Enigma (e-nig’-ma): Obscuring one’s meaning by presenting it within a riddle or by means of metaphors that purposefully challenge the reader or hearer to understand.
“The river is wide and deep. The current is strong. We must swim from shore to shore. We will be exhausted. We may drown.” My friend Joseph always spoke in biblical-sounding metaphors and visions—like he was an Old Testament Joseph. He was only 15. He sounded like he was 80.
His father wrote horoscopes for a living and Joseph had been influenced by him and his grave advisory prose style preparing people to more readily cope with their futures. In the example above, we were on our way to the Mall. It was a couple of miles away and we walked. There was a steep hill we had to climb, and we would cut across a busy highway that had a narrow drainage ditch running alongside it. Using a sort of allegory, Joseph had “translated” what was in store for us on our hike. Especially the prospect of drowning.
Two days later, we were going grocery shopping with his mom in the hope of scoring a box of “Little Debbie” honeybuns. Joseph said: “Lo, tomorrow we shall be transported to the heart of abundance. Rows and rows of foods and spices and products that clean surfaces , dishes, clothing, and human bodies await our famished, soiled, and clutching hands. We will fill our shining steel wagons to overflowing, including buns of honey, and pay their price by the beeping glow of numbers pulsing on the green screen.”
Joseph’s dire warnings ever came off as benign versions of themselves. Like getting your foot wet in the a drainage ditch by the highway, instead of drowning. The grocery store pronouncement worked out to be true, but in my opinion, could’ve been captured by two words: “grocery shopping.” Nevertheless, what Joseph said was memorable.
I sat and listened to him out of respect for our friendship. I almost told him to shut up, but I knew it would break his heart. At that point in our friendship, I was the only person who listened to his bloviations. That is, with the exception of our English teacher Ms. Commaski, who encouraged him. She would say things like “Ooh Joseph, you make my hair stand on end—look here behind my ear!” She was quite crazy.
She would do things like make us write about our toenails or what it would be like to kill somebody. I actually had a favorite assignment: Write a letter to Satan. Mine turned out to be 25 pages long and I got an A+.
Anyway, at Ms. Commaski’s prodding, Joseph went to college majoring in Religious Studies. When he graduated he became a soothsayer, using his literary skills to fabricate credible-sounding futures for his clients.
He operates out of a tent he pitches every day in his front yard. It is made of striped awning material. He calls himself “Karma-Cadabra,” I help him set up the tent every day and sit in its back corner wearing a gold-colored turban and sunglasses and nodding my head in agreement while Joseph mystically pontificates. He is quite successful with a substantial group of lost people serving as his growing client base.
I stay until noon and then go to my office where I offer my services as a private detective. My agency is named “Snoopy Eye.” Today, I’m meeting with a woman who believes she actually left her heart in San Fransisco. I’m going to talk to her about her memory issues and offer to help her find her heart. I think I have something worthwhile to say to her: “Have you looked into your soul’s lost and found where the rivers of conscience criss-cross and carry well-preserved fragments of your hopes like sockeye salmon seeing the manifestation of their purpose as, exhausted, they spawn in their queen-sized gravel beds. We shall find your heart! I have booked us tickets to San Fransisco. We leave this afternoon!”
Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu.
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