Not an Old White Guy

Let's write the book of Dennisez. (Good one, Pat. I owe you.) To avoid all the problems in the news this week, I will have to imagine God as more than an old white guy somewhere above the clouds pushing the atoms around with his thoughts. Still we have to keep it simple. If it's too complicated we shouldn't include it in an origin story, because it won't stick. The catchiest narrative would be that God is a lot like me: passionate, capable and intelligent. You're laughing. What's so funny?

Well OK, not quite like me because I know I'm kind of messy inside. OK, like you too, and George Burns and Morgan Freeman. To be fair, we should include indigenous people and people of colour and folks of every gender and poor people and disabled people and countless other unique and worthy people. Maybe God is like us without the messy bits. OK, God is the best imaginable version of a person.

God: You still don't get it, Dennis. You're leaving things out.

Me: What did I leave out?

God: You think it's about worthy people. It's not a club with worthy insiders and unworthy outsiders. Nobody gets left out. And then you missed nearly 14 billion years of creation before people showed up. You dismiss the millions of species who share the world with you and keep it working. You were an after-thought, and you've become a bother. When you're gone, the universe won't shed a tear and the Earth will blossom. All this fighting and building and managing things like you knew what you were doing...you people never get the story right because you make it all about you and your buddies. But I thought the music was nice.

Me: So what goes in the story?

God: It's the story of everything. Leave nothing out. And stop hunting the Wolves. It doesn't work without wolves.

Me: Right, I forgot the wolves. How am I going to write a story with everything in it? I don't know everything and I'm getting forgetful.

God: Finally! Forget the story. Just belong, like you said in your song...too many words, but your heart was in it.