Dear diary,
Now as Abram leaves the abode of Sarah in Mamre, thoughts of gratitude fill his mind. He ponders how fortunate he is to have found such a top-rate paralegal as Hagar, and for the zillionth time he thanks his lucky stars for his travelmate Sarah. “Why do these damsels, who are both so wise and attractive, put up with such a dowdy old fool as myself!?”
There is a pleasant echo, seemingly caused by the nearby cliffside, which lures Abram to speak his meditations aloud. And just as he is giving voice to the above thought, lo: Jehovah the God appears up ahead, in the grotto, as tho he has been waiting here for Abram. And there is a fountain of water beside him. And Jehovah shouts:
“Abram!”
And Abram stiffens and sez: “Here am I.”
Now, stepping forward to meet him, Jehovah sez: “Mr. Abram, you sensible tactician! Long time no see! How’ve you been doing? How’s the law firm? Where are you coming from? And which direction are you heading? Mind if I join you?”
And Abram answers, “Be my guest; it’s rather forlorn traveling solo.”
Jehovah stops short: “But what happened to your helpmate? Everyone knows you’ve got the best traveling companion in the whole wide world, and here I find you walking all by your lonesome! Where’s Sarah?”
“Actually, that’s why I’m out here, aimlessly afoot. I went to visit her this afternoon, because one of my secretaries now spends most of her time at Sarah’s place, and I needed some documents that the woman has been working on, for a case that’s coming up against an Egyptian fraudster—”
“That’s a shame; I like Egypt.”
“So do I,” sez Abram, “but this guy Saul, or Saulus of Tarsus — he’s apparently an apostle — who goes by the name of Paul (that’s why we refer to our work files as the Pauline fraud case), has taken root there, because Egypt’s climate facilitates communication with those who are yet-to-be-born — upcoming souls, you know? — and that’s the target of Paul’s con. So he set up a shell corporation in Egypt. Apparently that type of extra-dimensional interaction is harder to accomplish in humid areas like Minnesota.”
“Minnesota, I like that place, too.”
“Yeah, so anyway I’ve been worried about this case, because the clerk that I assigned to do my research ended up falling in love with Sarah, and the two of them now spend most of their time chanting poetry and caressing themselves. They’re expecting a child in March. So I got worried that the research on the Egyptian case was going to fall behind and need to be postponed, but it turns out that Hagar (that’s the clerk’s name) is truly on top of it — I mean, to the point where she’s basically wrapped up the case already. She even spell-checked my closing arguments.”
“Wait. Why would you need to spell-check a composition that you’re planning on delivering orally? Nobody will ever see the text of what you’re saying.”
“Hmm,” sez Abram; “good point. Henceforward, I’ll stop assigning that as a task to my secretaries. Thanks for the tip!”
“Don’t mention it,” sez Jehovah.
“So, anyway, that’s why I’m taking the scenic route home. I’m a little depressed; I feel helpless because I can’t help others — my only talent is to make profitable business decisions, and litigate mishaps after they’ve occurred. These things are useful, I know; but there’s nothing essentially creative about my existence. All that I do is reactive. I wish I had more whim in my life, more fancy. I wish that I were more in touch with the absurdity that I’m convinced underlies infinity. So it’s hard to avoid concluding that my career is worthless, or even harmful, when I consider myself in light of the simple happiness enjoyed by Hagar and Sarah. They asked me to stay, but I just had to get away. And the presence of all this wilderness—” here, Abram extends his arms, indicating the present ornamentation— “is sorta helping me to mull over my quandary.”
Now Jehovah sez to Abram:
“Here’s my advice. Return to Sarah, and submit yourself to her and her playmate Hagar. For I have promised them that their seed shall multiply exceedingly, and it shall be impossible to count the number of offspring that shall accrue unto the Sarah-Hagar line. If you think there’s a lot of people living on the earth right now, just you wait: for I plan on taking all those people up in chariots eventually — not all at once, like I did during the recent flood; but gradually, over time — and some fine day, the whole globe will belong to Ishmael. (That’s the name that the parents have chosen to give to their seed. It was my own suggestion originally, but they both really liked it. I took it from this novel that I read: Moby-Dick, by Herman Melville. That’s what Melville has his narrator tell us to call him. I wanted to show this fellow genius homage by naming my world’s Miracle Child after his own creation. God, I love Melville.) Yes, it is my secret intention to re-populate, yet again, the entire planet with the descendants of this new offspring. My hypothesis is that Hagar and Sarah, being the perfect couple, will therefore procreate the perfect people. So, for you, Mr. Abram, my suggestion is to subject yourself to their service: make yourself their most trustworthy friend.”
There follows a moment of pregnant silence.
“Ishmael, huh?” murmurs Abram.
“Yes!” Jehovah’s eyes widen, “And he will be a wild man: a real dadaist! Like that other book that I love, Spring and All by William Carlos Williams, where he sez, in part XVIII:
The pure products of America
go crazy—
“that’s my Ishmael! But just as York became New York, and England became New England, this pure wild crazy dada ‘product’ made in America will constitute a New America. Yes, EVERYone’s hand will be against my boy. He’ll be more X than Paul’s own Christ.”
— FUN FACT —
The name of the well where Abram and Jehovah had stopped to chat about this, in the wilderness, was christened “Beer Well” by Abram; for he noted that Jehovah kept dipping his glass into it, to refill it, while he prophesied the above, and the substance that it contained was amber in hue: a type of fermented malt flavored with hops. And, to this day, anyone can visit this well; just look over yonder: it stands between the dimensions commonly known as Kadesh & Bered.
— END OF FUN FACT —
Now it comes to pass, on the very first Saturday in March, that Sarah goes into labor and gives birth to her child by Hagar: and it is a boy. He just slides right out; there was no pain whatsoever, not even the slightest bit of discomfort. And Abram writes the name “Ishmael” on the lad’s birth certificate.
(For the record, Abram was eighty-six years old when Sarah bore her son to Hagar. And Sarah & Hagar were both in their early twenties.)
No comments:
Post a Comment