Tag Archives: loneliness

Alone With The Pigs

Share

(This is Part 2 in a story of the prodigal son. Read Part 1 here.)

The desert was no place for a man in silk. Blowing sand pierced the fine cloth, peppering his skin. It stung his unprotected eyes, burned his face.

Weak, hungry, alone, he cursed the sand and wind, cursed the city that mocked him, cursed the useless silk, cursed his birth. He cursed his father’s birth to the pastoral life from which he’d run. An unfamiliar odor assaulted his sand-whipped nostrils; he cursed the stench. Then, through squinted eyes he saw it: a herd of swine, their irritated squealing riding the wind toward him. He cursed the unclean beasts even as he hoped the drovers might spare him some bread.

“For a price,” they said. “Stay with this swine this night. What they don’t eat is yours.”

This night became two, then five, then a month. The famine that starved the land tore at his stomach. He watched in vain hope that the pigs would leave more than scraps, but even their rations were meager and their owner dared not feed them less; even in famine, no one wanted to buy a skinny pig.

Finally, lying awake, cold, and hungry in the desert night, sense came to him. The life he’d so longed to escape—the animals always needing care and feeding, the constant repairs to fences and troughs, the bucolic boredom—these were again his lot … minus the plentiful food on his father’s table. Even the ranch hands ate better than he ate now.

But how could he return? How could he possibly face again the father whom he had all but declared dead when he demanded his inheritance? Could he humble himself before the man he had so humiliated? Yet nothing could be more humiliating than his present state: silk rags torn and stained, body reeking of pig dung, hair and beard filthy and matted. It was decided then; he would return, fall on his knees, and beg for employment as a ranch hand.

It hadn’t been hard to leave that day, so many months before. It wasn’t hard to leave this day, either.

Part 3 coming soon….

It Wasn’t Hard to Leave That Day

Share

It wasn’t hard to leave that day. The conversation was awkward—”Dad, I want my share. Now, please.”—but walking away wasn’t hard. There wasn’t much to take; less to leave behind. He’d never fit, anyway. The work, the animals, the quiet but grueling life of a nomadic sheepherder. Adventure called, and the city they’d passed two days earlier. No, it wasn’t hard to leave that day.

He’d sold his share of the flocks and with the silver weighing down his bag, turned his face toward the city. Soon, having traded his bedouin robe for city silks, he sought new life in the strangely solid buildings. Friends were easy to find; wine, an enticing invitation. Never again would loneliness sit heavy in his heart. Little did he know that his dark, herdsman’s skin and heavy purse betrayed his ignorance and innocence. Had he known, he would only have worked harder to win the friendship of ones already willing to drink from his bottle. He slept little, and never alone.

Far away, another man also slept little, his aloneness magnified by the vastness of the familiar night sky. At first light he scanned the horizons. Each setting sun darkened his hope a little more. 

The endless city noise grew deafening. The constant press of people—even the women sharing his bed—only magnified the loneliness he tried constantly to escape. The wine only made him forget last night; morning carried memories of home – and the love he’d never acknowledged. Day by day, his purse grew lighter. When it was at last empty, so were his bed and table. No face in town knew his; no familiar face did he see. Alone. Again.

The flocks grew, replenishing the loss of the too-soon divided inheritance. But even as the pens filled to bursting, so the father’s broken heart spilled out its last hope. Still he watched….

It wasn’t hard to leave that day. What was hard was knowing which way to go. The city spurned him, its lights and sounds betraying the emptiness of a false life—and revealing his own emptiness. No, it wasn’t hard to leave that day.

(to be continued…)