Legend of the Crab

The Crab's Home

A Legend

One day, long ago or not yet past, Geskekelud got bored with playing with man, and cast his interest to the creatures of the world. He watched the creatures crawl and walk across the land, but their ordered actions disturbed him, so he watched the oceans.

A serpent swimming around its nest caught his attention, and he decided to change its mind and see what happened. The serpent realized that he had to choose a direction to swim -- either up or down, north or south, east or west. The serpent was furious at this limitation. It writhed and twisted, shook and shivered, but would not choose a direction. Finally, overcome with anger at its predicament, it ripped itself into 6 pieces, each drifting to one of the six directions. Blood filled the waters, and sharks came to feast on the serpent. They destroyed the nest and left a path of destruction in their wake.

Geskekelud was greatly amused with this result, so he searched for another creature. He noticed a crab perched in a cave, and he gave it the same realization -- that it must choose one of the directions to move -- up or down, north or south, east or west. The crab stayed still, and began improving its cave. Occasionally it would consider one direction over another, but always decided to wait until a decision was necessary, and worked on improving the cave in the meanwhile. Time passed, and Geskekelud, bored with the non-antics of the crab, wandered to other pastimes.

When Shagras incited a war in the ocean, the crabs were safe in the cave. When the Destroyer brought a famine onto the ocean, the cave had enough stores that the crabs could survive. When Anz brought order to the sea floor, the cave was so well established that he used it as a landmark, and it was not flattened like other irregularities in the ocean floor. When Nirian purged some of the sea of its salt, the crabs survived in their cave. When the Creator brought forth a new beast that preyed on sea-dwellers, the crabs hid safely in the cave. Still the crab did not decide. But no one minded.

And the crab and the crab's family lived safe, because of the efforts to improve its home. Unlike the serpent, which by rejecting its responsibility to decide brought destruction to itself and its children, the crab accepted its responsibility to decide, yet chose to wait before doing so. With the passage of time, this responsibility made the crab safer and stronger than others around it.