong Kong, and neither of them was raised Christian, so my exposure was all more peripheral, with the trappings of Christmas and Easter being something that surrounded me in society as a whole, but without a whole lot of the details of Christianity itself being a part of my life." She gives an easy, kind of crooked smile. "Which is mostly to say that I'm not sure I could take a really accurate guess about what parts gave you trouble."
Ansatz munches on a piece of cheese, nodding along with Mei's explanations and the inherent question in that last statement. "I'm ex-Amish," she explains, the same way someone would say 'I'm a brunette.' There's no fuss or rancor in the way she says it: it's just a fact. "And my mother got pregnant with me on her rumspringa, so I grew up with a lot of weight on me, which got even heavier when I realized that I'm queer. For all the beauty in the community I grew up in, there's a lot of regressive politics as well, and a mindset that put me at odds with my faith. And I mean, like, it felt like combat every single day, you know?"
"Ah, I understand in some ways, even if the specifics are different," Mei answers with a sudden smile, the kind of delight that comes from an overlapping shared experience. "I'm also queer. A lesbian, as well as... well, I was a trans woman before I Awakened, and that retroactively changed everything so that I never had been. I wasn't really at odds with my faith, but I was at odds with family and tradition, and the expectations that were always on me. Not just with my family, but with the community I was a part of, too."
Continually snacking as Mei talks, Naomi eats a few more pieces of ham and then wipes her fingers off once more. "Oh!" she answers happily, her smile broadening and playing brightly across her face. She goes quiet for a while, there. "Hmm. Do you think you never were a trans woman, or do you think that you still have that experience regardless of your physical body being changed by your Awakening?" She pauses after a second and adds, "Goodness, that's possibly a very intrusive question, I apologize. Sometimes my thoughts get away with me." She pulls one knee up toward her chest and wraps her arms loosely around it. "Yes, I found that to be the most painful part -- being in conflict with my community. The answer for me, personally, was finding a community that I fit with, and shaping my soul such that I have an undeniable link to the Divine. When you can bring angels to your side, people tend not to doubt that God is okay by you." Her dark eyes glitter, there.
Mei's eyebrow rises just a little at the question, in fact, right up until Ansatz realizes that it might have been intrusive, and apologizes. At that point Mei laughs softly and shrugs it off. "It was, kind of? But I'm also kind of an open book, to the degree I'm allowed to be. In this case, I'm allowed to be as open as I want. So to answer your question: yes, I still think of myself as a trans woman. I just try not to bring it up in Sleeper company because I can't explain, and I don't want to hurt anyone by claiming something that is false as far as they can possibly know."
Her head tilts a little and she asks, "you're talking about a Legacy? Do you mind if I ask what one?"
"My apologies," she reiterates, resting her chin on that knee that she's hugging. "I wouldn't want to make you uncomfortable." Naomi nods a little bit. "I understand exactly what you mean, yes. I've met a few other people who have similar experiences. It can be difficult not being able to talk about who you are and who you were in a meaningful way, or feeling like a part of you that defined you might be gone or altered forever, even if you like the outcome."
A pause, and she nods once. "Yes, I am. The Choir of Hashmallim. Quite a few of us are insufferable, I'll admit. It's easy to let that sort of direct communion with the Divine go to your head."
"I have a thick skin." Mei laughs. "Well, I have a thick skin when it comes to things that might only upset me. When it comes to other people, it's a bit thinner. I was an empath before I Awakened. I'm still a lot more sensitive to other people's emotions than is really healthy." There's another laugh. "And if you want a demonstration of how open I am when I'm allowed to be? My business cards said "Psychic Private Investigator" on them, and I was listed that way in the Yellow Pages. Not any more, of course."
She leans back on her elbows. "I've never met another member of your Legacy, so nobody has given me an insufferable experience with your Legacy in the past. What do you do? What do you mean by a direct communication with the Divine?"
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