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I had gone inside the room while she spoke, to get the tea ready. I returned to the balcony with a couple of cups on a tray, and a dish with cookies, chocolate, and another dish with Mexican pastry. I simply shook my head, referring to what she said. "How can you prove this? That's not possible, is it?"
"It is possible, but you have to help me, Peter. Let's do some role playing," said Ushi. "I will play your part, and you play the role of your wife, Sylvia."
Ushi took a couple of steps away from me, and turned around, facing me with a grin. "Here we go, Peter. Put your tray down and pay attention to the fact that whenever we touch on the truth in our relating to one-another, there is always zero distance between us. So here we go! You arrive at your home with Heather at your side. You get the key out of your pocket at your front door." Ushi reached into her pocket. "The door opens. Hello Sylvia! Let me introduce to you my newly found friend, Heather. Heather has gone through hell in her marriage that just broke up. She needs some help for a few days to establish herself here in Pittsburgh. I have invited her to stay with us until she gets back on her feet. It probably won't take long. A day or two might suffice, or a week, maybe more. We have a spare room that stands empty."
Ushi motioned me to respond to that. "OK Peter, play Sylvia's part. What would Sylvia answer to that? Play her role. Are you going to throw a tantrum? Are you going to raise the roof? Really, Peter, what could you say, playing her role? If you say this woman can't stay, because she is a woman, I will ask you why you want to throw half of humanity onto the scrap heap, like some subhuman species. Would I need to remind you that fifty-percent of mankind happens to be women? No, I wouldn't have to say that! Everyone knows that, right? What I am trying to illustrate to you, Peter, is that unless Sylvia is a bigot, she simply can't use that kind of argument to bar Heather from coming into your house. You, yourself, couldn't find a valid argument against this, right? Likewise, neither would she have, if this had been a real situation. I think she would have been honest with herself about the nature of our humanity. The option to bar Heather, wouldn't be open to her, right? And why should she bar Heather? Is there a distance to cross that would isolate Heather?"
I shook my head.
"So, let's see, what else could you say if you were Sylvia?" Ushi continued. "You might reject Heather on the grounds that she doesn't fit into 'our family.' If you were to bring up this argument, Peter, I would turn the argument around and ask you why 'our' family has to be so small that there isn't room enough for one more person, or for that matter many more persons. I would then ask you why it is, that we take from the whole world as freely as we do, to feed our family and meet our needs, or to enrich our home, and never give anything back in terms of enriching one-another as human beings, outside of this narrow sphere, and in a manner that enriches society at large. We take and take and take, and don't give a damn. Why are we so spontaneously willing to take, and not willing to give? Are we not all human beings? Why is this so hard to acknowledge on an individual basis? Obviously, being an honest person representing your wife, you wouldn't be able to use that kind of argument either, that your heart is too small, that Heather wouldn't fit. That option isn't open to you in your role playing now, and neither would it have been open to Sylvia in real life, right? The true response is that which reflects what is rooted in the heart and Soul of our humanity."
I nodded again. "What can I say? What can anyone say to that?" I defended myself. "What you propose would have been possible, is the same response that my friend Olive suggested is natural, when one is listening to great classical music, which she has said, is designed to have the same effect, to echo what is rooted in the human heart and Soul. She said that classical music brings us home. It helps us to discover the overflowing riches of our humanity."
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