This is a short, sad story of a village; and its children. Children born in filth to parents filled with angst pretending to be love. In the moment in which Life sparked, the filth was external. But in the very next moment, before acknowledgement was barely possible, the purity was sullied. Their parents could still see the hope around the edges, and deep within the parents held onto a dream that indeed this child would be the one. And some parents proclaimed as much to all who might listen. But alas, these same brash parents diluted possibility with expectations that were unavoidably attached to the filth of worldly desires. Yet those parents who were not overbearing, were as equally unsuccessful filtering the filth; despite their reason and their warnings, their children played in the mud. And then there were those parents who worked to (over)protect their children; to keep their children completely away from influences unbecoming, but regardless, the filth found a way to seep into these children as well.

As the children grew to ask more complex and difficult questions, their understanding of filth was refined, spreading and expanding to cover all and everything around them leaving a circle of righteousness like a cocoon keeping them snug and safe. Filth parted before them as they continued on their quest for their parent's hope. Some children it appeared were able to hover over the surface-filth and disguise their forays into filth as efforts to fulfill expectations. Some children wallowed in the surface-filth. And some children, in fact all children, learned how to fling filth making it stick to and slowly drip from some other children, marking them as derelict regardless of truth. It turned out that the hovering children were prolific filth flingers and also quite adept at dodging flung filth. And some of those surface children who were constantly barraged with flung filth soon found their cocoon in shreds and tatters.

Each grew up accordingly. The surface children who still held on to some semblance of a cocoon, began adulthood working for those who hovered. Those surface children entering adulthood in shredded, tattered cocoons felt filthy regardless of truth. The weight of the flung filth dragged many of these former sparks beneath the surface. Some of these outcasts spent a lifetime floundering. Some disappeared. Most of those who hovered as children, hovered as adults and came to believe that flung filth was truth and that everyone was deserving of their place.

A few of those working on the surface came to realize that those who hovered, though seemingly above the filth, were actually the purveyors of filth, sprinkling it down upon the masses cloaked as power, wealth, success, tradition, even kindness and generosity, and a (forever unfulfilled) promise that those who worked on the surface would ultimately learn to hover. Most of those working on the surface though were enamored, seeing these offerings as manna and learning to be happy in their place.

Anecdotally a former child would on occasion rise from their clinging filth and learn to hover. Anecdotally a former child would on occasion reach down and rescue a lost or floundering soul and help them to repair their cocoon just enough to find a place on the surface. For the most part though, those who hovered, hovered; those on the surface, worked; and those beneath the surface, drowned, over and over and over and over again.

This is a short, sad story of a village; and its children.

And this is a shorter, sadder story of other villages. Imagined villages. Hopes and dreams. Myths and legends. Villages in which sparks are reignited, purity is unsullied, and everyone is equally joyful and deserving of their reward. And villages in which justice is doled out, punishments are received, and everyone is equally filthy and deserving regardless of truth. In this story, everyone acknowledges that a day will come when each one of us will have to leave the village in which we sparked, grew and spent our adulthood.

According to the tradition of those who hover, all those who had hovered in the village from which all emerge will travel to a village inhabited largely by all those who had hovered. And those who had hovered will arrive with power, wealth, success and traditions intact. And according to those who hover, those who unappreciatively work on the surface and those floundering and beneath the surface will disappear, perhaps traveling to another unacknowledged, inconsequential village, (likely some horrible village filled with pain and suffering and angst). And according to those who hover, a select few of those who appreciatively work on the surface will join those who hover in their new village; after all those who hover will likely need workers in this new village as well.

And according to all those who appreciatively work on the surface of the village from which all emerge, they will be amongst the select few following those who hover to their new village.

And those who recognize the purveyors of filth, and those who are floundering and/or beneath the surface are largely silent on the topic of future travels because they are occupied, busy cleaning up the filth in this village from which all emerge and/or they are simply occupied, busy surviving.

And there are rumors of other villages. Villages that recycle visitors and put them on a train going back to the village from which all emerge. Villages in which visitors are copied, printed, bound and shelved in the stacks forever and ever amen. Villages in which visitors are liberated then merged into a single conscious goodness. Villages filled with orgiastic ecstasy. Villages in which each villager has attained a personal state of Nihilistic Perfection.

And this is a shorter, sadder story of other villages.

And this is the short, sad story of our village; and our children.