I took it to be a case of what Jung calls synchronicity, where an outer event coincides with what is going on inside. I assumed it had something to do with my psychology and I spent the next few years exploring what that might be.

I went to see elephants in the zoo; I read books about them; I collected them. Friends and relatives overwhelmed me with elephants of all sizes and materials and numerous objects in-corporating their shape. I painted pictures of elephants and my dreams were full of them.

Now I have a pretty good idea of what elephants have to do with me and why I found that first one. I was thirty-eight years old at the time. I had burned my bridges and I was on my knees. I had gone to Switzerland to begin training at the C.G. Jung Institute of Zurich. A lot has happened to me since, but much of it has to do, metaphorically, with elephants.