Rattlesnake. I’ll do it.”
“Good boy.” Rattlesnake smiled. “Here, take this.” He handed Attila his weapon. “It’s a present.”
“Oh, I can’t do that. What about your—your calling?”
“Someone else is calling. I’m tired of killing. I’m retiring. No rattlesnakes left. Even the baby rattles are nearly gone. Shooting has run its course. I don’t need it anymore. I’m passing it on to you. Here’s some advice: Never hurt a human soul. Hurting is mean, real mean. I never hurt anybody. Kill them if you like, but don’t you ever hurt them.”
Rattlesnake got up from his rock, brushed off his pants, and walked down the mountain.
4
ATTILA VISITS MAMA ZANY
ATTILA KEPT HIS WORD. He visited Mama Brunhilde Zany at her mountain hideaway, a log cabin high in the Tetrahymenic Peptide Chain, a group of mountains in the backyard named after her favorite chemicals, which served as her residence and research laboratory.
Mother and son took a seat on the sofa in the living room, facing each other. Mountain air ruffled the curtains as it blew through the open window. The aroma of fresh pine filled the room. Attila leaned his gun against the armrest. Offering him a cup of cold tea, Mama Zany explained, “Attila, you were always my favorite chemical experiment. I named you just as you popped out. I named my mountain the same way I named you. Seize the moment! That has been my motto ever since you were born. Whether it is life springing from my womb, or the Peptide Chain bubbling up from the womb of God Herself, creation is the point. Creation! That’s the key word: Create, create! Build, build! As soon as I moved here, I built the lunar laboratory of my dreams.” She pointed to the back yard. “I built it behind the kitchen with my own money.”
When Mama’s peroration ended, Attila said, “I like this location. Your cabin is pretty, so restful.” He paused to soak in the reflective atmosphere. “But, Mama, let me ask you a personal question: Why did you leave our house in New Jersey and move here without telling us? You’ve remained hidden so many years.”
Mama Zany twisted her gray braid, rose to her full six-foot-four height, and, peering down at her son, responded, “My dear little starlight, as a woman of high standards, I had to get away from your father. At the time, his career was in chaos and his mental life a mess. Chemists such as myself, ever aiming for perfection, hate blemishes. Perfectionists hate slovenliness. Zoltan was a slob. His saving grace was his insistence on playing every violin note correctly. This desire helped us during our first year of marriage. I deeply appreciated and admired his love of correct notes. Unfortunately, he loved the notes more than me. He paid no attention and cared not a whit about my dreams of creating a lunar laboratory, chemistry, my intellectual and scientific development, or anything else I liked. When, during a chemistry experiment, I accidently blew up the garage, interrupting his scale practice, he felt his concert career threatened. He laid down his violin and insisted I give up my investigations. Well, I could live without him, but I certainly couldn’t live without my work! So I moved out. As a loving mother, I didn’t want to disturb my child. I didn’t think you’d notice anyway. So when I moved out, I kept it secret because I didn’t want to hurt you.”
“But for two years?”
“You finally noticed!” Mama Zany raised her fist triumphantly in the air. “During this long hiding period, I realized I wanted recognition. I craved it, not only from Zoltan, but from my child! Yes, I wanted it from you. I also wanted recognition from the scientific community. I needed their confirmation of my work, and of myself as a scientist. I also wanted my community of chemists to love me. But they never did. I’m too tall.”
“Height has nothing to do with love,” Attila offered. He took a sip of the cold tea. “I recall that memorable moment, the day you finally called. What a surprise when the phone rang. We all thought you were dead.”
Brunhilde shook her head, expressing affirmation in the Bulgarian style. “I remember the call. By then I had understood that recognition by He/She-Who-Knows was more important than acceptance by others.” She sat down on a corner stool and leaned back against the wall. “As a little girl in Dusseldorf, rejection clouded my childhood. My parents’ most popular word was ‘Leave!’ It hurt me so. One day, while performing a chemical experiment, I saw something new in the test tube. Recognition came in a flash of explosive light. The He/She said hello. A happy smile crossed my face as I cried, ‘Ah, You love me!’ That’s why I became a chemist.
“How I remember that transforming day! Powerful neurotransmitters sparked my brain. Shining protons, crisp neutrons, beautiful amino acid chains, dazzling forms of protein accompanied by their protoplasmic friends, all ran helter-skelter through my mind-body connection. I became wiser. Love of Him/Her, accompanied by knowledge of the True Self, has little to do with recognition by others. These transient desires disappeared. I focused on the Great Chemist in the Sky. Ultimately, that’s why I moved to Colorado.”
Attila understood. “I like it, Ma.”
A soothing quiet ensued. The lad gazed out the window at pine trees, mountains, verdant fields, streams, and rocks. Not a neighbor in sight. A look of concern crossed his face as he glanced at her. “Ever get lonely out here?”
“Never. Loneliness is not in my vocabulary. My lab creates a network of friends. Some stay here with me in chemical form; others visit on weekends. I also belong to the Science of Friends Society.” Brunhilde pointed out the window to a distant mountain peak. “Our group meets at the foot of Mount Hieronymus on the first Friday of every month. There, stimulated by the cool breeze and fresh mountain air, we discuss the chemical underpinnings of friendship.” Mama Zany raised her right index finger. “My son, I see people as amino acids. In my network of personal contacts, I link one friend to another. I play with their carboxl groups. Slowly, other amino acid friends move closer. Finally, when trust has been established, everyone bonds. I now have over a trillion-celled peptide friendships in my network.”
Attila listened as a fresh idea emerged from the formerly vacant spaces of his mind. He watched it evolve, grow, shift, gradually changing form until finally, mature and fully grown, it burst, scattering seeds of expansion throughout his brain. Influenced by his mother’s scientific methods and his father’s metaphysical approach to violin performance and yeshiva-sitz armchair bottom placement, a weird combination of chemical doctor, linguistic priest, and philosophical rabbi of music, which called itself a “prabbi,” had began to coalesce.
Mama Zany leaned toward him. She placed her ear above his heart. “I hear you thinking,” she said. “Be careful. Watch out for the abyss.”
“Thank you, Ma. I’m watching.”
Attila stepped outside the cabin. He needed fresh air and time to think. Ambling through pine shadows, he sat on a rock, laid his gun to his side, considered the nature of growth, and pondered his future.
Would he develop a wider, even universal vision? Could he become a prabbi?
Three hours later he rose and headed back to Mama Zany for cup of tea.
5
MASHUGI
IN HIS SENIOR YEAR of college, Attila received a letter from the Israeli archaeologist, etymologist, linguist, scholar, and
