art of storytelling...4

A light had a string attached to it that would turn on and off with a simple, but sure, tug. The bulb was strong enough to light the otherwise dark room it stayed in and provided security to the person whose hand pulled on its illuminating string.

The man of the house left the dinner table, and his family, and made the light glow. With the door closed behind him, he reached as far as he could in the security of the light (and the closed door) and let his fingers run slowly, but trained, along a dusty pane until they touched what they were searching for. He heard his daughter talking excitedly about the Poesias de la Madre Oca (Mother Goose) story she’d finished earlier. She was just learning to read.

A velvet-covered box, outlined in metal the color of gold, was in the man’s grasp. The anticipation swelled quickly as it always did when he practiced this ritual. Gazing excitedly at the top of the box, he opened it as his eyes adjusted to the secret that was inside. His secret that…was…not…there.

Human nature immediately pulsed through his thickening veins and the light became more and more blinding while he looked around. He didn’t realize that he was turning to check the door every 4 seconds between frantic eyefuls of anything but what he was looking for.

There was nothing there. Nothing he wanted anyway, but his fear now turned from loss to gain, his family’s gain in knowledge of what his box held.

The other side of the door would hold a paranoia that, no matter the mask he put on, would close in like high tide on barnacles. Slow, but inevitable.

He did not know who had the treasure inside of what he had assumed was his unmolested box. Well, one man’s treasure is another man’s trash as one man’s villain is another’s hero. His heroic treasure would soon, if not already, be found out.

He pulled the string for the darkness he wished still surrounded his secret and opened the door. No one. Maybe he expected all of them to be standing there or maybe just his wife. Dear God, what if it was his kids? Whoever it was now knew the man that sat at the head of the kitchen table each night for dinner to be a liar; the life they lived a figment in the world of imagination.

In the kitchen, his son rose from the table and walked away without a word and his wife looked longingly at him, wishing the young man that used to be her baby boy would sit just a few moments more. Her daughter happily scraped the peas on her plate, proud of herself for cleaning the plate of food.

There was no easy way to say what the man needed to say; it’s never easy being the one to shine the light on your own darkness, but he had bought the bulb so he supposed he really had no choice.

Before he opened his mouth, his daughter left the table, ran over to him and hugged his leg, since that was as high as she could get, and told him she had a present for him and mommy and brother. She looked lovingly at her father; neck tilted as far back as it could go while he looked at his wife who shrugged her shoulders looking back at him.

Their son, a 14-year-old recluse whose lock on his door was his best friend rolled his eyes. Protesting was pointless. She was the baby and they all had to indulge her stupid child-like whims.

Leading her mom and dad by the hand, she pulled them towards her room and in the clueless anticipation of the moment, dad had forgotten about the mystery he still had to search for.

Inside of her room, with her own handprints of paint on the walls and a new bookshelf to hold her growing library, they stopped in the middle. The girl’s brother stuffed his impatient hands inside his pockets waiting for a good time to rejoin his friend.

She announced that she wanted to read to them.

Dad watched her skip to a drawer and open it carefully, as if whatever was inside would be lost forever with only the slightest touch of carelessness. She reached inside, her eyes wide with glee and when she turned around with her tiny fingers clutching the book as carefully as tight could be, her father’s eyes widened…but with fear. Mom was puzzled and her brother’s indifference was to be expected.

Naïve to jaded reactions of her family, the girl sat down and opened the book to her favorite part…

 

*Queridos hermanos, amémonos los unos a los otros, porque el amor viene de Dios, y todo el que ama ha nacido de él y lo conoce. El que no ama no conoce a Dios, porque Dios es amor. Así manifestó Dios su amor entre nosotros: en que envió a su Hijo unigénito al mundo para que vivamos por medio de él. En esto consiste el amor: no en que nosotros hayamos amado a Dios, sino en que él nos amó y envió a su Hijo para que fuera ofrecido como sacrificio por el perdón de nuestros pecados. Queridos hermanos, ya que Dios nos ha amado así, también nosotros debemos amarnos los unos a los otros. Nadie ha visto jamás a Dios, pero si nos amamos los unos a los otros, Dios permanece entre nosotros, y entre nosotros su amor se ha manifestado plenamente.

¿Cómo sabemos que permanecemos en él, y que él permanece en nosotros? Porque nos ha dado de su Espíritu. Y nosotros hemos visto y declaramos que el Padre envió a su Hijo para ser el Salvador del mundo. Si alguien reconoce que Jesús es el Hijo de Dios, Dios permanece en él, y él en Dios. Y nosotros hemos llegado a saber y creer que Dios nos ama.

Dios es amor. El que permanece en amor, permanece en Dios, y Dios en él. Ese amor se manifiesta plenamente entre nosotros para que en el día del juicio comparezcamos con toda confianza, porque en este mundo hemos vivido como vivió Jesús. En el amor no hay temor, sino que el amor perfecto echa fuera el temor. El que teme espera el castigo, así que no ha sido perfeccionado en el amor. 
Nosotros amamos a Dios porque él nos amó primero. Si alguien afirma: «Yo amo a Dios», pero odia a su hermano, es un mentiroso; pues el que no ama a su hermano, a quien ha visto, no puede amar a Dios, a quien no ha visto. Y él nos ha dado este mandamiento: el que ama a Dios, ame también a su hermano.

 

She did not know all of the words and was not completely sure of what everything meant. But she knew the word “amor” and since Dios es el amor, she wanted to be like Him.

The man reached out his hand and sat his daughter down, requesting that his wife and son stay in the room. He went on to tell them about his secret, about the Bible he had been reading and no longer wanted to be a part of their faith, though it went against their cultural upbringing. They listened in love and because of the broken secret, the revealing of the mystery, lived happily ever after…in Jesus’ name.

 

The End.

 

 

*(1 John 4:7-21 NIV) Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. this is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

 We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him. There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.

art of storytelling...3

The raindrops skydived to the ground, without parachute, splattering one on the other upon arrival to their final destination. One group of skydivers found themselves racing towards a concave slab of concrete that flowed downward and led to the backside of a small, yellow-trimmed house, filled with struggling spots of grass and errant cat droppings from the neighborhood strays.
A small tin awning sheltered a place large enough for one person at a time outside of the backdoor, where the lock worked sometimes. Tonight, a boy with nothing remarkable about him sat, taking up the spot large enough, at the time, for him.
He gave attention to as many drops as he could, watching the end of their time of identical solitude turn into a traveling caravan, destination unknown but the only place they were ever destined to go.
And he wanted to be one of the raindrops. If not for anything else other than that purpose that they served. Each one, flying full speed towards it with no hesitation, no doubt, only complete and unshakeable faith that their final place, the place where they would evaporate and reincarnate in the clouds, was the place they were meant to be all along.
The thought of this place, with the tin covered back porch fit only for isolation and seclusion, shuddered through him as his destination. If there was more, he begged to the home of the raindrops for a skydiving excursion there.
His helplessness was matched only by his comfort in the isolation he had become so loathsome of, but accustomed to.
He heard a car door slam. It wasn’t the same hollow, almost aluminum sound he knew from any other car door that would slam in these parts, no, this was a thicker sound, a full sound. As if the car brought so much with it, a body would have to close the doors and then come back to get the rest.
There were no voices, though, after, just steady footsteps, different ones, then a knock on the entry of the house next door. He had seen her face many times, his neighbor, but never knew her name.
He realized that he’d never heard her voice either, until now. Perhaps it sounded different when it was lower, like the soothing tune of anyone named “mama”, but his introduction to her pitch was a scorned wife. The voices got louder, his neighbor and the two men with the steady footsteps and heavy car.
But as quickly as they had risen, they fell to a silence only barged upon by the still falling raindrops.
After it was all over, and the raindrops ceased, and the blackness of the sky began to find its next part of the earth and the boy under the tin roof decided on packing small provisions, a change of clothes, the Word, and a picture of the only woman that had loved him, the police asked him about all three bodies in front of the heavy car.
He knew nothing of any of them but that they’d all reached their final destination, and he had no intentions of following them to that same place.

art of storytelling...2

At the apex of a grassy incline above a lair inhabited by Love, Sex, and Hate, there’s a small cabin made of stone. Normally, such a building would be called a home, yet in this case, it is simply called a cabin since it is surrounded by trees taller than its own roof.
There was nothing in it; no furniture, televisions or familial pictures on its walls. Just a lone chair that didn’t remember how it got there, but, nevertheless, found itself to be the only evidence of life in the empty place that could only use the sun through its one window for light.
Hate would walk up to the cabin, alone, just to get away from Sex and Love sometimes and sit to think of all of the power it had. It would try to figure out what new forms it could take to do its damage and cause chaos among the inhabitants of the world and even those that sought to destroy it.
Hate’s roommates, Sex and Love, were already settled in their ways. Hate had never been in Love’s room and didn’t want to be either it had decided. Sometimes it would visit with Sex, though, until Love would knock on the door and sweetly demand entry. Because, Sex could never deny Love when it came calling and Hate couldn’t stand to be in the same room with Love. At least, that’s what Hate tried to convince itself of.
The truth was that Hate and Love weren’t allowed to be in the same room because Love conquers all it touches and Hate’s only weakness was Love.
So, one day, Hate went to the cabin because Love and Sex were in a room together and it was horrible when they got together. Trees would grow and the yellow tulips on the front of Hate, Sex, and Love’s dwelling would open up and sing their arrival. Red roses blossomed around the perimeter of the house, that would become a home, and seven birds would come serenade the lair.
Hate could only stand the darkness of when it and Sex would get together. Nature would not come out for that, only a dark midnight that reeked of unpleasant lung-filling odors; eventually suffocating the room until the life was choked away from a soul. That was why nature would stay away, because there was no life there and nature can only survive with life.
There was a knock on the door and Hate looked up because everywhere it went, it was alone. It rose from the chair and looked around at the walls. They were suddenly covered with pictures of smiling, joyful faces, beautiful hills and valleys and stunning creatures. This angered Hate because it knew what was on the other side of the door: Love.
Hate looked around for a place to leave and saw the only exit was the small window the sun began peeking into just as it headed for it. Hate was much too big for the window and its anger only made it larger and slower to move.
Love began banging on the door and demanded to be let in, letting Hate know that it was trapped and this was the end of the road. Hate refused to quit and went over to the pictures, flinging to and fro around the cabin and trying to destroy everything in its sight. This was to no avail however, for Love had put the pictures there and whatever Love built could not be destroyed.
Sensing that its time was drawing nigh, Hate had one last idea. It had never tried before, but decided it was going to kill Love. If Hate could come up with the greatest disguise it ever had, it would be able to fool Love into thinking it was no longer there and then, would take the lone chair that rested in the cabin and beat Love with it. Because that was the only thing in the place that Love had not built.
Hate found its disguise; it would become a child, because Love could not resist children.
And with that, Hate opened the door and asked Love to follow it into the room that held the chair. However, Love was always smarter than Hate, and realized that this was only a ploy. When they entered the room together, Love asked Hate to come to it. Hate paused and said if only it would sit in the chair. Hate could feel itself getting weaker being so close to Love and had to act quickly. Because when Love walked over to the chair, Hate’s plan was to grab it from under Love and then beat the Hate into it.
Love agreed and stood next to the chair and said to the child that was Hate, “Child, whatever mistakes you make, I love you anyway and I forgive you.” Hate could not stand to be given any of this, this, Love and a tear dropped from the child’s eye, washing away part of its disguise.
Love grabbed the child and hugged it, thus ending the Hate inside.

The End.

art of storytelling...1

Once upon a time there were three guys and one girl who walked through a forest. The forest was mostly green, but there was a patch in the middle that was complete darkness. From the bottom to the top, it was blacker than a thousand midnights in the bottom of the ocean. They sought this place because inside, despite the journey, all of their grandest wishes could come true in this place.
The three boys knew one another from childhood. Raised in the same house, by the same two people they called mom and frank. The girl was the only child born to mom and frank and her three brothers, born at different places but reared as one, protected her as if they all had the same blood running through their veins.
The girl became ill one day and found herself on the earth in front of their home, unable to get up on her own and barely able to hear the frantic voices of her youngest brother and oldest brother begging her to wake up. She realized that she wasn’t asleep; she knew she wasn’t dreaming. But what she didn’t know was how to calm their voices.

The remaining brother and frank joined the adopted siblings in their desires for the girl in front of the house they all lived in, together, to wake up. She heard a strange voice, one unfamiliar, join her family chorus and despite her numbness felt a hand attached to the voice hold her face, and caress her cheek. It was a comfortably warm feeling that drowned the pleas of her family and held her ears at attention.
His message, it was an unmistakably male voice, is only known to her, but when he held her hand she suddenly rose and got up to the delight o those around her. They hugged and kissed her and frank demanded a celebration that very night. For his one and only daughter was with them.
While her family and friends celebrated, enjoying the revelry of life and their perceived abundance, the girl whispered to her brothers, each one while alone, to meet her at an appointed time in the land next to the house that led to the forest. They pledged secrecy of the meeting to her in their whisperings and watched the clock in the house with discretion until the appointed time had arrived. The boys looked at each other soundlessly, not wanting to break the pledge to their sister, and awaiting her arrival.
A light shone on the ground and following it to the source, they found an open door from the side of the house and the girl in the doorway. The night’s lamp shone from the moon when the door closed and lit her path to them awaiting her, standing side by side. She went along the line, whispering to each one a private word and leading these three, this band of brothers, into the depths of the forest.
Each worked harder on masking their fear than anything else. The further they went, the bolder she became, the more hesitant the steps behind her. The darkness she sought, more powerful than that draped on the trees, animals, and the place that was the forest was at the top of a hill. At the bottom, she stopped the caravan and looked at all of them.
She asked, simply, if they loved her.
They did.
She asked, simply, if they trusted her.
There was a pause, brief but defined, although their response was the same.
She began walking up the hill with their steps following her. When the darkness changed, their hands could not be seen in front of them. The youngest brother closed his eyes but became more afraid when he realized that he could see more with his eyes closed than when they were open. The oldest brother, aware of the safety of his sister, reached out for her, his panic growing with each air-filled grasp. He gritted his teeth to remain silent, gripping tightly to a promise he’d made earlier.
The voice that their sister had heard earlier that day, a deep smoothness that doused their apprehensions the same way it had for the girl while she lay in front of their house, calmly demanded light. They did not know that the forest around them remained in its swarthy glory while the darkness they stood in became light.
“Because you have loved and trusted in those that believe in Me, you will walk in the light.” The boys looked at their sister in a new light. She had loved them enough to bring them to the ultimate protection.
The End.