Preface of my new serial book, entitled "This Will Never Get Finished, Ever"
I never knew my parents. For a kid like me, for where I'm from, that's not an uncommon thing to say. But for me, I never saw them, never saw anyone like them. I've been robbed not only of family, but of ethnicity, of social context with which to construct my life. I've been robbed of identity, and I've had to make a new one.
My name is Lloyd Henry Cassell. And I am a convert to ethnic Judaism.
Well.. not that Ethnic Judaism is a real thing. I'm playing this by ear, here. But where else can you find a group of people-- a currently existing group of people-- so completely robbed of their culture as they are, and as I have been? A sparse smattering, across the globe, of people unified not by country, nor by race, nor by political beliefs or good fortune or even any real common interest, who have nevertheless strained so hard against the will of the planet to stay true to themselves, and true to each other? Most Jews you meet today don't practice any actual form of religion, which is the only thing they had in common in the first place. They have nothing tying them to each other. And yet, they forge those missing bonds themselves, weaving themselves into an ever-more-tenuous web connecting them to each other. Strengthening it. They grasp something ethereal, invisible, and yet substantial. Something to hold onto. Something to be proud of.
The decision was easy for me. I am a Jew, because I am also a Tinysaur.
My kind have not existed for millions of years. Even when they did, they were not the stars of their time; they were hardly even a footnote. We were not the smartest, the most successful, the most cunning or devious or fast or vicious. We were not the most agile, or the most adaptable. We were just the tiniest.
This is the culture I have inherited, no matter how long dead: I am a dinosaur. But I am the weakest, least terrifying, cutest dinosaur in all of existence, in all of history. And I am the last of my kind. I needed some strength; I needed some pride. I needed to be able to call people I don't like schmucks. Judaism gave me that. Even if I don't go to Temple.
The earliest memory I have is this. A part of the team that created me, that cloned my egg and hatched it and turned it with tweezers, was holding me in the palm of his hand. He was using a Q-Tip to tickly my belly. I am a fucking carnivore, I eat the raw meat of my dead prey. And I was being tickled. And because I was young, I thought that I could stop the humiliation through violence. So I clamped down on the Q-Tip and I didn't let go. The prick that tickled me lowered the thing, with me dangling from it, back into the cage they had set up to hold me. I should have gone for his fucking finger.
There've only been a couple of fossil records found of the Tinysaur. One of them was discovered, partially digested, inside a Tyranosaurus's stomach. Since a Tinysaur would be far too small to be hunted by a T-Rex as nourishment, some scientists have offered up another explanation for the bizarre find. Their take is that the mighty Tyranosaurus ate the Tinysaur, not to feed herself, but because she was ashamed to be related to it.
This is my life. I hope you enjoy reading it.
My name is Lloyd Henry Cassell. And I am a convert to ethnic Judaism.
Well.. not that Ethnic Judaism is a real thing. I'm playing this by ear, here. But where else can you find a group of people-- a currently existing group of people-- so completely robbed of their culture as they are, and as I have been? A sparse smattering, across the globe, of people unified not by country, nor by race, nor by political beliefs or good fortune or even any real common interest, who have nevertheless strained so hard against the will of the planet to stay true to themselves, and true to each other? Most Jews you meet today don't practice any actual form of religion, which is the only thing they had in common in the first place. They have nothing tying them to each other. And yet, they forge those missing bonds themselves, weaving themselves into an ever-more-tenuous web connecting them to each other. Strengthening it. They grasp something ethereal, invisible, and yet substantial. Something to hold onto. Something to be proud of.
The decision was easy for me. I am a Jew, because I am also a Tinysaur.
My kind have not existed for millions of years. Even when they did, they were not the stars of their time; they were hardly even a footnote. We were not the smartest, the most successful, the most cunning or devious or fast or vicious. We were not the most agile, or the most adaptable. We were just the tiniest.
This is the culture I have inherited, no matter how long dead: I am a dinosaur. But I am the weakest, least terrifying, cutest dinosaur in all of existence, in all of history. And I am the last of my kind. I needed some strength; I needed some pride. I needed to be able to call people I don't like schmucks. Judaism gave me that. Even if I don't go to Temple.
The earliest memory I have is this. A part of the team that created me, that cloned my egg and hatched it and turned it with tweezers, was holding me in the palm of his hand. He was using a Q-Tip to tickly my belly. I am a fucking carnivore, I eat the raw meat of my dead prey. And I was being tickled. And because I was young, I thought that I could stop the humiliation through violence. So I clamped down on the Q-Tip and I didn't let go. The prick that tickled me lowered the thing, with me dangling from it, back into the cage they had set up to hold me. I should have gone for his fucking finger.
There've only been a couple of fossil records found of the Tinysaur. One of them was discovered, partially digested, inside a Tyranosaurus's stomach. Since a Tinysaur would be far too small to be hunted by a T-Rex as nourishment, some scientists have offered up another explanation for the bizarre find. Their take is that the mighty Tyranosaurus ate the Tinysaur, not to feed herself, but because she was ashamed to be related to it.
This is my life. I hope you enjoy reading it.