The Page is an apprentice, a novice who holds the purest curiosity for the world. The Page of Pentacles holds his pentacle not to show it off but to study it. He wants to know its weight, its texture, and what it's made of. He represents the desire to learn a new skill, a grounded beginning, and the original intention of finding value through practice.
Xiao-Shi is A-Tu's son. He grew up surrounded by the aroma of "Black Gold Rice" and the calloused hands of his father. He had heard countless people praise his father's "Black Gold Rice," but it meant nothing to him. He was more fascinated by the gleaming carpentry tools in his father's workshop, passed down by the old carpenter.
One day, Xiao-Shi secretly took a piece of his father's scrap wood and a carving knife, trying to carve a small bird like his father did. He ended up not only making a mess of the wood but also cutting his hand. Frustrated, he threw his "creation" into a corner, thinking it was the most boring thing in the world.
A-Tu saw everything but didn't scold his son. He simply walked over, picked up the "ruined" piece of wood, and said to Xiao-Shi, "You're not carving a bird; you're making friends with this piece of wood. You have to first learn to hear what it wants to say."
From that day on, A-Tu began teaching Xiao-Shi the most basic things. Not how to carve, but how to distinguish different kinds of wood, how to feel their grain and hardness, and how to plane a board with the least effort. At first, Xiao-Shi found it tedious, but gradually, when he could tell the firmness of oak from the softness of pine by touch alone, a wonderful sense of accomplishment sprouted in his heart.
He no longer rushed to create but focused on learning. Every day, he stayed in the workshop, sanding, planing, and joining. A thin layer of calluses began to form on his hands—not scars, but the marks left by his conversations with the wood. Like a devout apprentice, he held the pentacle named "Craft," studying every detail with curiosity and focus. He hadn't yet thought about creating any earth-shattering work with it; he was just enjoying the grounded happiness that learning itself brought.
【Echo from the Mirror】
What new skill are you approaching with the curiosity of the Page of Pentacles? Are you willing to set aside expectations for the "result" and simply learn and practice, enjoying the process of moving from clumsy to skilled? Where will your first step begin?