Silver Orb

'The Norse mythology of the early 325 A.D. told the story of the night sky in an attempt to explain the moon. Sung by a wandering barb, the story gathered fame across Europe, but was later forgotten during the age of the Crusaders. In the myth, three goddesses played with their father’s golden eyeball during a summer afternoon when the father laid napping. Supposedly, when the father woke up he slipped on his own eyeball and the small ball bounced from heaven, down the Staircase of Hope and dropped down on Hell’s stomach. The nomads who roam in Hell called the stomach, Father Sky. However, the sky already hosted an ornament, and when the jealous Sun saw the golden eyeball, she weaved her magic, turned the eyeball silver and banished far away. The goddesses’ father, to the girls’ surprise and relief, was pleased by the outcome. Now, when night fell, the gods used the moon to watch the humans and to record the many sins and follies darkness brought out from people.'

I raised head and looked bemusedly at my grandmother. Tugging at my grandmother’s hand woven sweater, I pointed to the last line of the paragraph. Nearby the intercom announced the closing time of the museum and a guard began setting up the normal night procedure.

“Ne, ne, grandma!” I tried to shake my grandmother’s attention away from a small duplicate of the moon, hanging above the paragraph of explanation. “Is that true grandma?”

My grandmother looked down at me and I was surprised by the scowl marring her usually kind face. Walking away from the exhibit, she took my small hand and began another one of her stories. I refrained from rolling my eyes.

“Once upon a time, when the sky was covered in darkness, a young warrior took up the commanding presence of the night. He was the son of the last imperial family and in order to save his village from thieves creeping in at sunset, the brave man decided to take up an impossible task. Journeying across the River of Soul, he was ordered by the Moon God to make a chain of human ears in the shape of the moon. Appalled by the command, the warrior decided to sacrifice the cows instead, but afraid that the God might realize the truth, he took off one of his own ears too.”

My grandmother turned and knelt down besides me, “To this day, the moon shines steadily for humans at night, but when the night is cloudy, we say that the God is punishing the warrior for his deceit.”

Trying not to grimace, I blurt out the question I had been anxious to ask my grandmother in a long time. Staring at her back, I asked solemnly, “Grandma, why must your stories be so grotesque?”