Saturday, September 6, 2008

Droubble: Survivor's Guilt

Survivor's Guilt

I finish my prayers, remove the phylacteries from my head and hands, and try my best to look on the bright side. I’m alive, but besides that, there’s not much.

Most of my long life, I was religious enough; I made my devotions and went to temple, but it never seemed terribly immediate. Things changed, of course, when He started talking to me. I was honored, and, at the time, quite willing. I was His chosen one.

Now it’s all shifted again. He doesn’t talk to me anymore.

Maybe he sensed my doubt. I never really thought he’d go through with the plan; I assumed it was a test, an empty threat, that he’d spare us at the last moment. Right up to the last, I assumed he’d take it back.

Or maybe he’s just done with me.

I lie as still as I can, trying to decide how much of the nausea is from the heaving seas, how much from the farmyard stench, how much from the memories playing in my head of drowning men and women scratching off fingernails trying to get onto the ark. I wonder, not for the first time, if I’m really the lucky one.

No comments: