Contact!

“I hope you see it truly”

A young forester walked by as I picnicked by Loch Ness, and I asked him if he had ever seen the monster. He did not smile at the question. He had lived there always, he said, but he had not seen it yet. For him, though, its existence or non-existence was not important, because he interpreted it as a didactic figure of faith. “It teaches us to believe in something we cannot see—you understand me?” He thought a great deal about the matter, he told me, and often looked out there on the  chance of glimpsing the creature.  I said I seemed to see it every five minutes, but again he did not laugh. “Well before you go home,” he said meaningfully, looking me straight in the eye, “I hope you see it truly…”