The Crime

 

The Crime

 

Already in the beginning of time humans had begun their migration upwards after the pearl that was said to lie on top of the mountain. The first generations made it to a certain altitude and built temporary villages on the mountainside where they bore children who would move further up the mountain. This the children did, building villages and leaving behind at the stage in question evidence of their primitive culture, endeavors and existence, as well as axes, weapons, tools, pelts and symbols. Their children set off further up the mountain to make it possible for future generations to reach the pearl at the summit; they built temporary villages and left behind clothing, tools and symbols, as well as certain half-animal, half-linguistic expressions that were mostly unintelligible noises which resulted in equally incomprehensible laughter. Their children began moving further up the mountain, leaving behind clothes, tools, symbols and slightly more refined written signs like “boo”, “mammoth” and “penguin”. Their children climbed on, further up the mountain, built temporary villages, began doing arithmetic with half-mathematical symbols that applied some of the numbers we use today, and left behind certain linguistic written characters like “dog”, “Messiah”, “clothes line,” “invention” and “Satan”, but there was no real form of communication, and to the observer – God, for example – the many disconnected words appeared meaningless, while it meant a lot to these people merely to be able to express concepts in the same way - even though they didn’t know what these concepts were - so that one day “Messiah” was a hen, the next day a hound, and for that matter it was only the word “clothes line” that was used regularly for a longer period of time as the designation for an axe. Their children proceeded to build new villages further up the mountain in their quest to reach the pearl; they figured more with the use of more mathematics, invented entire number systems and left behind a largely unintelligible alphabet for their descendents which these descendents gradually understood, though not in the way of their ancestors. Their children, in turn, were capable of refined speech and able to agree on specific common feelings and describe them with words; they began to understand that people could be different and feel differently, and differentiated themselves from the masses, whose descendents these days yell derogatory words to others whom, as individuals, attempt to be the first to reach the pearl in a wild sprint straight up the mountain, not bothering to build houses that would indicate a certain humility, namely the insight that it would be future generations - or future generations’ grandchildren - who will reach the pearl, or, more realistically, be at all capable of forming the notion of it being possible.

    Today these people stand on the mountain top, one by one, and wonder why there is no pearl, for apparently they expect more than - by virtue of a common language – being able to philosophize about why the pearl isn’t there and perhaps has never been there; so that it is merely the primitive ancestors’ primitive hope that has turned into cultivated, vindictive hopelessness. But the people haven’t been cheated, for said pearl had been rolling for centuries down the mountain, at the foot of which it was picked up by a little boy who made it into a necklace that he gave to his proud mother, who gave him a kiss on the cheek in thanks and used it three times at the clique-like, primitive occasions prevalent in the days before humans had discovered the mountain, and that, god knows, couldn’t have been particularly gratifying. Whoever it was in the beginning of time – whether it was a person or a god – that gave the pearl its light shove and whatever the shove meant, and whether so old an intention can be the same for those who presently ponder it: the lack of the prospect of having this crime solved fills the people at the top with a redeeming hope and more truthful hopelessness.