Story of the Day: The Whale

 

The sands had a golden sheen to them, and though Myndil and Aodhgan were still far from the southern shore, the aurulent shimmer coruscating over the southern shore charmed their view. The barm swaffed over the beach, painting the coastline in undulating shapes, the cockles and clams writhing under the reach of the receding waves. A stream of sea spray plumed up from the waves, and a baleen whale suddenly surfaced, greeting them from afar with a sshuuffff!   

                “Oh, hallo, whale!” Myndil cried, waving at the whale. “My, how amazingly big it is! I have never seen a whale like that before. All the whales in the north look quite different. I didn’t think there would be any creature larger than your wolf this far south, but that whale is really-- yes, halloooo!” flapping frantically.

                The whale did not wave back, but it flicked its tail as it breached the squall, which was like saying hello, and Myndil was happy about it. It made another sharp blow before melting beneath the water and lulling lazily under the waves.

                "God bless you!” Myndil called out to the whale.

                Aodhgan’s eyes crinkled with smile lines. “I don’t think that was a sneeze, Myndil.”

                “Oh. Well, God bless the whale anyway, because they are one of the most majestic creatures, though their mouths really are terrifying. In the summer, when we take the children into the ocean for swimming, we have to warn them not to swim too far out, lest they get sloshed about by a passing whale.”

                “The whales in the north are large,” Aodhgan acknowledged, “but they won’t eat people.”

                “Oh, no, of course not-- giant fish do, but only when God tells them to—but that whale looks quite different from the other whales I’ve seen. The whales at home make great and horrific sounds when they’re talking to their friends in the water, but they don’t seem to like me much. They never answer me when I make little whale noises. Maybe I am speaking the wrong dialect of whale? I wonder if this one will understand me. It is far away, but maybe the whale’s hearing is better than mine.” Myndil hemmed and domed his hands around his mouth. “HhrrrRRruuuNNNnnnuuuuEUUUURRRRRrgghghh!” he heaved, extending the groan as much as his lungs would allow.

                He paused and waited, listening for a reply. Far in the distance, there was a violent snort and a beluine “thwop!”

                “It answered me—it answered me!” Myndil cried, in an ecstasy. “Aodhgan—the whale—it answered me!”

                “A long time ago, someone told me that whales once walked on the land not long after Creation.”

                “Oh, Aodhgan, whales cannot walk—they don’t have any legs! And even though they’re not fish and need to surface for air to fill their lungs, how could such enormous creatures stand upright?”

                “They also said that humans once came from the water.”

                Myndil thought about this and considered. “The Good Book says that the creation of sea-things and crawling-things came long before the creation of man, but if God made us that way, wouldn’t we have gills and little webbed feet like frogs?”

                GOD REMOVED THEM BECAUSE HE THOUGHT THEY LOOKED STUPID.

                “Oh. But is that how you created us, God? By making us come out of the ocean and then new-fashioning us for land?”

                DOES IT MATTER? MAN SINNED IN THE GARDEN ANYWAY.

                “Very true.”

                GOD SHOULD HAVE KEPT YOU IN THE WATER.

                Considering Myndil was now happening to whales and eager to happen to the rest of the marine population, this would not have been so unpardonable a fate. He only wondered whether the fish and shellfish could forgive god for speaking badly about them in his book enough to want to know him. Underwater oration was also a difficulty, but if whales could speak to him in song, they might be persuaded to learn a few baleen hymns.