Corky the Dolphin

The following story is not a play on the Bible, as usual, but is a play on the latter-day spiritualism, or the "New Age" bible.

Corky the Dolphin was a bottlenose dolphin who swam around in the Pacific Ocean in the 1970's. If he had been human, he would have been described as a "surfer-type" - Bermuda shorts, and flipped-back hair. But as a dolphin who didn't wear clothes, the only thing he wore was his smile.

Corky got his name from his dad, Pep-Squid, who always thought the sound of burping was funny, whether it was humans or dolphins. The difference was that dolphins didn't need antacids, and had never heard of dolphins who felt "bloated." But he loved Hostess Twinkies.

Corky was a young dolphin the first time he swam around humans on a boat. Before the humans even noticed dolphins circling the boat, Corky could hear what the humans were thinking:

"If that jerk doesn't quit playing that same tape over and over and over, I'm going to throttle him," thought the tourist.

The tourist's kid thought, "I'm so bored. The sun is the sun is the sun. The ocean is the same old ocean, and nothing ever happens."

"I wonder what we're having for supper? The advertisement for this cruise said we were going to have a light snack with our surf' and sun. I hope they don't mean chips and dip. After these four daiquiris, I'm in the mood for a steak," thought the older, padded lady.

The resident stud-muffin thought of the tourist, "That chick sure is cute. I wonder if her bathing-suit is padded, or if all that beautiful cushion is really hers?"

Corky detected no hostility in these thoughts, and even though he did not know what a tape was, or a daiquiri, or a cushion, he felt the humans must be of some sort of compatible mental vibration, because at least they completed sentences in their own minds.

Corky's father, Pep-Squid, had warned him what could happen to him around a boatload of humans: they would blubber, scream, and like as not start sentences without finishing them - the Dolphin's Bane. For instance:

"Oh, look at that dolphin, he's so..."

"Can you believe this sunset, it's just so..."

"The captain is a real stud-muffin. I wonder what he'd be like..."

Corky had been warned by his dad, Pep-Squid, his mother Mamma L., and his Aunty Acidik to always be careful around humans who don't finish their thoughts.

Corky also remembered Pep-Squid's advice about how to deal with dolphin-worship, which was best avoided at all costs. No dolphin liked to be idolized, because then they became objects of worship instead of play. Corky shivered and did a flip whenever he remembered one of Pep-Squid's horror stories:

"They was on a boat, kid, and I was the only dolphin around. I floated to the boat, put my snout over the sideboard, or whatever they call it, and this big ugly chick shouts, 'Oh look, Melvin, it's an itsy bitsy cutesy widdle dolphin here just for us!'

"Well, I was having a tough time with the 'iddle widdle' speech but I was gonna make it, kid, because I remembered what your grampa, Gnarly Gnose, who found submarines in WWII, told me. 'Don't be afraid of the mealy-mouths, son, because they're a lot better than the swamp-asses down South.'

"So I figure being on the west coast and all, and meeting your mother (Kantar Ra bless her saintly prow) was gonna save me, and I needn't never worry about no snot-nose humans with bad English again.

"But what I didn't reckon on, Corky, was being talked baby-talk to by a bunch of pee aitch dees!"

So Corky remembered what his dad had told him, but he also worried about what his mother, Mamma L. had told him about one of her human excursions.

It had been a quiet morning on the ocean floor. Mamma L. had been fixing a can of tuna for Corky's supper when she decided to tell him about her poor adventure with guru-seeking humans. Corky just listened, and floated in ever-tightening circles, while Mamma L. told her story.

"Oh, Corky, it was terrible," said Mamma L, while wiping her fins free of tuna juice. "These big grotesque people with marmalade smeared all over their lips came up to kiss me, and said I was so cute, and how they all wanted to hug me until I thought I was going to belch. One of them hung a big necklace on me with a bunch of lava-rocks, and said I was a blessing and had been blessed."

Mamma L. shook her head, and continued with her story.

"That lady put that necklace on me, and I felt like a hunk of iron had been put around my neck. I had always been taught that when humans gave you a blessing, you were supposed to honor it, the same way humans are supposed to honor our blessings. When that lady put that hunk of junk jewelry around me, I thought I was going to float to the bottom of the ocean and let the sharks get me.

"But, Corky," said Mamma L. with a beseeching tone in her voice, "A blessing is supposed to lift weight, isn't it? Why did I feel when that lady put that necklace on me as if I were sinking to the bottom of the ocean? And why would she do that to me, if she loved me, as her vibration said she did?"

"I don't know, Mamma L.," Corky said. "I haven't had a chance to learn about humans yet, because you and Daddy won't let me until I'm big enough, but I'd like to learn why humans have a habit of hurting the ones they love."

"That's sweet, dear, but please don't get hurt just trying to figure out what happened to your daddy and me. You are so much more precious." Mamma L. said, and blew him a raspberry in affection. "Remember, there's never a shortage of humans on this planet, but dolphins willing to work with them are a treasure, indeed."

Corky swam 'fore and aft that day, convinced he could solve the riddle that had plagued his parents. Obviously they had dealt with ignorant humans who did not understand their own blessings, much less those offered by other beings. Corky, in his youth, thought he might be able to penetrate that mystery known throughout the galaxy as a "Closed Mind."

Corky decided to speak to the ignorant humans.

"Eh-eh!" he said. "Eh-eh, eh-eh, eh- eh eh eh!" he cried.

"Oh, he's so precious!" screamed the daiquiri lady. "Throw him a strawberry, or a banana!"

Corky swam back away from the boat. "Throw him" he understood, but not strawberry or banana, as those were outside his point of reference, and he did not want to be thrown.

The tourist kid did not speak, but his eyes glowed.

Then the cushion lady spoke up, "Oh, the big darling! He's so exquisite! Do you think he'd fit in my bathtub?"

The stud-muffin didn't speak up, but simply thought to himself while looking at cushion-lady, "I'd like to fit you in my bathtub."

Corky didn't know what a bathtub was, but he knew a creep when he saw one, so he spit at the stud-muffin. Cushion-lady giggled.

"You little bastard!" cried the stud-muffin, and threw some shrimp-bait into the ocean. Corky burped his thanks, but was still confused by his adventures. He decided to float away from the boat for a few laps, do a couple of rollovers and flips, and think about what his Aunt Acidik had said recently.

"Humans have run out of gods to worship, but they have an incessant need to worship, so now they are looking for non-humanoid forms to worship," Aunt Acidik had said. "I'm not trying to be cynical, boy, and it is true that it is time for dolphins and humans to meet. There is a bigger clock on this planet than ours, boy, whether you like it or not, but the problem for dolphins like us is 'How do we answer the new clock' without running into the lunatics who are still following the old clock?

"Well, there ain't no answer, son, except you pay attention to the new clock, and forget about the old clock. And if that means you have to run into a few springs, whirligigs, and worthless parts, you still take that which is worth something to you, and swim as fast as you can toward the future."

Corky thought about what his aunt had said, and decided to run with it.

He rejoined the boat, with all the hootin' and hollerin', and pretended to join in the hootin' and hollerin', and ate all the free shrimp he could get. Corky did everything he could to look like a dumb and sweet dolphin, and would have twirled his cap if he'd had one.

He played the fool until sunset, when the adults got bored and started thinking about their drinks, dinners, and lays. The tourist kid, who wasn't old enough to be ambitious in terms of ambiance, corpulence, or pestilence, had decided to keep the dolphin company for as long as the dolphin wanted to keep the ship company.

When the sun got low enough into the sky that it didn't look like a sun anymore, but rather like a lime that had been thrown into a green field, Corky rammed the boat, which flipped the tourist kid off the boat and into the water. Corky swam under the kid before he could draw breath, and the kid grabbed onto Corky's fin, and both sailed toward the shore to a new life.

The End.

Love, Galadriel
08/04/2004
Tales/corky.htm