What Happened

What Happened!

I exist as the planet exists. I am part of this living world. I was created as the planet formed; molten. I watched with interest: as the planet cooled, seas formed, and the land was barren. I continued to watch as the plankton to large fish eat each other, reproduced, and multiplied. I rose out of the sea to become land. I watched it become covered with creatures large and small from one celled life to insects, amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals. It was interesting to sense what everything was doing.

Despite my small bit of Giai existence, I was happy. I found it interesting when bipedal sentient creatures came to my place of existence. They knew me and worshiped me. I was important to them. I liked it as they worshiped, fought, feasted, played, and mated.

Then pale skinned men came. They could not sense or know me. They built homes and farmed. There was tension between my people and the others. My people prayed to me that the others would go back from whence they came. Out of the ground I encouraged an illness against the pale faced ones, but my people took sick too. I made a mistake. My people left me.

I was left to observe again. A small group of pale men, women, and children tramped over me. A number of dark-skinned people followed. These other men built themselves small wood homes, and a large lovely house for the pale men and their family. The dark-skinned people worked the fields while the pale ones watched. One day two of the men from the big house got together and fought. One screamed about loyalty to the king and the other about freedom. I observed with relish as one knocked the other down. He then stoked off to join the king’s army.

A hundred years or so later an army camped over me. They were attacked by their northern brothers. One man was so afraid he wanted to run away. I fed his fear. He froze and was killed. This was fun. The slaughter was grand. The dark-skinned people ran away.

A town was built near me. They cut down the trees. Many homes were built from those logs. One home was built right over me. They built a big building out of brick and called it a cotton mill and the houses, mill houses. All I could feel was a few bugs, mice and other such things crawling back under the house. I was depressed. I was bored. Where was the diversity of forest, and animals, and people killing each other. Out of desperation I seeped into the house and haunted the corners. I was a gloomy, mostly benign entity.

I did nothing but observe. Several families came and went. The first was not happy with mill life. They wanted to be in the fields and hunt. I whispered in their ears, “go back.” They did. The next family was deeply religious and read the bible every night before bed and did long prayers at every meal. The youngest adult was a bright young man. He was touted as doing so well at the mill; he was promoted as manager over something. The family was proud. I was disgusted with them pounding on a book and praising a dead man that ruled over their souls.

Some of his young friends took him out to celebrate. His father, a pious churl of a man, warned him to be an up standing Christian man. It was late in the night when the father was encouraged by his wife to look for him. The churl could hardly get out of the house fast enough to go look up a loose woman. He did go and look for his son, after he took his time with the woman. It was rumored that he got beat up for insulting honest men having a beer and playing darts. The father could hardly drag himself home. On the porch he found his son had passed out.

Earlier the young man’s mother had greeted him at the door screaming at him for drinking. Being bored I had fun with the young man. Someone had given him a jar of white lighting. He had carried it home with him. After his mother’s tirade he sat on the porch steps. I was fairly certain; I could get him to drink it. So, I started to whisper in his ear. “You should drink your gift. You are already in trouble. What difference would it make if you have more.” This last bit swayed him. He took the lid off and drank it in gulps. He soon fell on the porch floor. The next morning, he screamed “I can’t see.” By nightfall everything they owned was on the street. The mill did not take a blind drunk and a dad to beat up to work that day.

A number of families later, one moved in with a pregnant woman, several older children, grown daughter and father. They all worked in the mill except the grown daughter and mother. They kept house.

The woman had a baby. It cried all the time. A week went by and everyone in the house was cross. They could not sleep. I was thrilled. Finally, the daughter went to get a doctor. I whispered things to the baby. It keeps crying. The mother started dinner stirring and chopping. She could not stand the crying and went to the baby and screamed. “Stop, stop!” With my encouragement she raised the knife in her hand and yelled. “Stop!” It did as its life blood ran out of it. In a silent house the woman looked fixedly in horror at what she had done. She got hysterical, yanked out the knife and tossed the baby across the room as she fell to the floor on the up turned knife. I think I had managed to turn the knife on her. I thought it would be wonderful for her haunt to come keep me company. Instead, I learned about misery.