The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2899 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

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This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
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“So are you happy that I did nothing to harm your sister?” I addressed to Trish.

“I s’pose so, but it did look like her.”

“Except it wasn’t her. If it had been so she would have been all right.”

“How, you zapped whatever it was and it just blew up.”

“I sent love at it—it couldn’t cope and disappeared.”

“How could love do something like that?” she looked and sounded sceptical.

“Love is the most positive energy of all, so if directed to a negative powered entity will either neutralise it or cause it to self destruct. If it had been a positive entity, then it would have grown from the injection of energy. It didn’t, it disappeared so ergo, it wasn’t positive hence my assumption was correct.”

She still didn’t look impressed when she walked away.

“What was all that about?” Danielle asked.

I explained that we’d had some sort of entity trying to play with us and I zapped it.

“Entity?”

“Yes, an elemental.”

“So how come you can accept those but not god?”

“I don’t know, just a personal thing. The Jesus stuff is just a huge con trick which most clergy are informed about yet still perpetuate the nonsense.”

She shrugged, “Does it matter if it helps some people get through the day?”

“It does if people feel it gives them the right to hurt others.”

“I thought that was only Muslims?”

“No, what about anti-abortionists shooting doctors in the States?”

“Really—killing doctors?”

“Yes, some people feel performing abortions is killing babies. This they then use to justify killing the doctors who do them.”

“But what about rape victims or badly deformed babies?”

“That doesn’t seem to count. However, the problems in Syria are far worse, how people cope with those monsters, Daesh or whatever they’re called, I really don’t know. Yet there are still people, mainly youngsters trying to leave Western countries to go and join them until they see the reality.”

“I heard a woman talking about going to join them until she realised how bad they were, she had an awful job escaping them with her child.”

“They groom their victims just like paedophiles do, building up pictures in the mind of the victim which are nowhere like the reality. How these youngsters fail to ever see the news or read a paper or see things online about what happens in Syria really baffles me.”

“I don’t watch the news very much, too depressing—it’s all about that Trump bloke. How can anyone vote for a bloke with a haircut like his?”

“It does tend to reflect his policies—a total mess.”

“At least Obama looks neat and tidy.”

She went off to do her homework and I sat down at the computer but didn’t switch it on. I reflected on my conversation with Danielle. My agnosticism was a personal choice which was possibly as bad as the fundamentalists who refuse to listen to reason. I still felt that apart from the Shekina business, there was no reason to believe in god, personalised or otherwise. If she was the source of the blue energy then she was a source of goodness and love, if she wasn’t, then I had no idea what was going on. So is the godhead just a source of goodness and love? I don’t know, hence my agnosticism—a not knowing.

It sort of linked back to ideas I had before when I was trying to reconcile what my parents believed with something that was acceptable to me. The best I could conceive was of some entity, like a universal consciousness that pervaded everything except that it wasn’t conscious of itself or anything else, just like a cloud drifting across the sky. It wasn’t very satisfactory so I gave up after that, which proved much more satisfactory. Logically, none of it made any sense so people who believed who claimed some religious or spiritual experience must be believing on a purely emotional level, which is exactly the same as my rejection. I’m happy for them to believe but choose not to myself.

Now I could switch on the computer. Well I would have done except Daddy came to see me. “I hope ye’re no tae busy tae see me?”

It was obviously a reference to earlier when I effectively told him to go. “Uh no, Daddy, come and sit down.” I shut the door and led him to the two sofas the other side of the room.

“I ken ye were angry this morn, but we hae tae dae it like that, we dinna have a choice.”

“I know that but it still felt like a slap in the face.”

“Why d’ye think I came tae tell ye m’self?”

“I didn’t think about it, other than to feel angry. It was a job I never wanted until I did it for a few months and I think I made a reasonable stab at it.”

“Ye did really well which I hate tae admit, but ye did a better job than I did.”

“I doubt it; anyway, our styles are so different it would like comparing apples and bananas—me being the bananas one.”

“Aye, ye got that bit richt.”

“Hah, hark who’s talking.”

“Listen here, ye wee upstart, I wis teaching students afore ye were born.”

“And probably still using the same lecture notes.”

“Aye, weel ye canna improve on perfection.”

“I did.”

“Ye whit? Ye scunner.”

“I’m a better teacher than you were.”

“An’ jest hoo did ye reach that conclusion?”

“An expert told me so.”

“Aye weel ye ken whit ye can dae wi’ experts?”

“This one is impeccable.”

“Aye that’s whit they all say.”

“No I mean it.”

“Aye alang wi’ believing in Santae Claus.”

“I can’t comment on that.”

“Why not? Afraid yer expert may disappear in a puff o’ smoke.”

“I doubt it, he’s probably too fat to do that.”

Oh aye, jest like Faither Christmas then?”

“Beard isn’t as well developed.”

“Hoo d’ye ken?”

“Take it from me, the person I’m thinking of, who told me I was a better teacher has a beard but it’s not the free-flowing sort of Father Christmas and no it isn’t Dr Mary Bertram, she shaves her beard.”

“Aye oor own bearded lady. Sae wha is it then if it’s no her?”

“I can’t tell you, that would be breaking a confidence.”

“Ye scunner, I dinna believe anyone telt ye, ye’re making it up.”

“D’you honestly think I’d stoop to that level just to points score?”

“Ye micht if ye felt ye were losing.”

“You what? Me losing? Never.”

“Sae wha wis it?”

“I told you, I was told in confidence.”

“Aye sae ye did, an’ I didnae believe ye thae first time.”

“That’s your problem.”

“Naebody telt ye?”

“They did.”

“Sae wha wis it?”

“Are you sure you want to hear the answer?”

“Aye, but I dinna ken if I’ll believe ye.”

“It was my predecessor.”

“Wha wis that, I cannae remember?”

“You, you daft gowk.”