Jun 2018
Some years ago there was a different Zenia. There was a house where she more or less lived, and a man who lived there too. And all the things that went with it. And the good and bad and mediocre times flowed through her fingers. Nothing was especially good or bad, and she didn't think about whether it should be different because before this house and this man there had been war in many nations, and like many people all over the planet that they lived on during this time, Zenia and the man in the nice enough house felt grateful to be alive.
When she stopped to wonder if she was meant to stay where she was, in the nice enough house, with the loving man and the kind people who lived near them, Zenia only knew that she was 1. grateful to be alive 2. happy that the bombs had stopped falling after many years of many bombs falling 3. hopeful at last for a future that might include both number 1 and number 2 for quite some time into the future. The moment that she caught herself thinking the above thoughts, she would curl up, in a corner or in a bed, or in the bathtub, and sob. Because the hubris of daring to think such thoughts was frightening, and yet she wanted to have hubris. She was a daring person by nature, and she wanted to be herself again.
~^~
After some years in the nice enough world, crouched down, trying not to invoke the wrath of the Gods in whom she absolutely believed, Zenia snapped.
~V~
Thus begins the tale in which we now find ourselves.
~V~
This World is not the one in which we live now, but a reverse circular inside out imploded mistake. It doesn't matter right now how it came about, you wouldn't understand it, and probably don't care. What matters is how it started. If you can see that part clearly, it might make everything else fit together. It's a vast puzzle. A vast puzzle of misintent spinning backwards on a lunatic's turntable at what could be called, perhaps, as a sick joke, warp speed, like a flip book, that is a kind of cartoon. So bear with me as I try to explain what I don't understand to you, so long after the ultimate destruction and rebirth that it is probably not possible for mere mortal minds to comprehend.
All we can do is try.
~V~
When she stopped to wonder if she was meant to stay where she was, in the nice enough house, with the loving man and the kind people who lived near them, Zenia only knew that she was 1. grateful to be alive 2. happy that the bombs had stopped falling after many years of many bombs falling 3. hopeful at last for a future that might include both number 1 and number 2 for quite some time into the future. The moment that she caught herself thinking the above thoughts, she would curl up, in a corner or in a bed, or in the bathtub, and sob. Because the hubris of daring to think such thoughts was frightening, and yet she wanted to have hubris. She was a daring person by nature, and she wanted to be herself again.
~^~
After some years in the nice enough world, crouched down, trying not to invoke the wrath of the Gods in whom she absolutely believed, Zenia snapped.
~V~
Thus begins the tale in which we now find ourselves.
~V~
This World is not the one in which we live now, but a reverse circular inside out imploded mistake. It doesn't matter right now how it came about, you wouldn't understand it, and probably don't care. What matters is how it started. If you can see that part clearly, it might make everything else fit together. It's a vast puzzle. A vast puzzle of misintent spinning backwards on a lunatic's turntable at what could be called, perhaps, as a sick joke, warp speed, like a flip book, that is a kind of cartoon. So bear with me as I try to explain what I don't understand to you, so long after the ultimate destruction and rebirth that it is probably not possible for mere mortal minds to comprehend.
All we can do is try.
~V~
"Zenia" owes everything to my having read the work of Margaret Atwood for many decades, all of it. In particular, "The Robber Bridegroom" in which Zenia is the villain.
