The Prophet Phil (Wilderness Express Series)
Phil, as the nameless prophet was known by the faithful, had lived many, many springs ago and was known to the current generations by the words he etched upon the shards of acorns which were the backbone of the Church of the Great Acorn.
Once fervently believed to have been an actual living, breathing squirrel, moose, or badger, and so on, each theory boasting its own underwhelming number of adherents, the modern took Phil to be primarily a metaphor for the Great Acorn’s love for all furkind. This progressive approach to the prophet and his writings was always professed in large groups where the Great Acorn, the Pinecone of Time, or even Mother Ocean would have greater difficulty sussing out who said what, and punishment might be avoided with a quick nod of the head to the critter standing next to you. Alone and behind closed doors, it was only the truly deranged, or bored, who questioned the existence of the gods.
All were in accord that if Phil were alive today, he’d be rather strange, seriously behind the times, and in dire need of a crash course on modern bathing protocol. Nevertheless, within the mystic realm of diction from on high, in Phil all trusted.
The prophet knew what they couldn’t, so they followed. Especially, when they didn’t understand where they were going, why they were going there, or how smashing a whoopie cushion over their heads every forty-ninth step was supposed to cleanse their aura, atone for their sins, or please the Great Acorn in any way.
Most lost count, being distracted by the vitalization of the crisp mountain air, the enchanting hues of the forset, or the soothing babbling of the numerous mountain streams and simply emptied the hot air of the whoopie cushion upon their head at random intervals, resulting in a cacophony of holy flatulence all along the mountainside. The number fourty-nine couldn’t possibly be important, could it?
The beloved prophet was like many nonbelievers before his dramatic conversion to the faith, so the story goes in the book of the Hermit. Though, it should be mentioned, a small, yet devout sect of Acornians claim that the ‘h’ was a mistranslation and the book doesn’t tell the story of the terrifying conversion of the faith’s most prolific prophet, at all. Rather, they claim it is merely the diary of a frog who mostly rambles duly on about rain, the finding joy in the small things, and the near escapes from a sybarite pig.
Naysayers dismiss this pious sect as the mere nonsensical meanderings of sleep deprived minds saying whatever necessary to coax silence and sleep from a defiant toddler. The K theorists suggest their detractors stick to textual criticism rather than irrelevant, low-aimed attacks and promise to really blow the socks off the status-quo with their next thesis to be published in eight to twelve years, when the house is much quieter.
For the rest of Acorndom, the story goes as follows.
It was a warm, summer valley day, like many before it, when Phil, known by a different, less holy name at this time which will be revealed later, was strolling the mountain paths in search of the specialty good he traded at market, mushrooms.
He hummed a spritely tune as he enjoyed his morning hike, dancing a jig when inspiration struck and collecting curiosities strewn about the path.
About an hour into his journey something at the path’s edge caught his eye. Upon the ground, shimmering in a beam of light valiantly fighting its way through the thick canopy above, lay an oddly shaped acorn. The not yet Phil sideways moonslid to the acorn, humming along the way.
The capra stopped before the acorn and crouched. It was just another acorn, bumpy top, stem protruding from the top, while the smooth bottom tapered to a point. A stout, healthy looking acorn, without doubt, but rather typical, nonetheless.
A bit disappointed, future Phil shifted his weight as he prepared to go on about his mushroom driven business. It was with this shift that something akin to magical happened.
The light once again struck the acorn, causing it to take on a new shape, with a face upon it to boot.
Time immeasurable passed as soon to be Phil shifted from one leg to the other, blocking, then releasing the beam of light to revel in the splendor of the acorn’s light induced metamorphosis.
Had it not been for a pinecone, of the rock-hard, tightly closed variety, eons could have drifted by blissfully. As it always is in these stories, a message from above descended, pinged off a rock, and ricocheted up into the crouched rear-end of the tantalizingly near Phil.
The goat yelped, sprang forward, and knocked himself silly on an oak beside the path. He landed hard and unconscious in a large gathering of the very purpose for his daily sojourn, mushrooms.
Another pinecone descended from on high and popped the snoring quasi Phil between the eyes who rolled over and sat up. Large, red topped mushrooms whose caps billowed outwards like a wide-brimmed hat before caving inwards as one moved towards the convex top, and covered in white spots surrounded the goat.
The mushrooms squeaked as he passed a hoof above the most glorious specimens he’d ever seen. Just then, the soon to be self-proclaimed Phil, noticed the fragments of the acorn scattered along the forest path.
A tinge of disappointment tugged at the goat, entertainment was hard to come by in Wilderness. The unrealized Phil coughed and images flashed before his mind.
“What crazy dreams” he said while rubbing his brow.
The goat curled a hoof and prepared to flick away a large fragment of acorn when something unseen stayed his hoof.
‘My word’ thought the teetering on the cusp of Phildom goat as he turned the shell to discover strange etchings on the concave side of the shard.
‘Your word?’ challenged a voice in a rather uppity tone.
“Well, yes” mumbled the Prophet as he looked around to locate the source of the voice. “In a sense, I guess. I said the words, though I don’t suppose they belong to me.”
‘Of course not’ spat the voice. ‘How could you ever own a word?’ The ‘ooo’ was drawn out in an incredulous tone. The unnamed prophet nodded agreement.
‘I, however, own many words’ said the voice haughtily.
The prophet absent mindedly fiddled with a piece of shroom lodged between his front teeth with his tongue while he scanned the canopy above.
‘I own them all, in fact’ added the voice quickly and would have folded its arms tightly across its chest while giving a curt nod had it possessed any of the aforementioned appendages.
“All” gasped the unnamed, his astonishment split between the audacity of the claim and the strange floating feeling overcoming him just moments after the successful freeing of the mushroom chunk which was swallowed soon after, the intention of which divides the Church of the Great Acorn in two fanatically opposed factions to this day.
‘Unquestionably’ snapped the voice. ‘Why don’t you look again at all…’
The words began to fade, sending the prophet into a panic. Moments from Phil tossed rocks and pinecones over his shoulder as he frantically sought further shards of acorn. His barrage of unaimed ballistics knocked a beetle from its hold on a tree across the path. It buzzed with indignance and muttered something about mammalian privilege.
It was discomforting that an unseen voice spoke to him, not to mention employed a tone a voice that laid plain how irksome it was that the unnamed was failing to grasp the gravity of the moment. Still, crumbling self-esteem aside, it was entertaining.
The voice must be heard again!
The unnamed scrambled around the trees, searching desperately for hiding nooks from which to coax the voice. To the blight of generations of sober furkind, another pinecone struck the prophet square on the head, knocking loose the remaining chunks of shroom, which he dutifully swallowed.
‘It’s all right there’ the voice washed back into his mind like a tsunami. ‘Read for yourself. Then, try to tell me it wasn’t I who created the world.’ The voice rested an elbow atop a knee propped on a bulge of grey matter within the capra’s mind and chuckled to itself about the absurdity of counter opinions.
The unnamed’s jaw dropped open.
‘Why the surprise? Have you not been listening this entire time?’
Future Phil looked to the ground in shame.
‘Oh, if I could only choose who stumbles across my great acorn manifesto” grumbled the voice and kicked the bulge of grey matter in accordance with its own creed of ‘Either smite or spite.’
“Chosen?” winced the unnamed as he soothed a sharp pain on the side of his head. “I’ve been chosen?”
Disbelief was sanctimoniously escorted from his mind at gunpoint. The creator had proclaimed him chosen. Who was he to question such unquestionable authority?
This changed everything. He was now a divinely inspired goat, no mere ware touting market critter. Not any more.
‘Phil!’
That’s who he was. Or, rather, Bill is who he was, but no longer. Such a common name would never convey the majesty of his new calling. He needed something with spunk. Something with real pizazz. He needed ‘Phil.’
Newly ordained Phil tossed the flap of his robe aside and stood with his chest out, beaming with pride.
From the trees, a voice shrieked.
Phil recoiled in shame, quickly covering himself. This had been one of the many mornings in which Bill had forgotten his underwear.
“Silly Bill” tisked Phil. “You could never bare the burden of revealing the truth to the world.”
A wave of shame washed over the prophet due to his poorly chosen words. Then he reminded himself that it wasn’t him doing the choosing. It was the creator who spoke through him. The Great Acorn, whose words only brought shame to the unbelieving.
Phil knotted the belt of his purple bathrobe with black and white stripped collar and began collecting all the shards he could find. Pockets full, he grabbed a handful of mushrooms and the hardest pinecone he could find. He still wasn’t clear about which brought the Great Acorn’s voice to his ears, so he hedged his bets.
Off he went, peak way, to find a quiet place to heed his calling because Phil was a doer, a goat of action, prepared to ingest any substance or inflict whatever pain necessary to bring the good news to the pitiful masses yet to its paradigm shifting truth.
