The Seven Days of Creation

On the First Day, God shouted, "Let there be light!" And sure enough, as if He'd flipped a switch, there it was: a ray of light so wide and bright that everything upon which it shone was illuminated.

Except for Queens. In Queens there was no light, which troubled God, for His legacy seemed suddenly tainted.

On the Second Day, God tired of a thick fog that hugged the marshy ground upon which He walked. "It's been very foggy here lately," God said aloud to no one in particular. "And damp. Oh boy, has it been damp!" And God looked down at His sandalled feet and recoiled with further disgust. "I'm wearing sandals!" He yelled. "All I own are sandals, and they're gross to wear when the ground is wet." So God took drastic action.

With the wave of a finger and the wink of an eye, God created the atmosphere, which made evaporation possible, and as the moisture drained through the soil around him, and as the puddles slowly shrunk, God's sandals finally dried, and God again was comfortable.

But Queens still had no light, and God's confidence further betrayed him. At the end of the second night of His stewardship on Earth, in the smallest corner of His massive brain, God wondered if He was a failure and cried Himself to sleep.

On the Third Day, God had a radical idea.

"I'll break up Pangaea," He thought to Himself, because Pangaea had never quite suited God's unique sense of design. He thought it was clunky and awkward and that it dominated the globe, but He'd never known what to do with it either, and if He had, He'd kept His ideas hidden from the world and lacked the resolve to effect them. And yet now God was determined to act. "I'm doing it. I really am," He said aloud as if convincing Himself of the righteousness of His course. "And no one here can stop me."

And just like that He did it, and He clapped His mighty hands together and like a mime wiped them clean for emphasis. "There. Done. Finished," He said. "Can't take it back now."

A moment passed as God surveyed his work, and God grew visibly pensive. And then another moment passed, and God began to fret. He looked where Pangaea once had lain, and then He looked at it now in seven pieces scattered across the oceans. He bit His knuckle. He bit His lip. He wrinkled His brow. He fidgeted. "Oh, dear," He said. "I hope that wasn't a mistake."

And Queens still had no light, and again God cried in bed.

On the Fourth Day, God created the moon and the sun as a gift to the borough of Queens, which had lived without light since the First Day. "At last!" God said to Himself, relieved, as the sun beat down upon the world He'd created. "At last the borough of Queens shall have..." And God intended to say "light" but didn't because before the word had left His mouth, a telegram arrived at His door. God read the telegram quietly. His eyes grew wide, and His nostrils flared, and His face turned a fiery red. "There's still no light in Queens?!?" He bellowed. "This has to be a joke!"

But the telegram bore no lie, and darkness reigned still in Queens, and God's tears fell thick like a curtain.

On the Fifth Day, boredom plagued The Almighty, and He stocked the rivers and lakes with animals so that He could fish when bored again. He cast his Natural Motion Fishing Snake into the shallows, caught a huge black bass within seconds, and said aloud, "I like to angle."

In the evening, God built a fish tank and filled it with fish from the tropics.

And then He looked at Queens, in the dark still, and cried.

On the Sixth Day, God cast His eyes toward His fish tank. "These Harlequin Fish are boring," He complained. "You Harlequin Fish are boring," He told them. He tapped the glass. The fish did nothing.

And then God created people because people at least will do stuff.

"Do stuff," He said. "Now do stuff." And the people quickly sinned.

On the Seventh Day, God did not rest as many scholars have long suggested. He took the morning off to fish and appeared to be resting, but by mid-afternoon He was back at home and hard at work again.

Having fished now twice in three days, God had seen firsthand that the lakes and the rivers and the forests were thriving, and yet God seemed deeply troubled. "If such a thing is possible," He thought, "some of my species seem to be doing too well." God recalled an essay he'd read once about wildlife management in which the author had recommended the introduction of predators into an ecosystem overwhelmed by a few tasty species. "It makes sense," God said to himself, scratching His chin in thought. "It makes good sense."

And then God put forth a masterpiece, Eater X, his greatest creation yet. "You shall eat what others cannot!" He commanded. And Eater X vowed that he would.

And Queens was still without light.