In the old times, when cave people weren’t hunting or being chased by predators, they sat around the fire and shared facts. They would have told stories, but they didn’t know what those were yet.
So they shared things that they knew had happened.
“Kog hunt big cat.”
“Ape bite Grog face.”
Then one day, Og got the idea to tell the group a story that had not happened.
“Og is out. Hunt big deer,” Og said. The group murmured in assent — they had heard this one before, but it was an old favourite.
“Og take time, track deer to Dark Forest. Hoof prints lead up tall mountain.”
The group perked up. This was a new detail.
“Og scale mountain. Take very long time. Very dark, very treacherous,” Og said, then seeing the confusion on his friends’ faces, added, “‘Treacherous’ mean scary. Hard.”
Og’s friends nodded as if they had known this already.
“At top of mountain, Og not find deer,” Og said. He had them in the palm of his hand. “Og find… treasure.”
The murmurs had turned into soft hooting — the group was very excited, even if only about half knew what “treasure” meant.
“Shiny rocks. Big, pointy spears,” Og paused. “Drawings of sexy ladies.”
The group was in a frenzy at this point. They had to find the treasure. They quickly grabbed their spears and headed toward the Dark Forest.
“Well — ok, maybe we calm down,” Og said. “Go in morning.”
But it was no use. The group had run off.
They wound their way through the forest until they got to a tall, dark mountain. This had to be it, they thought.
Slowly, the group made their way to the top of the mountain. Og trailed behind, nervously. He was not sure what lay at the top of the mountain.
Unfortunately, a large sabre-toothed tiger had made its home there. It killed all of Og’s friends while Og watched, horrified.
The moral of the story is this: once you have told a story, you can never take it back. So be careful of the stories you tell, and the stories you listen to.
Well – that is quite the story! Thank you. Now, how about some reflections on telling the story?
Alright — I told this story to my girlfriend and she laughed at some parts and had some suggestions for how to punch up others. She found the ending a little abrupt, which I agree with, but I thought maybe that played into the telling a little bit — to add a bit of “oomph” to the end. But that’s probably a cop-out since I struggle with wrapping things up with a bow. She also mentioned that as far as creation stories go, it was a little hard to believe that no cave person had figured out how to lie to another cave person before this point to get their hands on a nice sabre tooth pelt or shiny rock. Fair enough.