Visions of Happiness: Collected Short Stories

By Norman Nathan

This anthology comprises two collections of short stories, “Extraordinaries and Eschatologies” and “Why God Made the World.” These thirty-eight stories have never been published before as collections, although many of them have been published individually.

In discussing “Extraordinaries and Eschatologies,” Dr. Nathan stated that he hoped this collection would have special appeal to readers of short fiction because the stories are unconventional and varied. Many of the stories use satire to advance their themes. The style of writing communicates quickly, avoiding long descriptions that barely advance the story line.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 29, 2019
• ISBN: 9781543458565

Norman Nathan

A professor emeritus of English literature at Florida Atlantic University (FAU), Dr. Norman Nathan published more than 550 poems, 6 books, 39 short stories, and 62 scholarly articles during his prolific writing career. Dr. Nathan’s poems and works of fiction covered a wide range of topics, including, to name a few, the seeming contradictions between the principles of physics and human experience; his childhood growing up in the New York City and Hoboken, New Jersey, areas; aging; politics and economics; biblical themes; English literary themes; and overpopulation.

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EXTRAORDINARIES AND ESCHATOLOGIES

THE ORACLE AT THE UNITED NATIONS

¹

Divinity was disturbed. How long, oh man, how long, God lamented, will you bicker unendingly over problems of zero importance? For the airwaves were filled with nonsense like, Who hit the most home runs left-handed during July? "Is none a singular or a plural noun? or How can we maintain peace if we don’t have enough armaments to destroy the world?"

So God said between two moments of time, Let there be an oracle on the front lawn of the United Nations in New York. And there was an oracle as ordained.

Despite the oracle’s ability to give correct answers to difficult mathematical problems, all the nations on the Security Council agreed that it was phony. The most newsworthy clergymen called it a tool of the devil, for it had no working parts, no visible source of energy, and no receptacle for contributions.

When the Gallup and Harris Polls both showed 100% hostility to the oracle, however, the official attitudes altered. Never before had there been universal agreement about anything. Clearly the hand of the Lord was making itself manifest.

Suddenly long lines waited around the clock to ask the oracle for help. You really do love Susan, Queen Elizabeth the First was a virgin, and You can’t multiply by zero were some of the reported prognostications. But the oracle stubbornly refused to give information about the future—whether about the stock market or a horse race—and some few remembered the symbolism in the Bible when God said to Moses, You can see my back, but not my face.

Any request for the truth of the present received an answer. Questions on health were rewarded with prescriptions, despite full-page ads in newspapers by the medical associations proclaiming the advantages of consulting a physician of your own choice.

And suppose, a noted heart surgeon suggested, God wanted you in Heaven and prescribed accordingly? After that, most preferred less than divine assistance—particularly those fundamentalists who felt that if they refused God’s medicine they’d go to Hell.

But innumerable other areas of advice remained. To accommodate the hordes, a board was established to make rules for oracle users. The long-winded were forcibly removed, as were those who kept arguing after their questions were answered. Finally, the law required everyone merely to think his question, for the Lord understood without benefit of syntax.

Sociologists, theologians, psychologists, psychiatrists, and librarians insisted in vain that all questions and answers be given to them for their files and for research purposes. A certain head of state (though this could never be proved) tried to bug the oracle. The CIA, in a secret memorandum, said it couldn’t be done. A terrorist tried to blow it up. But as the bomb exploded, its force was propelled back into fragments of metal. Could the oracle produce atomic fusion? None found out.

Apparently the oracle was human-tamper proof. Try to write your name on the hard, brilliant surface—it was like trying to write on water!

Strangely enough, among the millions of questions presented to the oracle, not one involved (as far as anyone could prove) preventing war or overcoming famine. As one diplomat, speaking off the record, put it, Suppose we didn’t like the answer? Suppose God told us that our enemies were right? How subversive can you get, putting questions of state to an oracle!

The most frequent question, according to exit polls, was how to increase sexual enjoyment. The oracle pointed out that it was mainly a matter of psychology, an answer that pleased very few.

Philosophers deplored the use of the oracle as curbing profound thinking, while anthropologists eventually approved, once it had become part of the earth’s culture.

A famous psychiatrist demurred. It’s futile to question God about one’s ego, id, or superego. Granted that the Lord will supply answers. But we all know that answers are worthless unless you discover them for yourself. Now, twenty or thirty sessions on my couch … .

Historians found a strange sequence among those who followed the solution to their difficulties by presenting additional problems, in violation of the law requiring the thinking of only one question.

One Lucius Quiver, for example, once asked, Which is the tastier food, apples or cornflakes! God replied, Apples. Imagine Eve tempted by cornflakes!

As was revealed in Quiver’s trial, he violated the law by asking orally, Which is the tastier for me? God said, Apples.

Barely able to function, Quiver continued, May I invoke the privilege of freedom of conscience to say that I, misguided though I am, think cornflakes are tastier?

No, the oracle replied, for you don’t think so.

The arresting officer said that the look on Quiver’s face as he staggered out of the oracle was indescribable. He was fined five hundred dollars, but TV appearances and a book earned him half a million.

Any violation of the rules governing the oracle has since been made a capital offense.

THE MINIMUM OF THINGS

²

Don’t be startled. That’s right, I’m really talking. Talking for the first time in a long while. And I know there’s someone in the room because I’ve just been fed.

You can’t be Martha. You must be a nurse taking care of me. But whoever you are, there’s something I want to tell you. Not just yet, for it’s important that you take down every word. You’ll need time to arrange for a stenographer or a tape recorder. You should also get in touch with my wife and probably some medical doctors so that they can be here.

Nine meals after this, call it at meal ten, I’ll tell you my story. Until then I’ll repeat these directions each time I’m fed.

* * *

I suppose you’re looking at me, still shocked, wondering just how much is left of me. No doubt you’ve wondered many times whether I’m alive at all, whether I’m not just a kind of reflex action like part of a worm after the life’s been crushed out of it. You know I can’t see. I can’t hear anything either. I can hardly remember what taste and smell are like. And I have almost no feeling. Almost, for there’s one thing I can feel, and that’s kept me alive. When something touches my tongue I feel it, slight though the sensation is. I can’t tell hot from cold, liquid from solid. I only sense that something’s there, and I do what must be swallowing, because I’m alive and I’m being nourished.

That’s how I know I can talk. I still have power over my tongue and throat muscles. Since I can eat, my jaws must move—and even my lips. I can think, too. But most significant of all, I can use my imagination. That’s why you have to put down every word I say. I’ve something important to tell you.

To prove my brain’s just as good as ever, I’ll begin with my name. I’m Robert Macy. I lived in Ramsdale in central New York. My wife’s name is Martha and I’ve one son.

This must be a hospital room since a case such as mine doesn’t go home. But when I first spoke I asked you to get in touch with Martha, and I’ll assume that she’s here. It’s pleasant to think so, and I like to imagine pleasant things.

Don’t be surprised, Martha dear, that I tell my story so fluently. I’ve rehearsed it many times. You can’t question me, and I had to be sure that every word was carefully chosen.

Some people will think me cruel to want you to know that I’m really alive. Maybe you’ve grown accustomed to my being an almost lifeless thing. Have I the right to bring back memories? But I’ve always been an experimenter, and I must chance this too, even though I can’t check the result.

For I feel that I can give you something, Martha, something too valuable to be lost, something that we could only grope at before I went away. I want you to know that you no longer need pity me my present condition. I want to prove to you that I’ve always loved you and still love you.

You remember our quarrel when I left for Australia. I seemed almost glad to go, you said. I joked about a man my size needing a chance to get out from under the heel of so tiny a wife. You were hurt. You turned away. That’s what you always did. You never cried or flared up. When something happened that displeased you, you turned away.

I took you by the arm and pulled you back. Do you think I’m really leaving you because I’m going away? I said. You’re always with a person you love. You frowned, and then you clung close. Then I left.

Curiosity, I suppose, had made me not reluctant to go. I never felt the need for physical nearness that you did. You knew I loved you. Yet I still recall the anguish on your face when I honestly said that I could go away without any remorse except for the pain I was causing you.

You were hurt again when I couldn’t be by you when our child was born. I remember your last letter to me. The last one I read, that is. You’d called him Robert, too. That was just like you. I’d have been willing to call him anything. Even Experiment the First. You were too much in a hurry to wait to include a snapshot. If you ever sent that picture, I didn’t get it. Because it was just after I’d read about my son that the accident occurred.

It’s not difficult to figure out what happened to me. I alone was to blame. I was working with materials potentially dangerous. I didn’t have to be quite so adventuresome.

But when I got to Australia—I wrote you about it; I’m sure I must have written you about it—I found my formula not as effective as I’d hoped. It had been great for paralyzing and killing insects back in the States. But in Australia many species quickly built up a tolerance for the stuff.

Something was wrong and I had to continue my experiments. Of course, I had to be careful. Anything too deadly might kill helpful insects and other creatures such as birds. Nevertheless, I proceeded to try for a stronger insecticide.

Only a little while before the accident happened, I had a chilling thought. I’d just changed the formula by increasing the proportion of chlorine. Suppose the new stuff got on me. Maybe it could paralyze me too! I’d better check it, I thought, and looked around for something alive and expendable.

There was a parakeet in the lab. I sort of owned him. One of my assistants had gone back to the States and left the bird behind. Here was an ideal means of testing the new formula.

I brought the cage over to the table. I had a trace of remorse for what I might do to the parakeet. Wasn’t he happy in his own world? Still, my new stuff probably wouldn’t hurt him at all. At any rate, I had no choice. I had to find out what would happen.

With a glass tube I siphoned several drops of the formula. I lifted the tube above the cage and released the liquid on the parakeet’s wing.

For a moment he stiffened. Then he fluttered his wings. A drop shot into my eye and I felt a sharp, burning pain. The vial filled with my formula was right in front of me. I must have grabbed it involuntarily and spilled the stuff over my hands. All I know is that I shivered once violently.

When I regained consciousness I was more rested than I’d ever been. I tried to open my eyes, for I could see nothing. Then I assumed I was having a peculiar sort of dream. Much time must have passed before it came to me that I wasn’t sleeping and that I could no longer see.

It occurred to me to listen to try to find out where I was. I heard nothing. Less than nothing, for the man who can use his ears will hear noises even when he’s alone, holding his breath in the middle of a cornfield. I know. I once did it. Suddenly I realized the truth. All my senses were gone. I tried to move. No, I couldn’t even try to move. I felt as if I were suspended from nothing, by nothing in mid-air. There was no gravity, no friction, no flexing of the muscles that would let me, if not move, at least exert some pressure.

I remember when we first bought our home. It was winter and the car battery was dead. To get the car started I had to push it into the road and then coast downhill. But there was a rut in the driveway and a back wheel slid into it. I tried to push the car out of the rut. It wouldn’t budge. I felt helpless. But at least I could try to push. You don’t know what it is, not to be able to try.

I was desperate, but I wanted to console myself. It would soon be over. I would soon die. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep. I had no way of telling time. No sun set to tell me that the day was over. No clock ticked away the seconds and the hours. I couldn’t even sense my breathing.

Mentally I began to count. It would take a minute to count to a hundred. That meant it would take a day to reach one hundred and forty-four thousand. Don’t laugh. Remember, I had to invent ways of finding out what was happening to me. I reached half a million, and still I felt rested, had no need of sleep. By my figuring that meant over three days, more than seventy-two hours without sleep. Suppose I counted fast. Suppose it was three hundred to a minute, if someone could count that fast. Still it would have been over a day, and I should have fallen asleep.

I realized what I was trying to do. I wanted to count the last bit of my life away. I had no hope of regaining command of my muscles or the use of my senses. My formula had been only too successful. Apparently, it wouldn’t so much kill a living organism as render it helpless so that it would quickly die of malnutrition. Unless, that is, some humanitarian code prolonged its life. Then it would live on for a while in a state removed from death only by a sense of arithmetic. I could count. And I wanted to die counting, so that I would have no time to think. As a person is supposed to count sheep to remove awareness of his surroundings until he falls asleep, I was going to count until I fell asleep forever.

I won’t tell you how high I went. You couldn’t believe it. At length I gave up, realizing that I was doomed to live. But how was I being fed? Not intravenously, for I noticed that occasionally my tongue and throat muscles surely were moving. After each of these periods, my thinking processes slowed down a bit. The difference was hardly great. Remember that immobile as I was, any whim of a sensation would be like sunlight to the eyes of a man bolting out of a dark room. Clearly, whoever was taking care of me could feed me, and I was eating as instinctively as a newborn baby.

Don’t think, Martha, that this discovery pleased me. Life seemed worthless to me in my condition. Worse than worthless—boring, desperate, maddening, miserable. At times I would think I was really dead, living in some kind of a devil’s heaven with nothing to do and no place to go. I tried not to eat. When I felt my tongue moving I tried to stop the movement. I quickly discovered that I couldn’t even die by refusing to eat, any more than a baby can refuse to grow in the womb by rejecting the flow of the umbilical that feeds it.

Fortunately, it didn’t occur to me that since I could move my tongue and throat muscles, I could talk. I could ask whoever was within earshot to put me out of my miserable existence. Perhaps a good-hearted nurse could do this without throwing any suspicion on herself. My health surely was precarious. Just not feed me for a few days or give me only water without nourishment, and I should surely die hardly aware that I was going, and without pain.

Let me repeat, fortunately I didn’t realize that I could speak. If I had, I should have begged for my death and might have lost the greatest opportunity that life ever presented to me.

I can see you turning away as you hear this. How could I be happier now than I ever was, living without being close to you and never having seen my son? Yet I love you, Martha, and I love him, though I don’t know whether he’s a year or ten years old, for I have little conception of time. I live only in the now. And I’ve learned more clearly what true love is. It doesn’t depend upon possession, upon holding something tight in your hands. It’s only when you haven’t a single demand from someone that you can best love him. I can’t tell you in words what I mean. You couldn’t fully understand it. I hope that when I’ve finished my story you’ll at least be able to imagine just how I feel toward you.

Since there was nothing else I could do, I set myself ways of passing time. It was useless to try to continue where I left off in the lab. You can’t conduct experiments without physical test tubes, and you need chemicals, not a dash of imagination, to put into these test tubes.

At last I tried a hobby that I’d often neglected—books. Back in high school, before I specialized in chemistry, I’d been a great reader. I never read many books, but there were several that I’d read over and over.

Robinson Crusoe had been one of my favorites. With the passing years, I’d almost forgotten it. I tried to recall not merely the general story but the intimate details of his life alone on a deserted island. I identified myself with Crusoe, for I too was alone.

I added to the book. At first I saw him as a man of middling height, of spare figure, with two teeth missing and gold crowns on four others. It amused me to include these trifles. What did it matter that I mixed up twentieth-century dentistry with an eighteenth-century novel? Hadn’t Shakespeare, the greatest story teller of them all, done the same thing with the works he borrowed from?

Gradually I noticed that Crusoe added several inches to his height, his teeth became sound, and he had three pounds too much about his mid-section. In fact, the title of the book changed to Robert Macy. My problems were greater than Crusoe’s. I had to build a new life without sticks and stones, wind and rain, or animals and a man Friday. Since my problems were greater, my book would be greater.

Further changes occurred. Robert Macy grew dim in my vision. Soon he had no height, no teeth, no awareness of the sensible world outside him. He became in the book what I am. It was easier for me to live my new life if I saw myself as an objective character in a book.

Was there anything that my major character, myself, could do without the aid of his muscles or of his fellow humans? Listening to music suggested itself to me. I’d often hummed to myself in the past. You don’t have to have a band playing in order to hear music. I began to go over melodies I’d heard. At first the impression was vague. I was much like a baby learning to walk. But finally, I began to hear music as clearly and distinctly as if I were listening to a Philharmonic broadcast on a Sunday afternoon.

Then I became the leader of my own orchestra. Mercilessly I picked out our flaws until we could really play. We improved with each concert. I improvised. Needless to say, I soon preferred my own music to that of the most famous composers.

I can see you smile a bit at this. My sense of humor, you say. But believe me, Martha, people can play finer music in their own minds than any they’ve ever heard. It takes time, I admit. I have time—so much of it that I don’t even know how much. Grant one thing. Even at the best of concerts the seat you’re in grows hard. You have to shift your position. Someone in the audience whispers, and you see yourself shortly on trial for manslaughter. But I can listen to music without any distractions.

I can’t tell whether I listen for a few minutes or days at a time. All that I know is that I get exactly as much as I want. I feel that my life in creating music is better than that of other composers. They measure their productions in terms of time. A person is a year older, and only one sonata written. Or he’s spent a week vainly searching for a few bars of music. I don’t know how long I wait before inspiration comes. All that I know is that it does come, and the interim of failure seems as short as sleep between two active days.

I do more in my book than write and listen to music. Who can bear to live alone—if there’s a choice? So I live with people. I live with you. Not in a world of delusion but in a real world. I can’t tell you what you are doing at the moment. The important thing is that I know how you think and how you feel. I know you now much better than I used to.

I can trace this knowledge back to our earliest dates. I tried to dress neatly just to please you. You even read part of a chemistry book. Gradually we both gave up the sham, though you never would remove your bookmark. We found that the only thing that mattered was our feeling for each other. That’s why I know you still love me. Some people will doubt that I can know anything. But I understand you, and therefore I’m as confident as a man can be that you still love me. I say this because I don’t want you to feel sorry for me. I want you to be as happy as I am. There’s nothing but certainty in my mind about you.

I’m even getting to know other human beings intimately. One by one I become other individuals. I reason with their minds, see things with their eyes, and even try to quake with their fears. Strangely enough, problems vanish when you see them with the personalities of others.

The world becomes to me a gigantic experiment. When a person does wrong, it’s like a chemist mixing the wrong chemicals. Sometimes the lab blows up. But each year we get to know what chemicals not to mix. I don’t suppose we’ll ever completely stop explosions. The point is that each year we learn more.

But I’m getting preachy, and I don’t want you to think that my life is like that. It’s not like that at all. What my life is really like is that I’ve become an artist. I merge into the personalities of others. I’ve a freedom and exuberance I never felt when I was confined to my own little world of the senses. Far more than in the tale of Robinson Crusoe, I’ve made a universe of what many would call a deserted island.

Perhaps this strikes you as not quite sane. Living in this darkness has affected me, you say? But doesn’t everyone live in darkness? How do you know that what you call living, the other people you see around you—how can you be sure that it’s not all a fantastic dream? Maybe you’ve dreamt up your world, dreamt me up, dreamt up all your five senses. Are you really any more secure in your world than I am in mine?

I imagine my voice must be becoming weak. I’ve talked a great deal. I’ll speak again only if I have something new and important to say. I leave you, Martha darling, and you, my son, with a final word to show my love for you.

I’ve found something. I can be happy, more than I’ve ever realized, with the very minimum of material things. It’s almost as if I’ve reached Heaven and found it not filled with rich clothes and rare foods, but just a place in which all human beings need no more than sufficient fuel to keep their imaginations working.

I’ve carried my yen for scientific experiment into the utmost realm. My laboratory is the mind and my elements are infinite.

And when I die I may be much the same as I am now. Except, perhaps, I won’t have to feel the slight movement of my tongue and throat.

DIARY OF AN IMMIGRANT

³

After I left the immigration bureau, I decided to walk about to familiarize myself with the general appearance of the city. That nobody paid any attention to me, foreign as I must have looked, was a good sign. As I had expected, here I would find absolutely no prejudice.

I would wait until I overheard an American or British accent, or even French or German. In this cosmopolitan area, it shouldn’t take long to meet someone who knew one of these semi-international languages, which I spoke fluently. It was perhaps two hours later, having heard no familiar sounds, that I approached a rather distinguished looking man.

Could you please tell me … . My mouth dwindled to a close, for I had hardly uttered the first word when the man almost bolted away from me.

Here, too, looks are deceptive, I said, quickly calming myself. I walked over to a group, one member of which appeared to be entertaining the others.

Far from answering the questions that poured out of my mouth, they greeted me only with silence. This rudeness was repeated time and again as I approached others. Something about my manner or voice must be offensive, I thought. I decided to watch the natives and pick up their custom of greeting.

In just a short while, the shadow of a pattern began to emerge. Though I understood not one syllable that I overheard, I could detect that two languages, or, more likely, two dialects, were being spoken. Some individuals, rather sullen looking and crude in their overall appearance, spoke in coarse and nasal tones. Others, quickly distinguished by their generally cheerful attitude and an air of courtesy—except, of course, when I came near—spoke softly and musically. The two types kept sharply apart, and I felt that my chances of success would be better if I tried to make friends with one group only.

The happier looking people appealed more to me, and I decided to show them my good intentions by speaking more softly and avoiding English words that had harsh sounds. My care was fruitless, for again and again I met with hostility. Since I was a stranger and couldn’t afford the luxury of discouragement, I permitted myself to be rebuffed for hours.

Could it be that they understood me but disliked Americans? I put on my purest German and tried different questions. Where’s the best restaurant in this neighborhood? I asked, as if I were merely from another part of the city. I varied my approach. I smiled. I frowned. I spoke through my nose; I spoke with a musical voice. Nothing helped.

Apparently I’d have to pick up one of their dialects by being attentive, getting key words like yes, no, hello. I’d watch gestures. It would take time. But I had come to stay, and this place was to be home.

What I really needed at the moment was a hotel, to locate myself. While I couldn’t read the signs, there was enough evidence that certain buildings might very well be hotels. I entered a large, likely looking place and was quite pleased to see the traditional desk and a man who in all probability was a clerk. Yes, even the register was in plain view.

By this time I was too wary to speak. I reached quickly for the desk pen and moved to sign the register. The clerk, however, grabbed my arm and closed the book. He spoke the musical dialect. I was afraid to answer. I made motions. Let him think me a deaf mute.

But I soon gave up and had to ask, Could I please have a room? It was no surprise to see his face grow tense. He tightly clutched the register as long as I remained near the desk. Half-heartedly I tried to console myself that this hotel must be filled. Wearily I thought to myself, I’ll try another.

I could, of course, have gone back and complained to the immigration bureau. But I didn’t want to risk being considered a troublemaker lest I be transported to a city reputed even more inhuman than I found this one to be.

With no place to stay, I wondered what would happen when night came. If I slept in the street, would I be arrested? Then, at least, someone would have to talk to me. Or would I be silently shelved into jail and released when my time was up, only to find myself once again picked up for vagrancy?

Despite the fact that I’d been equally rebuffed by all the natives, I still felt a hint of kinship with the soft-toned people. I encouraged myself to think that in time I’d learn their language. I noted a consistent word they said in passing or at the opening of conversations. This must be a common greeting.

I practiced a bit with the word before I tried my luck. [_], I said eventually as I approached a cheerful face. (Spelling the word won’t help. It’s the way of saying it that makes all the difference.)

The stranger opened his mouth to reply, no doubt puzzled by my not quite proper tone, made as if to respond, and then silently walked by. I must improve my pronunciation, my manner, whatever, until I received an audible reply. Then I’d be able to figure out the meaning of a few more words. In time I’d approach sounding like a native.

It seemed ages that I’d been walking so hopelessly. Yet night did not come and I began to wonder about the climate