The Way We’ve Always Done It
Oh goodness, another weird short story. I’m sorry. I had a dream and I can’t just write that down here because it has a lot to do with past experiences and random people who don’t belong. So what does my brain do? It makes to weird creatures and writes a story. I can’t help it. Author memes available as proof upon request.
The Way We’ve Always Done It
Once there was island nation called Potamus, where the trees grew short and stout and the residents lived on seaweed. The island was volcanic, and frequent eruptions of hot gas singed the treetops and forced the rain forest to grow out rather than up. The volcano was only middle-aged and mostly friendly. It still lay low in the center of the island rather than a mountain looming high over it. It would remain so for centuries to come for it was content to bubble and puff rather than build itself up with lava at the cost of destruction of life on the ring of land.
The creatures who lived on Potamus were gray and bulbus, with long tubular noses. Their skin was moist and seemed like it should have been soft except that small, hard bumps gave the skin a gravelly texture. They walked on two rounded feet, almost like soft horse hooves. Where their legs met these squashed-ball feet, there was no ankle, merely a crease where one round limb met another. It was this way all the way up the body, a roll of lower leg meeting a roll of the upper leg meeting a barrel of a belly to which rolly-poley arms were attached. Potamusians had no neck whatsoever only their head, which looked very much like the head of a snow man except stone gray. And most noticeably different was their nose, which dangled a couple inches past their chin.
This story came out quick and ridiculous, so why not add a quick sketch into the mix?😆
Of course, having a smallish trunk for a nose meant that this protuberance often rested on their mouths. This caused the Potamusians to form a habit of mumbling, then slinging their nose out of the way with a puff of air from their mouths and a swing of their heads in order to repeat themselves more clearly. Most of their noses were long enough for their rough textured shoulder to provide adequate traction to keep it there long enough for a sentence or two to escape. Then, it would flop down in front of their mouths and the whole ritual began again. Mumble. Sling. Repeat. Flop.
There were a few unfortunate individuals in Potamus whose noses dangled free and short, reaching neither chest nor shoulder if flung. On the island, it was generally assumed that an infant born short-nosed would have a shy, reserved temperament. The truth was rather, that every Potamusian was a lazy Potamusian. So anyone with a short nose rarely took the time to use their hands to hold their nose out of the way to enable them to speak clearly. Instead, they mostly listened and entertained themselves with their own thoughts and the funny, almost ticklish feeling at the base of their noses and against their chins when their noses swung back and forth as they walked. Of course, these noses of varying lengths all had the added advantage that when the volcano rumbled and puffed, they could turn their noses inward, lay the opening against their skin and stifle the hint of sulfuric gas that emerged from the center of the island.
The islanders on Potamus spent a good portion of their time harvesting seaweed, which grew in the many shallow marshes that surrounded the circular island. They did this by sloshing through the shallows until they found a good patch of seaweed. Upon such a discovery, they plunged their head down, wrapped their nose around several stalks and then tore it out as they stood back up. Their round bodies and rough skin grabbed quite a lot of water, which splashed everywhere as they ascended. The trick was puffing breath out of your mouth and shaking your head simultaneously, else not a little water would find its way into ears and eyes and mouths. (They had no earlobes. Rumors spread around the surrounding islands that they were accidentally made with all of their earlobes added to their noses, though you’d never hear anything of the sort on Potamus.) You may guess that this is quite a challenging task to teach young Potamusians. For this reason, adult residents had the added challenge of harvesting for themselves and family members too young (or too old) to manage for themselves.
Potamus?
It’s important for the reader to note that the creatures on Potamus Island were placed there on purpose, for them to take care of the island and vice versa. The seaweed was given to them by the ruler of all the islands to fuel this lovely symbiosis of stout flora and fauna.
There were occasionally rebellious Potamusians who, taking advantage of the shortness of the trees, stole seeds to eat from inside the their fruits. But they always grew thin, then gaunt and their lives ended prematurely. A few of the rebels claimed the richness of the seeds and the lingering sweetness of the large, purple-red fruit was worth the suffering, but most of them regretted it eventually.
The tradition of harvesting seaweed with noses on Potamus began as a way to disassociate with the seed harvesters who, of course, used their hands to reach, break and clean the fruit to acquire the seeds. Not wanting to offend the ruler of the islands, they wanted to distinguish themselves. As if their well-fattened bodies weren’t enough contrast, they wanted to look and act completely different from the seed-eating Potamusians. This added to the acceptance that it was far better for short-nosed individuals to remain unheard than to use their hands too much in moving their noses aside.
Teenage Potamusians with open-temperaments and short-noses (or a dislike of slinging their noses to a shoulder every other moment) often went through a phase when wanted to be heard, so they simply lifted their nose and spoke. Without fail, rumors about these circulated, that they were giving seeds a try and the evidence showed in how much they used their hands. By the time the story reached their families, the youngster had either quit the nose-lifting habit or indeed expanded their diet beyond seaweed. Why not? If they already had the bad reputation, they figured they might as well indulge.
One day, a truly quiet-tempered, short-nosed Potamusian was wandering around the short-jungled island and happened upon a cellar. Toz, as he was called, was pure-hearted and maybe a little oblivious to the politics surrounding the seaweed vs seed situation. He never thought people would think evil of him for being or discovering something among the seed-bearing trees because he was a dedicated seaweed-eater. His young body was growing rounder all the time to prove it.
Without any hesitation, Toz opened the cellar and discovered heaps of spledid works of art. Statues both stone and wooden as well as engraved scenery filled the underground room without room for walking. No one in Toz’s or his father’s lifetime had practiced art. Still, he did not realize the implications of his discovery and ran straight to the closet and incidentally busiest beach to announce it.
When the creatures of Potamus saw the cellar and passed around the art, they were stunned. Some people shouted that it was evil work of seed-harvesting hands. At this, several carvings were dropped out of fear that the one holding it might somehow be associated with the debased outcasts.
“How else is this possible?” Agreed a Potamusian holding a statue that looked remarkably like her. (She found the likeness amazing even though,with the exception of nose length, there was little variance in the appearance of any well-rounded Potamusian.)
“A nose could never do this.” A guy admitted over an engraving.
“Neither could hands, unless they were practiced. Like seed-harvesters.” The woman’s voice was sharp with malice.
Another Potamusian, hunched over and deflated (as opposed to thin) with age stepped gingerly out of the crowd toward the entrance. “That’s not entirely true.” Her voice rattled.
The crowd looked at her and one another. They had always been a unsure about Eedit. She tended to harvest sea-weed alone, usually just before dawn. She always claimed it was to see the sun rise on the water. Being too lazy to try it, the rest of the residents couldn’t appreciate that explanation.
The question of her being a seed-eating rebel came up over afternoon drinks as often as guesses over who would be the next Potamusian bride and groom. But the first was settled just as quickly as result of the simple fact that Eedit was the fattest Potamusian anyone had ever seen. Even though she’d outlived everyone by decades, her folds and folds of skin attested to the enormous size she had once attained.
Eedit hadn’t said anything more, but she rifled through the objects nearest the entrance of the cellar until she came out with a sharpened stone tool and a rustic hammer made of a roughly cylindrical stone with a wooden handle fitted into a hole and tied with rope. (Maybe she would have looked for different tools, but she hardly fit through the door and was too old to bend over.) She looked around people’s feet until she saw a hunk of a wooden branch, weathered by a few years on the forest floor. She grunted and pointed to it, a normal form of cummination for a senior Potamusian. The person standing nearest held it out to her and she began to carve a wavy line into the wood.
Onlookers gasped and mumbled around her.
“Amazing what you can do with a good pair of hands. I’m not even an artist, never was.” Eedit spoke matter-of-factly, though various emotions courses rampantly through the group of onlookers.
There were several seconds of silence and then a barrage of questions.
You mean you knew people who did this stuff— this art?
How do your hands hold on so well? How do you know the hammer will hit the chisel?
Maybe she is a seed-eater.
Impossible.
How does she know all of this?
What else has she been hiding?
She still didn’t answer the crowd except to say, “Come with me.”
If they weren’t such a lazy bunch, the would have grown impatient at her stiff waddle to the beach. She waded in and waited silently for everyone’s attention. The crowd was electric, though they were unsure if they should be appalled or excited. She raised her hands in the air and a thick hush fell over the people. Most of the island’s residents were there and those who weren’t on account of a nap or romantic slosh in the shallows would never admit it afterwards.
Eedit kept her hands up as she turned and faced away from the crowd. She bent at the waist and it looked like a regular seaweed harvest. Except instead of plunging her entire head under the water, she simply reached her hands down near her feet and jerked up some seaweed.
Everyone gasped. One grown man Potamusian slung his nose to the side and began to speak, “But we don’t—”
“We did!” Eedit interrupted. “And I stlll do. Every morning.”
“It’s shameful!” Shouted another.
“We couldn’t possibly act like seed-eaters!”
“The depravation!”
Eedit rolled her eyes. “You’ll never be mistaken for depraved seed-eaters. You’re very clearly the haughtiest, most narrow-mided sea-weed eaters the ocean has ever seen. You were supposed to eat in the shallows not be shallow.”
Toz laughed at her cranky pun and joined her in the water. “Will you show me how?”
Eedit raised her head in ascent but someone interrupted. “Now, wait a minute.” One of the older residents came forward, though he was still much younger than Eedit, young enough to be her child or even grandchild. “This is just not how we do things.”
“No, you listen here. I’m too tired to go along with this anymore. How do you think I out-healthed you all in the waist-line despite the fact that for the last fifty years you lot have trapsed in and out of my house all day for advice and recipes and salty drinks and seaweed snacks? Not that I wasn’t happy to, because I pull up more seaweed in an hour or two than you all in an entire day. You’re wasting your time.”
The crowd shifted uncomfortably. Then, the same man spoke up. “But our noses— that the way we’ve always done it.”
The ancient Potamusian sighed as if she was scrounging around to find the last ounce of patience inside her. “I’m not asking you to forsake what’s been given to you. I’m telling you the you’ll be better off if you stop clenching what you’ve added to it.” With that Eedit turned and began to show Toz how to squeeze his hands tightly and pull upward with his arms. Many Potumusians joined them in the water, intrigued by this method that kept the saltwater out of their inadequate ears. Others, waited on the beach for a while before either deciding to join or returning to their homes and harvesting beaches.
“They’re not all as bad off as they seem. Some of them just need to test it out in private. You’ll see.” Eedit grunted in a way that slightly resembled a chuckle. The remaining tension of exploring this new old way of doing things was sliced to bits by laughter when she added, “Before you know it, they’ll be fat as a tree.”
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