“Actually, there are times when that much Lutheran schooling muddies the water…”
Neil Foster was sitting in his favorite chair at home while Sara putzed around in the kitchen, allegedly making dinner.
Neil was reading the Amish newspaper from a small town in Ohio his parents had subscribed to for as long as Neil could remember. His mom, though not Amish, was from the town and herself had been reading it since she was a girl.
Specifically, he was reading a column by a woman who wrote about what fun motherhood was turning out to be. Her column was usually good for a relevant insight and even a chuckle or two, which was more than Neil could say for a lot of columnists from newspapers with larger readerships and payrolls.
This week the column, which usually had a religious bent, was discussing the resistance of temptation, specifically how her kids seem unable to resist the temptation to draw on some less traditional drawing surfaces, like the kitchen counter and the bedspread, and how temptation crept into her life as an adult.
“Hey, lover,” Neil called to Sara. “Come here and listen to this. What do you think this means for us.”
Sara, whose skills in the kitchen were still, as Neil charitably put it, developing, turned off whatever she was burning, wiped her hands on a dishtowel, entered the living room and sat on the couch. It didn’t occur to her, though it did occur to Neil, that even though they had only been dating a few months, his woman, who was doing her duty and making his dinner, had come when her man had beckoned her.
Neil mentioned the general resisting temptation tone of the column to his beloved and read to her a couple of funny lines about the columnist’s kids using their favorite colors to redesign the bedspread and then read her the last paragraph, which had talked about the will to resist the right now.
Sara felt she could probably guess the point Neil was going to make.
“So,” she said. “Since we are doing everything but having guy-on-guy sex with Nicholas and Jennifer, are we resisting the right now?”
Neil looked at Sara and nodded, but didn’t say anything, a tactic he usually reserved for conversations he wanted to get out of. In this case, though, his silence was designed to encourage Sara to go with her thoughts. It worked.
“I think so,” she said definitely. “I mean, we’re not swingers…are we?”
Neil laughed, reached out his hand for Sara’s and shook his head.
“No…no we’re not, lover,” he said, realizing he said that with a little more confidence than he should probably be expressing. “Not that I’m too familiar with what the exact terms of swingerdom happen to be…”
Sara laughed.
“…I’m just saying…” Neil continued. “It’s not as if we hang out at threesometonight.com or are sleeping with every couple that will spread their legs for us.”
Sara thought about that for a second and decided she agreed.
“Still though, what would Reverend Longstreet say about our, uh, affairs?”
“Oh, he would not approve of them at all. Don’t doubt that.”
“Tao, though, is on board?”
Neil straightened up in his chair and shrugged and said he had yet to see any literature detailing specific Tao policy on the matter.
“But Tao is in favor of anything that stems from living from the inside out,” he said.
“Wanting to get laid comes from the inside,” Sara said skeptically.
“Yeah, but we don’t need to get laid. We get all the sex we want with each other.”
“Then why are we fucking Nicholas and Jennifer?”
Neil arched his eyebrows and shrugged.
“It feels right. It’s what we should be doing. Nicholas and Jennifer each have something we’re missing.”
Sara laughed.
“That’s no shit,” she said as much to herself as anything.
Neil laughed, bringing Sara back from between Jennifer’s legs to the living room.
“Let’s face it, you like fucking Nicholas and calling him ‘daddy’. You don’t call me that, and I’m not a whole lot younger than Nicholas.”
“Yeah,” Sara said.
“And Jennifer doesn’t have a shlong, so it’s no wonder you like her.”
Sara smiled conspiratorially.
It’s a good thing my parents aren’t listening to this conversation.
“And, pray tell, what do you like about Jennifer, Mr. Foster?” Sara asked, smiling coyly.
“Well,” Neil Foster said thoughtfully. “The basketballs she’s passing off as tits, obviously.”
Sara laughed and hit Neil on an arm.
“And…”
“Well, let’s face it, lover, she’s built like a brick shithouse like few other women on this planet. I mean, we’re both pretty foxy people, but we’re both jumping in the sack with her every chance we get.”
Sara put a hand to her mouth and laughed, a wonderfully feminine gesture that drove Neil wild.
“Yeah, but how do we know we’re not just looking to get laid more?”
“We know,” Neil said. “We know.” For emphasis, he patted Sara’s knee as if his advanced years gave him special insights into the matter. “If we were we’d be hooking up with other couples, or looking to, at least, we’d be guilty. But we’re not. We’re okay.”
They sat there for a little bit. As always, the silence was comfortable and in no way strained.
“So, lover,” Neil said. “Let me ask you this…”
“Shoot…”
“…you have just enough experience with Tao and just enough knowledge of religion to be dangerous here. The question is who’s at fault here? Are we wrong for violating what the church would have us do, or is the church wrong for being out of step with human nature?”
Sara whistled which, as usual, annoyed Neil because he couldn’t whistle. Her whistle made it sound like she was being asked to consider one of mankind’s most fundamental questions, which, of course, she was.
“You’re the one with thirteen years of Lutheran schooling,’ she said, passing the buck. “You tell me.”
Neil laughed.
“Actually, there are times when that much Lutheran schooling muddies the water. You have the benefit of recent introduction into both Tao and the church. A fresh, open mind is as good a qualification as any, actually.”
Sara considered the matter for a moment.
“I feel we’re on our path, lover. Being with Nicholas and Jennifer does not feel immoral. Cheating on something at school…”
“Like your spelling words…” Neil said making Sara laugh.
“…that feels wrong from the get-go. If I were to sleep with Nicholas or Jennifer, or both, without you there or knowing about it, that would be wrong.”
Neil pursed his lips and nodded significantly, an act which, as usual, Sara thought was pretty funny.
“That doesn’t really answer our question, though” Sara pointed out.
“No, but it does provide an insight,” Neil said, holding up an index finger. “Because to date the whole of human history hasn’t been able to provide a definite answer to that question, so we can cut ourselves some slack. I thought it was a good question for us to try and answer, whether we’re resisting the temptation of the right now or if we’re not.”
Sara nodded her head confidently.
“We are, Neil. There’s no doubt. We’re not just trying to fill a void by fucking whoever we can get into a hotel suite.”
Neil looked at Sara sharply.
“That’s pretty smart for a kid,” he said, smiling.
Sara smiled, too, and tilted her head, which Neil, with more than a tad bit of lust in his heart, felt made Sara look a bit younger than her eighteen years.
Sara got up and returned to the kitchen. Neil usually avoided going into the kitchen while Sara was cooking for much the same reason people didn’t watch the cow being killed before dining at a steakhouse, but this time Neil followed her and saw she had taken a bottle of wine out. He opened it and poured two glasses and sat down at the bar in front of the stove. Sara was back at the stove adding what appeared to be sawdust to what could be spaghetti sauce. After that she looked up at her man.
“That phrase you just used, filling a void. Is that original?”
Sara looked up from the stove and shrugged.
“I think so. I haven’t been at this spiritual racket long enough to steal quotes or anything, I don’t think.”
Neil thought for a second.
“It cuts right to the heart of what we humans are about.”
“It does?”
Neil nodded.
“Something inside us, a void if you will, says there is more to this existence than simply feeding ourselves and producing offspring. That something is bigger than us. If it wasn’t, Columbus would still be wandering around the coast of Spain.”
“Speaking of feeding ourselves, lover, dinner is ready!” Sara announced.
Neil looked at dinner as Sara put it on the table and decided Sara’s cooking skills were actually improving. The textures of what was probably spaghetti were consistent with what its inventors more or less intended, it smelled moderately appetizing and it didn’t look like a surgical procedure. The garlic bread, however, resembled charcoal briquettes. Privately, Neil expressed surprise they hadn’t set off a smoke detector.
“It tastes better than it looks,” Sara said.
Good.
Neil thought better of making a crack about that wouldn’t be all that difficult, instead saying “It’s a good thing you’re a good lay and procure beautiful women for me.”
Sara laughed.
“So,” Sara said after the first few bites of dinner had been taken without either her or Neil requiring medical attention “Religion tries to fill that void.” It was another statement/question from Sara.
Neil nodded.
“We all have a point in our lives,” Sara said.
“Sure, of course, we do. That’s what religion does, it fills the void. Does it pretty well, too, by giving believers a course to follow here on Earth and the prospect of eternal life after they die. But it doesn’t necessarily care if you find the point to your life, as long as you’re a good believer.”
“Tao, though, simply teaches you to fill the void from the inside out.”
Neil smiled and tapped his nose with an index finger, indicating Sara had hit it right on the nose.
“You’re learning fast, young lady, and this provides further proof we belong on the path: people take to it intuitively. You have been exposed to Tao only a few months, and already you can cut straight to its heart.”
“And religion is not intuitive?” Sara asked.
Neil paused to pour some more wine.
“I don’t think so. If it was you would have been in church years ago. Religions put a lot of time and effort and spend a lot of money running schools from kindergartens to universities to teach people its precepts precisely because it is not intuitive and people like Reverend Longstreet wouldn’t make a pretty good living preaching the Gospel.”
Sara sipped some wine.
“I wonder how much Pastor Longstreet makes?”
Neil knew how much the good reverend made because his old man used to be one of the ones who determined what the Reverend Jackson P. Longstreet was paid. He told Sara the Reverend Jackson P. Longstreet made about $115,000 a year.
Few in the church also knew that, though, because it wasn’t very Lutheran to talk about what you or others made, though it was plain to anyone with the sight and the sense the good Lord gave them the good Reverend didn’t work for free. Nobody really minded what Reverend Jackson P. Longstreet made, even if no one was entirely what it was, because it was good for the congregation’s morale to know their pastor could afford a nice car and didn’t live in a shack and could afford an appropriate wardrobe to conduct the church’s business in.
(Two)
Neil and Sara had finished dinner and were doing the dishes.
“So, to review Neil, Tao has neither a deity to pray to nor a scripture to read.”
“Correct.”
“There are books though. We met because of a Tao book.”
Neil smiled at the remembrance of how he hit on Sara in the bookstore.
“Yeah, and those books do have certain fundamentals and precepts, but they aren’t pronouncements from on high and aren’t considered sacred. They are merely guidelines to getting on a path, precepts to be either accepted or rejected.
Neil thought about what he had just said for a second. Sara saw Neil was thinking and kept quiet, a trait a lot of women Neil had gone out with didn’t have, which made him appreciate it that much more in Sara.
“Even world-class sprinters need starting blocks for a race, after all.”
“Do you ever wonder why we don’t get invited to more parties?” Sara asked, laughing. “You are boring. But in a good way.”
Neil smiled.
“It’s a good thing you’re a good lay and procure beautiful women for me,” Sara said.
“But getting back to filling the void,” Neil said before plunging back into thought. “The void is part of the human experience. We all have it.”
“Yeah, we do.”
“It’s like having a bunch of sheep on your ranch with them wandering around aimlessly. You need a corral to keep them in.”
“Why would you want to pen in sheep?” Sara asked innocently. “I’m no expert, but that doesn’t seem very Tao.”
Neil shot a glance at Sara.
“You’re right, dammit! A pox on you!”
Both lovers laughed as Neil worked his brain a bit.
“Well…?” Sara said after a bit.
Neil thought about it some more and snapped his fingers when he found something.
“How about you have a bunch of sheep on a ranch and they’re wandering around aimlessly and…and…you need a shepherd to show them the way?”
“But isn’t Jesus the Good Shepherd?”
Neil pinched the bridge of his nose with a thumb and middle finger. For effect, he snorted.
“Yes!” he said, almost hissing, which made Sara laugh. “Jesus Christ is sometimes referred to as the Good Shepherd. Anything else?”
Neil had the good sense not to blab when someone was laughing at something he had just said, so he kept quiet until Sara stopped laughing.
“The problem with religion though, is, as I so dully noted, that it’s not intuitive,” Neil said. “Man is not born with an intuitive knowledge of or a belief in, God. He learns it. Similarly, other ways man tries to fill the void, like booze, entertainment, greed, are not intuitive, either.”
“Is that why our after-dinner activity is a dry, technical discussion on the human experience and not, say, watching television or a movie? Because entertainment isn’t intuitive? No wonder you were available when we met,” Sara said drolly.
Neil laughed.
“You’re telling me. You’d be surprised at the number of women who find this topic boring!” Neil said, pretending to be shocked. “Actually, I was surprised you liked me. I was afraid I was going to be too nice for you. I’ve learned you girls like a little naughty in your men.”
“How do you know us chicks like naughty?”
“Oh, you discover it pretty early on. Like when you’re in sixth grade and you get in trouble and the girls start looking at you with that look in their eye? That’s the demarcation. Some guys like the attention and those are the players and they’re the ones making out at recess. If you’re a real Lutheran, however, you’re embarrassed by the notoriety your bad behavior got you and you shy away from the attention. Then you start an adolescence of never getting invited to parties.”
“Well, you were naughty enough,” Sara said. “One, you’re over thirty and hitting on an 18-year-old which makes you a nasty old man, and two, something told me you don’t play by the rules, which, seeing as you refuse to hold down a real job, is more or less true. Plus you have muscles. That overcomes a lot of niceness.”
“And you and I together are filling the void.”
“I like filling the void by putting my face between Jennifer’s legs,” Sara said simply.
Neil laughed.
“Sure, why not? You said it best, cheating on your spelling words would be immoral. Taking something that isn’t yours is wrong. Not only that, people know it’s wrong before they even do it. The mere thinking of it sets off red flags.”
“Is that why you officiate and refuse to get a real job?”
“That and the fact I have no real job skills, sure,” Neil said, nodding vigorously. “It’s what I should be doing with my life. For now.”
“For now?”
“Sure, for now. The path teaches us to be open to what nature and circumstance put in front of us. Perhaps the end of my interest will come someday?”
“I hadn’t thought of that.”
“That’s where the guiding hand of an older man comes in handy, lover.”
Sara wanted to laugh, but after looking at Neil she could tell he was serious.
“How will you know?” she asked, moving in for a hug.
“Most people know when a cycle in their life is ending. The key is to be open to it. It is usually not difficult to tell when you’ve drawn every possible benefit from an experience.”
(Three)
Neil Foster had recently finished banging his beloved Sara Miles like a gong and the two were snuggling in bed. Sometimes Neil really grooved on the fact he was thirty-three and banging a foxy 18-year-old, but tonight had been a fairly tender session, with both Neil and Sara expressing various sentiments that sounded as if they were stolen from a goddamned Hallmark card, though it was not completely emotional for Sara, who from time to time could be heard making a variety of noises consistent with a woman receiving a high degree of sexual pleasure.
“Neil, why do you keep taking me to church? You admit you’re not religious right now, so why bother going with me?”
“You’re entitled to make your own decision, lover. The best way to do that is to take you to church so you can come to your own decision about what works for you.”
“Works for you? You make it sound like therapy.”
Neil chuckled.
“It’s not. But there are various spokes leading to the hub of a well-led life. Tao works for me. Religion works for some. You’re a young lady on a spiritual quest. I love you and want you to have as much experience as you can.”
“The church is basically good though. The Reverend Jackson P. Longstreet is a good man.”
“I’m not entirely convinced of the former, but the Reverend Jackson P. Longstreet is as good a man as this species can produce, Sara. Our dads are good men and they are as good, but no man is better.”
“Then let’s say the current Neil Foster worldview, that there is no God, is correct. How come good men dedicate their lives to something that isn’t there?”
Neil shrugged.
“They believe it is there. Just because Neil Foster believes something is so doesn’t make it so.”
Sara made a face feigning surprise.
“Should I worry that the Reverend wouldn’t approve of our sex life?”
Neil looked at Sara curiously.
“Interesting question. I can’t answer that for you, because you’re you, but I don’t let it bother me. I’d be embarrassed he knew, but that’s because I grew up Lutheran and dandruff embarrasses us. I wouldn’t worry about his opinion because it isn’t his life. It’s our life and what we do behind closed doors is our business.”
Sara snuggled in a little closer to Neil and hugged him a bit tighter.
“Well, I’m proud of our life. Even if I do spend part of it between Jennifer’s legs.”
Neil laughed. He was happy to hear that.
Chapter 13
Swords in the Narthex