|
Dr. Omed and the Cargo Goddess
His Loveliness the Pope (SDAABS) has long been a devotee of the Cargo Goddess, and often makes pilgrimages to Her Shrines and Temples—the flea market, thrift stores, Goodwill and Salvation Army. When I was down and out, poor and crazy in Denver, I shopped in the alleys. I worship as I shop, an urban hunter-gatherer sifting the detritus of other people’s discarded possessions for hints from deity; “rags and tatters from Salvation Army counters,” as Leonard Cohen puts it. The Goddess of All Cargo is generous, and I find many interesting things, in answer to my prayers.
A little show and tell is called for at this point. At the flea market one fine spring day I picked up a little musty volume entitled THE HISTORICAL EVIDENCES OF THE TRUTH OF THE SCRIPTURAL RECORDS STATED ANEW, WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE DOUBTS AND DISCOVERIES OF MODERN TIMES, by George Rawlinson, MA., Late fellow and tutor of Exeter College, copyrighted 1860. A big title for a little book, originally given a series of lectures, in reaction against the German bible scholars who were digging into the historicity (or lack thereof) of the New Testament at the time. I opened the book and tucked between two pages was a picture cut out of a magazine or newspaper, depicting a rubenesque female cupid in tights perched on an orchid. I fell to my knees in the dirt and praised the Goddess for this sign. Well, not really. But I paid the fat man in the booth a dollar for it, and have treasured it ever since as a goddess given sign of my vocation. |
