Cylithria’s Mt. Vesuvius, Pompeii & God Parable
October 1st, 2009 by Cy
So there it is, about 5:30 this evening and I am at what I affectionately call, The Church. (Yeah, not a slick nicname, it was second runner up in fact – but trust me on this, you don’t want to know the first runner up name mkay?)
I was at The Church because over a month ago, the Youth Ministry Preacher, Tree and 6 other active teens in the youth ministry approached me for aid on a secret “Mission from God”. Shit you not, the kids actually called it that. Now ya’ll know me, Kids = I’m a sucker!!! Secret Missions = Totally there!!! In a Chruch – Say WHUT?????
But they conned, talked me into it. Those slick secret agents! Their mission was simple enough, they’d formed a garage band, in secret…. met, in secret and had finally revealed this to Preacher Rick when Preacher Man busted them privately talking about it one day. Preacher Rick does not condone lying, although he understood his youth congregation’s concerns and “reasons” for the lies. They didn’t play classic spirituals or hymns…… they liked rock and roll, country, pop, even reggae - and often times learned new songs based on how the song would “fit’ into a life lived for God.
It’s kinda cool…. but that is another post. They came to me after Tree and I spoke of the years I spent directing/producing.screen/stage set up for many, many youth groups in local area’s productions. They knew what they wanted to do, how to play the music, but needed help setting it up – and a guitar player too. I ended up saying yes. *shrug* sucker.
And THAT is how I found myself left with 26, six to eleven year old kids at 5:30 pm this evening. You see, the band wanted to involve ALL the kids, thus we’d even had two practices with the little heathens angels. I’d assumed, since most of these people don’t know me, and these are little snots kids, parents would drop them off for the pre-pizza party and either the Preachers of The Church would watch over them, or parents would stay.
Rrrrrrriiiiiiiigggggghhhhhhhhht!!!
I mentioned there were 26 of the little dipwads darlings didn’t I? Yeah, twenty six. That is not 1, but 2 bakers dozens full…….. and nary and adult in site. And somebody brought red bugjuice for all of them to drink…. with pizza….. yeah…… bad….. bad…. bad……
They ate and worse off, drank their fill while I was finishing sound check. I found 26 sets of red stained, hyper yelling lips when I walked back there. The noise alone was maddening…….the shreiks? OH TO THE FUCK NO.
It started simple. “Leave Geroge (my guitar) alone please.”
“No no no honey… don’t touch George please.”
“Okay now, we’re leaving Geroge alone now…”
“Look kid, hands off the axe.”
“THAT IS IT……….. EVRYBODY OUTSIDE NOW”
(That last part I yelled in my Marine Corps Drill Instructor Voice. It works!)
I got em outside, lined them up side by side, 26 dorks ducks in a row and began walking the line.
(Still using Marine Corps Voice, but not at a roar, just vocal trajectory level)
“WE WILL NOT DESECRATE THE HOUSE OF GOD, WILL WE?”
“nooooo”
“AND WE WILL BE GOOD CHRISTIAN….”
“Soldiers?” a voice cries out.
hey, I know that song! I think. “YES, SOLDIERS. SO WE”RE GONNA MARCH….SING ALONG, I CAN’T HEAR YOU”
And yeah…. wanna know what…. for a while… that ACTUALLY WORKED……
And then Lil Jake had to find a cricket. a big, black cricket. and not only did he find it, but he of course alerted his mancub friends….. Then…. he threw it at Amber and her friends……
OH
DEAR
GAWD!!!!!!
The girls shrieked and screamed and squealed at decibels that truly should be looked at as weaponry…. the boys covered their ears, laughing and howling and screaming “WHUT?” at each other over all the girl noise and I stood dead center hoping life would end.
I stormed to my car vowing to get my duct tape and I swear to you I was going to GET MY DUCT TAPE but then I spied something else in my trunk. A book. It’s actually an old coffee table type book, it’s a photo essay of Mt. Vesuvius and the city and ruins of Pompeii.
Duct Tape OR Book?
Damn that was a hard choice if I tell this honestly. I really did just want to slap tape on all their mouths. I really did….. but…. they had to sing during church tonight……… little rapscallions. I grabbed the book.
I slammed my trunk so hard that every kid, small and teens inside stopped and got that scared look on their face. Now I spoke in a low, barely audible tone.
“In a circle, on the grass, around that rock.” I point to the center stone in The Chruch’s yard. “there will be no touching, no talking, no hitting, pushing, shoving, falling, bumping, bruising, bashing, bleeding, crushing, smooshing, accidentally anythinging each other……I’m gonna tell a story.”
26 sets of eyes watch me, concerned. I make my way to the rock and catch a glimpse of snickering teens vacating the outdoors. The Bastards left me!!!!!!
“This….. is the story about Mt. Vesuvius, the Volcano, and the City of Pompeii…in Italy.” I began.
“That’s not about God. a volcano is a mountain that explodes!” Lil cricket man snottily informs me.
I lean his way and leer at him. “Everything is about God.” I growl. He leans back. AHA! Submission is mine!!!!! I rule the universe….. except…..
I open the book. I forgot. It’s a picture book. FUCK ME BLIND, I think to myself…… then I flip open the first page and show them the map…. from there, I talk every piece of history or science I know about the pictures before these children. (Thank you for my teachers in school. I so owe you and I still remember )
Now if you don’t know , Mt Vesuvius was a mountain in Italy, it erupted and coated the city of Pompeii in ash and lava etc, literally burying the citizens alive. These pictures showed great details of the excavations, and admittedly; the dead.
The kids were glued to our discussion and it was a discussion. We passed the book, we spoke of things, they asked questions. It was pretty nifty….. until Lil Cricketman spoke up.
“This story has no God in it. This is Satan’s work. Satan explodes things in fiery ruin, not God.”
I should have grabbed the duct tape!
I smile and hear Preacher Rick and Preacher Jacob approach. I ignore them -
“Jake,” I ask as he tosses the book at me, “Has God ever talked to you? In your heart?”
“YEAHHHHHHHH” he sneers. Like I am dumb. His ass is mine.
“And has God ever told you to do something?”
“Yeah……”
“What? Did you do it?”
Jake looks at his friend and rolls his eyes. “Well yeah…. he told me to help my sister and I did.”
“Cool! Good for you. But why….why did you do it Jake?”
His head waggles now as he speaks. “Cuz God told me to.” (duh) was implied.
I smile and look at the other kids. Nodding I agree with my favorite little man. “Jake is right, God told him in his heart to help his sister and he did, because God told him too…. and we should all be good Christian soldiers and do as God tells us, right?”
All the kids agree. some more eagerly then others, but none the less they are still engaged. I wait, knowing Jake won’t let me down…. he doesn’t.
“But we’re God’s children,” he says and then points to the book. “That’s an exploding mountain!! It has no ears.”
Now both Preachers seem to have a cold, a short, get my attention cold. I ignore them.
“Right, Volcano’s and mountains don’t have ears.” I agree. Jake looks smug. Time ti wipe this childs face….
“Now, who here can tell me how the bible starts?”
Right away helpers raise hands. One by one, I let each child add a portion to the “And It was Good” segments of the bible… the creation story. After praising the group effort I start steering.
“So when God made the heavens and earth, first there was not much right?” The kids sort of nod. “So God, he had to kind of put it all together…. he had to make an earth and all the things on it…..didn’t he? ” more slight agreement.
“Ya’ll have seen the pictures of space…. the pretty ones, very black with bright sparkle dusts and pieces just floating in nothing right…”
“The hubble ones”
“Right!!” I smile…. they know exactly what I am talking about now. “Well think about it…. God was right out there…. all that stuff and he needed to make an earth. So he told a piece of that stuff, go here, do this, and he told some blue stuff go over here…. no i want more blue water… you be water….”
Now i stand up and touch the rock, “And he put the rocks together…..teeny different pieces…. see the flecks… and grass, none grew at first he had to make lots and lots of grass…….. and the sky…. AND…. mountains…..”
I point back to my book. “and every single piece of that stuff in the universe, the stuff floating….stuff that wasn’t yet an earth…… it listened to God and THAT is why you sit on grass and those leaves fall and the sky is so blue…..God told the grass, the leaves and the sky to be…. and they listened too. They listened and so did Mt. Vesuvius…”
“Why would God tell that mountain to explode Miss Cylithria, people died.” Andrea asked so sadly.
I knelt down, grabbed the book and motioned the kids close together, Instantly I spied both Preacher’s horning right in. Opening the pages to flip through some of the best photographs of the Pompeii possessions found, I point at things. I point out the pottery, the bowls, the tools, the cloth bolts then I look to Andrea and Jake, “But where is the cameras.” I say softly.
28 pairs of eyes r- scan every picture. sure enough, back in those days, no camera’s. …
“You see it IS a story about listening to God. God tells us to love him and follow him and we will have eternal life, and never be forgotten. Like Jake and the Earth has shown us, when God talks to our hearts we must listen and do as he says – no matter what. And EVEN AS BIG as Mt Vesuvius was….. and boy wasn’t he a big mountain…..even when you’re big, you listen and do as God asks, because that is what is right to do, right Jake?”
Jake nods solemnly.
“But….” Andrea looks at me, she looks down to the picture…. back to me…. back down and she traces the line of a woman’s face. “This lava…..it’s God’s camera!”
I nod as every set of eyes there suddenly sees the “camera God had used to capture and show us the people and times of Pompeii.
“Mt Vesuvius did as God spoke to the mountain to do. Mt Vesuvius did God’s work when it listened to God. Just like Jake did, like you all do. And yes…. that lava from the exploding mountain….. became God’s camera. ”
“WOW’s” and “That so cool’s” began being heard. The kids crowded in, closer around the book, now looking at God’s pictures as i sat back on my knees to give them room. Then and only then did I take a really long, deep breath.
Jake snatches one page of the book, turns it to me and points to the Drawing of before and after the eruption. “God really CAN move mountains!!!!”
I grin like a mad woman. “So it is said Jake, so it is said!” The kids collapse back into the coolness of God’s camera.
Suddenly I look up. There are two sets of eyes staring at me. I offer a teeny shrug. “We were playing games, got a bit…..too busy so I thought a story would be good.” I sheepishly force a smile for them.
They say nothing for a moment. I start to get that ick feeling I get when around church folk. Instantly I think, Well ya should not have left them with me then eh?
I stand up. Brushing dirt off my slacks. I step to where the two preacher’s are, away from little, totally happy ears. ”Sorry”
“Cylithria,” Preacher Rick gasps. he is shaking his head no, slowly. “Where did you learn that parable?”
I look at him and feel my nose wrinkle. “Parable…..I made that up, just now. off the cuff.” I shake my head vehemently no. “It’s no parable!”
“Will you write it down. Can you? Please? Is that even possible?” Preacher Jacobs suddenly asks.
I stare at the men, no quite sure what exactly they are thinking. “you guys thought I was out of my league didn’t ya?” I realize as it sinks in, what I see is some form of admiration or something like that.
Preacher Rick instantly smiled and nodded. “I Know Jake… he is my tester.”
I laugh as the kids start to get to their feet. Preacher Jacobs lightly touches my elbow. “Can I…..I don’t know if I will remember it right, I don’t know that I’ll forget it, but….”
“I’ll tell you what Padre,” I say as I slide away from his touch. You watch them, I will go in and blog this. Here,” I dig out one of my MOO cards, “Here is the URL. DON’T give it to The Church. I don’t need them on my blog….but you let me go sit, I’ll write it and schedule it to post after services tonight. you can print it and use it at will.”
“Cylithria, thank you so much” he gushes as he looks at my moo card. He chuckles at the bi-line, “Headstrong All Along”
“One question before you go?” Preacher Jacobs suddenly says. Taking me away from where Preacher Rick is being told the cool God’s camera story, Preacher Jacob looks at me with deeply searching eyes. ”How do you know how to make up a beautiful story like this one, about God, his love and listening to him when you don’t believe in him?”
I smile, not in malice but because only hours before Obround asked me a very similar question.
“How do you preach the word of God when you don’t believe in all of your congregation Padre?” I reply, using my similar answer Preacher Jacobs recoils slightly, as had Obround earlier.
“Believing there is a God doesn’t make him real……but God’s camera damn sure does sir, Excuse me, I have to write.”
– — – — – — – –
Promise made, promise kept Padre. This should auto post at 7:50 pm EDT.
- 3 Comments »
- Posted in I'm such a Dork, Life Lessons, Why Not - Right?
Technorati: 
