It is becoming clearer to me that however much one may think one is ready for change, the truth is always far beyond what was expected.  My first assignment is no exception.

For those who may not know, a new Cupid begins his work in the early spring of the Earth year.  This is when the air begins to grow warmer, when life returns to the Garden, and when the human culture says that one should look up, look out, begin to expect change.  It is easier to influence most of them in these days, and so our superiors use this time to bring in new workers, so that we may learn in a simple case.  Their definition of simple, however, would not be the same as mine.

Lamarr Woods lives in a small room on the bottom of a building full of small rooms and too many people.  His home, if one can call it by such an affectionate word, is full of chaos.  The windows are dirty, allowing in little light, while his belongings are scattered all across the floor.  I would be amazed to know how he finds anything that he needs.  He even sleeps[1] in chaos—his body mostly uncovered, the “sheets” nearly falling off of his bed.[2]

I admit that I was dismayed, at first.  Of course we all hope to be helping good people, those who have resisted the downward pull of the Enemy and who nurture light in Its very shadow.  Are those not those whom we should reward?  Lamarr, at first glance, did not seem to be one of those people.  His body was unwashed and uncultivated, and his aura was dull, holding no extraordinary talent or intelligence.

“Judgment is not your task here, Asa’el,” Danit told me.  “Look under his pillow.”

Of course, she had to explain to me what the pillow was—the object on which the human’s head rests when he or she sleeps—but when I did, I looked underneath it, and there was one of the humans’ versions of the Repository.

Danit explained to me that humans will often keep precious things under their pillows.  It is a location close to their minds when their minds are most like ours, when they are closest to remembering what they once were.  In sleep, they keep their treasures close.  “You can learn much from a person from what they keep close in sleep, what they reach for first upon waking.”

She was right—even before we heard Lamarr’s thoughts sharpen toward wakefulness, his hand reached for the book, and his first act on waking was to open it and read a passage.  Then he rose, went to wash his body, and turned directly to prayers.

It was the first time I saw a human worship.  Danit called it a privilege, but it was more than that.  Listening to the words, watching the way he used his body to offer his praise and devotion—it was a deep honor to bear witness to it.  You Singers may scoff, saying that humans only worship half-heartedly, turning their attention away from the Father-King whenever they think they can get away with it.  I, however, have seen how Lamarr’s faith runs always at the base of his thoughts, influencing his and protecting him from the temptation of the Enemy.

That temptation is very real.  If you have never left heaven, you cannot know how powerful It is among the Stolen lands.  Just in the hour that it took Lamarr to get to work, I saw the darkness that clings to them all.  Even Lamarr, one of the purer spirits I saw, hardly even noticed the others around him.  The humans move in vast crowds, but they do not see.  The Enemy blinds them to one another, to both the beauty they should protect and the ugliness that they should fight.  They are sent to fight, but how can they fight when they cannot see, do not know?  It is no wonder to me anymore, that even our Father-King has a Long Fight to win back what was Stolen.

I have lost my focus.  I was telling you of my assignment.  For those of you who do not know the details of a Cupid’s work, allow me to explain.  Like all of our brothers and sisters, we are unable to do anything against the humans’ will.  Free will is what gives them the power that weakens the Enemy, and we are not nearly strong enough to oppose it.  We can only influence, using the knowledge given to us to plant suggestions for their thoughts to follow, altering their paths just slightly to make changes in their lives.  For this assignment, that was exactly what was required—I simply had to alter Lamarr’s path enough to bring him into contact with the partner we believe to be best for him.

Her name is Tammy Jones, and she is twenty-eight.  She is a pretty, small human with thick soft limbs and pale sunlight hair—they call that color “blonde”.  Her partnership with Lamarr has great potential for goodness, but they would never have met without a slight intervention.  I was the one fortunate enough to offer this intervention.

Timing was essential.  Tammy was on her way to a meeting with a client, and she was clinging to her coffee[3] and her phone[4] in great anxiety.  Lamarr had made this walk a thousand times, and he was paying no attention to anyone nearby, absorbed in his music.

I was tempted to do a simple physical manipulation—give her a slight push, and she would have fallen right into his arms.  But that would have had no lasting impulse, and Danit had warned me that humans often need a bit more than a single look to see the worth in others.  So I simply whispered to her that she might have made a wrong turn, making her look down at her phone again as she walked.  She knocked into a fire hydrant,[5] nearly fell, and cried out loudly as her coffee was upended over herself.

Lamarr received some of the splash too, and he stopped short.  Danit and I watched as he turned to Tammy.

“Yikes,” he said, laughing a little.  “You okay?”

“Ugh,” Tammy said, pulling her wet shirt away from herself.  “Oh, I—yes, I’m fine.”  (Many humans do have this odd habit of denying their own troubles.  It is part of the distressing trend of independence that makes them so isolated from one another.)

“Yeah, you look it,” Lamarr says, putting his hands in his pockets.  (She did not, but Danit said it was something called ‘sarcasm’ and promised to explain it to me later.)

Tammy was nearly in tears.  “Well, I have a meeting with a new client, and I was early, but now I’m going to be late, because I have to go back home and change…”

Lamarr looked around.  “Here,” he said, catching her hand.  “Come with me.”

My work was done at this point, but Danit encouraged me to follow them, just to see the beginning of the connection made.  Lamarr’s place of work—a diner where he is a cook[6]—is right next to a dry cleaner, where they clean clothes.  Lamarr introduced Tammy to the man in the dry cleaner, who it seems is a good friend of his, and made a deal with him that she could borrow a nice blouse for the day.  Apparently, sometimes people don’t return for their clothing, and the dry cleaner keeps them for a time.

By the time the two of them left, they had already arranged to meet after Lamarr’s shift, and there was a light in both faces that hadn’t been there before.

“That is why we do what we do,” Danit explained to me.  “Love in all its forms makes the world a brighter place.”

I look forward to my continuing work with Tammy and Lamarr.  I will monitor them for a time, until my seniors decide that their relationship is secure enough to require no further intervention.  Danit says it will not be long—as I said before, theirs is a very straightforward case.

She warns me that other cases will not be so easy.  I look forward to the challenge, and will keep you all informed of my progress as time goes by.

 

[1] The physical body requires a period of non-activity, called sleep.  This is the period, incidentally, when it is easiest to communicate with humans.

[2] This is the designated location for sleeping, though many humans show great talent at doing so in other places and positions.  Sheets are thin coverings meant to contain the body’s warmth.

[3] A bitter and forceful liquid that the humans consume in perplexing quantities.

[4] A device used for communication of many different forms.

[5] A fixture on streets that is full of water, rather than fire.  I do not know why it is named as it is.

[6] A “diner” is a form of restaurant, which is a place outside of the home where food is served and the humans are unkind to one another.  The cook is he or she who prepares the food.