Simcha and Me

 

We sat by the lake and looked at the sky. As we looked a fly went by.

"Hey, that's weird," I said.

"What," asked Simcha.

"It's a story from my childhood."

"I remember," he said, then shook his head and added, "Not really."

"There's a fly. It zooms past in a panic. It's being chased by a frog."

"The frog wants to eat the fly. This is a simple story," he nodded.

"Not really. The frog is running from a cat, who is running from a dog."

"So no one is chasing the fly?"

"No one."

Simcha laughed like he was remembering something horrible.

"It's like that in life," he said.

"There's a war in my world," I told him. 

"I know."

"I like the bad guy."

"Why?"

"He doesn't seem so bad, but my friend can hear explosions from her window. How can that not be bad?"

Simcha took a deep breath.

"I can tell you something about that," he said. "In all my years I've never seen a necessary war or a person who did not need redemption, and I am older than this lake and you and everything chasing that fly. Everyone likes their own bad guy."

"Why?"

"We're like that fly. We each have our own perspective." He paused and asked like he knew the answer, "How does the story end?"

"It was all a mistake. There was a lamb with its hoof stuck in a metal bucket. The noise scared a man who ran, which scared a fox, who scared a cow, who scared a pig, who scared the dog. They were each running away from something and scaring the animal in front of them."

"It's like that in life," he said like he was remembering something horrible.

We sat by the lake and looked at the sky.