I was about five years old at the time.
My dad and I used to play doctor like we were playing house.
My father was my patient.

“Oh, try it.”
Dad sat quietly with his mouth open.
I looked inside my father's mouth with my eyes and then placed the thermometer on his forehead.
It was a non-contact thermometer that flashed a red light when touched by a person's hand.
As my father lifted his clothes, he placed a stethoscope with a red heart in the center on his chest.

“Exhale.”
I placed the stethoscope against my father's chest and listened for the inaudible sound of his heartbeat.

Thump, thump, thump, thump, thump.

“Your heart is very strong.
Instead, your throat is a little swollen.”
The young doctor, whose pronunciation was not even clear, gave a prescription after examining the patient.
And he prescribed a medicine that contained small chocolate chunks.
After receiving the young doctor's prescription, the father did not forget to express his gratitude.

“Dr. Noh Hyo-ju will become a very excellent doctor.”
I smiled broadly, not even knowing what the words meant.
I didn't know then that smiles sometimes lie.
--- p.7-8

Anna Guide was waiting for me in front of the school gate.
He looked relieved when he saw the hourglass in my hand.
“I will introduce this place from now on.
This place is divided into adults and children.
You will be staying at the Pium School in this area.
There is a dormitory inside the school.
Adults stay at the Pium Center over the hill.
I've heard that there is an absolute being that moves the world of blooming, but I don't know the details.
I haven't even seen your face.
The system here is a cyclical structure where those who arrive first explain things to those who arrive later.”
Anna Guide's story didn't make sense to me, but I decided not to judge.

“We’ll introduce the school later, but for now, the hourglass in your hand is the one you’ll be using here.
This watch will show the time of the mind, not the physical time, at the speed of falling sand.”
“A heart clock?”
I shook the watch up and down.
The strange thing is that the sand particles did not fall down.

“Why doesn’t the sand fall?”
“This hourglass is designed so that sand only falls when the mind moves.
It's a clock that moves when the energy of the mind is filled.
By the time all these sand particles fall down, you'll be out of here and over that wall.
So this clock tells you what time you can leave here.”
--- p.22-23

In the dorms, there is no need to stay up late at night.
This was a world without tests or grades.
I liked that there was no anxious or stressful exam period.
There was no lining up of children here.
There was no adult who threatened me by saying, "The person next door is the top student in the whole school."
Of course, there are no academies or private tutoring.
I didn't feel tired because I didn't have to chase the mirage of being number one.
There is also a rule that you should not sit at your desk for more than two hours.
The spirit of blooming is that at least one should be able to learn about life.
Don't point fingers at them and call them inferior children.
Moreover, there were no sons or daughters of my mother's friends, and no entourage was visible.
Just go at your own pace, that's all.

--- p.77

The baby bird is struggling to break out of the egg.
The mother bird across from me did not help her baby bird hatch from its egg.
I reached out because I felt like I should help too.

“Don’t touch it!”
Teacher Anna shouted urgently.
“Why? It’s so sad that the baby bird is struggling so much.
“With just a little help, I can break out of the egg.”
“There’s a reason why baby birds flap their wings so much.
The flapping of a chick's wings builds muscles for life, enabling it to fly.
If someone helps the baby bird hatch, the baby bird will never be able to fly.
So the mother bird leaves it alone.
It's the baby bird's job to fly.
The mother bird knows that.”
I was amazed to learn that a baby bird's wingbeats build muscles for life.
The laws of the ecosystem that I was unaware of were operating on mysterious principles.

Here, I realized that the more I realized something new, the more the hourglass moved.

--- p.115-116

Mom stared at my face for a moment.

“Hyo-ju, when I see you, I realize how selfish I am.
You are my daughter.
You can hate me.
I just want you to make decisions that only think about you.
If you have any doubts, follow your heart.
If you ignore my honest feelings, I can't find the real you.
“Please embrace the feelings of confusion I have right now.”
“Is that really true?”
"of course.
Even a job that looks good to someone else is useless if you are unhappy.
There are many people in the world who graduate from good universities but live unhappy lives.
“There are people who are happy farming while getting dirt on their fingernails, and there are others who find fulfillment in risking their lives by going into a fire to save people.”
I asked my mom again.

“Are you happy now, Mom?”
“At least I don’t regret my choice.
If I regret anything, it's because I did something to you that I shouldn't have done.
Don't tell me you can't do it because of someone else.
I think you have to do it for me.
It's painful to make any decisions right now.
But as time goes by, I will meet the real you.”
--- p.139

"Eunchan, do you know what I feel here? Ultimately, it's my heart and thoughts that change the world in this universe.
This hourglass is showing you right now.
Your hourglass filling up means your heart is becoming stronger.
Don't worry, that heart and mind will make you different from before.”
“Sister, you don’t trust me right now, do you?”
“That’s right, if you don’t trust your own heart, your mother won’t be able to trust you either.
I think we are inside a magnetic field called space.
In the end, it is your power that changes you.
“This is the proof.”
I said, handing the hourglass I was holding to Eunchan.

“Just like my older sister said, I feel like I’ve matured a bit since coming here.
“When I go home, I won’t be afraid of my mother like I used to.”
I thought I knew exactly what Eunchan meant.

--- p.175