I asked myself: what would the world be like if humans, just like the rest of the animal kingdom, was in heat only for a short portion of the year?
What if women only went into heat in the spring, and what if men only sought to mate during this time? How would that world look? How would it differ from now?
I set out to truly pose that question in a short story which then grew and grew, and then grew some more and ended up novel.
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They say Jesus Kristus was untouched.
You learn it in school, you hear it from parents, from grandparents—from them especially—from friends, and from preachers; you read it in the Bible: Jesus Kristus was the first to, and the only one ever to, escape, ascend, transcend, what have you, the Storm. He was the first ever to rise above it unscathed, as they like to put it on the late-night TV preacher-shows, especially now with a new Storm approaching; although unscathed means the same as untouched, just has more of a bite to it, and these late-night TV preachers like biting.
And not only was Kristus untouched or unscathed, they go on to tell you, he was conceived beyond the Storm—or unconceived—is how the Bible puts it in many places—although born in December, mind you. He was Stormless, is how I like to think of it when I believe the most. Sometimes I believe less, or not at all, and then I don’t really care how He is thought of.
Grandma, who always believed—hungrily, thirstily—used to say He was beyond the Storm: “Jesus Kristus was beyond the Storm,” she would say, with a sigh, with a blissful little expulsion of air, with an upward longing, her eyes moist, seeing not what was there right in front of her, but instead looking at (or for) some private heaven, some longed for ecstasy. Beyond it, she’d sigh. Beyond it and Untouched, is what she kept telling me since as far back as I can remember. Hungrily, thirstily.
And not only Untouched, she’d go on—and when I was little there was no getting away from her—Kristus was the first to see the Storm for what it was, was the first to call it by its real name: Temptation. That’s the name she gave it, and often. As does the Bible, and all those preachers, too.
Temptation. Temptation. Temptation.
But let me tell you, the Storm is more than temptation. This word, this thing, temptation, if you really look at it, implies a choice, does it not? Doesn’t it promise you some say in the matter? How can the Storm be a temptation if you have no choice? But Jesus Kristus, too, uses that word. I’ve seen it in print. And so she did, as well, Grandma did. And often.
“The Storm is temptation,” she’d say. “It is Nature’s test of the spirit.”
And it is also the command to make more of us, Grandma would often add, in the form of desire: the urge to people God’s beautiful planet with more of us. And that little heavenward sigh. She was so blissful, especially when she had me in her clutches.
Of course, that’s what they teach you in school as well. The Storm is nature’s way to make sure we go on. Without it there would be no more of us, no humanity, no babies, no sir. That’s what I was taught, and that’s what they still teach, as far as I know. And who’s to argue? It’s true enough, that’s plain. The proof lies in the sea-of-babies pudding come December.
Still, Jesus Kristus does urge temperance. In many places. I don’t find that surprising, really. What I find surprising is that He never urged abstinence, not that I can find—though those biting late-night preachers swear He said it. They go on about it. And on about it. But I have not read Him say it. What I have read Him say is: let the Storm enter only for the sake of offspring, only deeply enough to spawn.
That accomplished, He says, shun it. Do no invite it, He says—as if we are inviting the Storm.
In other places Kristus warns against “indulgence.” That is how the New Testament puts it, and therefore Grandma, too. Indulgence.
Before He arrived to save us these couple of thousand years ago—the New Testament goes on to explain—the Season, or the Storm—one word’s as good as the other—was nothing but one long orgy. Nothing but a month of sexual revel and abandon.
Which pretty much hits what happens these days right on the nail. As if the New Testament had never been written, or read. Just so much old paper, even if gilt-edged, like Grandma’s Bible.
Yes, He warned us about that, Kristus did. He warned us about the dangers of letting go—which is how you indulge: you let go. And when you let go you become inhuman, which I’ve always found to be a strange word to use in that context. One of his Disciples, Luke, I think—or is it Matthew?, now I’m not sure—uses the word unhuman instead, equally strange but for some reason it seems to fit better. It is the same thing though: inhuman, unhuman. Grandma had another word for it: Beastly. She liked to say that word: beastly. Again and again. Beastly.
But I do know what He is talking about. What He’s talking about is letting go, about letting let the Storm take over. To open yourself up wide, to offer no resistance, to let the Storm enter fully. To let it rage. Perhaps that’s what Kristus means by invite.
Lately, I’ve come to think that perhaps what Kristus means by inviting is agreeing. And that what He means to say is that we are not animals. Not beastly. We are better than, higher than, stronger than, finer than the beasts. That we, being human and not un-, have a choice, where animals don’t. But that’s where I return to square one, for I don’t think we have a choice. I don’t think the Storm is a temptation, no matter what Kristus says, Untouched and all. I think it is an imperative.
Something that occurred to me a long time ago is this: how would He know? If He indeed was untouched, if He was never seared by that awful (or wonderful) heat, how would He know, truly know, what the Storm was like? How could He call it a temptation if He had not been tempted? That’s what I’d like to know. And that’s one question Grandma never got around to answering—she could be very hard of hearing when she chose to, could Grandma, looking around to see where the noise was coming from, not finding it, giving up, changing the subject—although, as I grew older, I got around to asking it often enough.
Had He been Touched, and then ascended—shaking himself free of the Storm—well, that’s one thing. But He’s always Untouched, as in Never Touched. That’s what bothers me.