When the world was young there were no colorful butterflies to brighten up the days of spring and summer. There were creeping-crawlers, who were the ancestors of the brightly painted winged ones, and although they were very beautiful they crawled close to the ground, and few saw their beauty. There lived a lbeutiful child called Spring Flower who was kind and gentle and loved by all who knew her. She was always smiling and pleasant, and had a gift in her cool hands to remove fever from someone who was sick. As she matured into womanhood she was given the gift of being able to heal most ailments that she found in people. She would dream dreams, and beautiful creatures with rainbows on their wings would visit her. They taught her that every color of the rainbow had a differnt healing gift. They told her the purpose of her life was to heal, and that after she transcended to spirit her healing gift would be left for all to share. They called the woman 'She Who Weaves Rainbows In The Air'. As She Who Weaves Rainbows In The Air grew and matured so did her gift of healing. People came from far and wide to seek her healing gift and she always did what she could. She always had time for all of the Earth's children, and in times of rest she would talk to the brightly colored creeping-crawlies, and marvel at their beauty. One day as she rested one of the creeping-crawlies came and rested on her shoulder. She spoke to it as she did to all the Earth's children, offering her assistance. The creeping-crawlie spoke to her softly in reply. "My brothers and sisters have always been with you when you have been doing your healing work,
lending you the energies from the colors on our bodies. Soon you will be enterng the spirit world. How can we continue to help then? We are so close to the ground that few notice us. If we could fly then people could see our bright colors in front of them. Can you help us to fly?"

She Who Weaves Rainbows In The Air promised to do what she could to help, as she always did. She related the conversation to her husband, and requested of him to dream a dream for her to help her to find a way to help. The next morning he awoke very excited to tell her of the dream he had dreamed, but when he touched She Who Weaves Rainbows In The Air to wake her, her skin was cold, and he knew that she had made the journey into the spirit realm in the night. Through the time of preparation for her burial her husband remembered well the dream that he had received, and it comforted him. When it was time to take She Who Weaves Rainbows In The Air to her body's final resting place, he looked on her bedding, and just as he dreamed there was one of the little creeping-crawlies waiting for him. He took the little creature with him and placed it on his wife's shoulder as he had been instructed so to do in his dream. "Thank you', whispered the little creeping-crawlie. "Now my body also will die, but my spirit will be one with the spirit of She Who Weaves Rainbows In The Air and together we will teach my kind how to fly."

After the burial the man stayed behind, looking at the grave and thinking of all the happy times he had shared with his wife. Suddenly a creatur with brightly painted wings flew out of the grave and landed on the man's shoulder. "Do not be sad," she whispered, "for now the visions of my youth have been made manifest. I will teach the rainbow-winged ones to bring happiness and healing to the people. When your time to cross has come I will be waiting for you."

Many years later when the man was old with snow on his head, he too passed into the realm of spirit. His children stayed at the graveside long after all others had departed. They noticed one the new rainbow-winged creatures flying around the grave, before long joined by a second rainbow-winged one, and they called these creatures butterflies. The two new creatures flew to the place of renewal, and from that day our world has been blessed with the colorful healing of the butterflies who brighten the air and our spirits with their rainbow wings.