How the Giraffe Got its Neck

How the Giraffe Got its Neck by Adam Y. Edwards

Long ago far before man, when the world was just beginning God was thinking. He was in the process of creating the creatures to inhabit the earth. He decided to make special animals to lead the others. He thought of a sleek, black, catlike creature that would use fear to control the other animals in the jungle (the panther). He thought of another animal, this one a large, undersea creature with sharp teeth, large jaws, and special “radar” to detect underwater prey from a long way off (the shark). This one, like the panther largely ruled his kingdom using fear and intimidation. God placed him in charge of the ocean. But God wasn’t finished; he made yet another animal, this one much smaller, to rule the colder areas of the world. This creature was the smallest but most terrifying of all. This creature had a grey, sleek coat of fur to keep it warm, long sharp teeth with jagged edges to rip the flesh off of any creature who dared to opposed it, but that’s not it, he made this creature a pack of smaller but still terrifying animals just like it to help it accomplish its goals.

He had made a ruler for every different place in the new world except for one…. The African prairie. He spent day’s thinking of the perfect animal, but still his mind was devoid of it.  On the fifth day he grew frustrated, dark clouds rolled over the earth, thunder pealed, and lightning flashed, earthquakes rattled the earth. Hearing the commotion his young son, Jesus ran to his father “STOP!!!” he shouted. “Don’t take your frustration out on the world.” he begged, “why don’t you make the animal peaceful, gentle and humble instead of violent, domineering, and intimidating.” He said.  “That’s preposterous, get out of my sight!”

That evening however, he thought about what his dear son had said and decided to try his idea.( After all, they were both the same person!)Unfortunately however all of his powerful (strength, size, confidence, bravery) materials and characteristics) had been used on the previous animals.  The only traits that were left were beauty and intelligence . God worked for hours on this animal. The result was stunning. The animal was about 5 feet long with beautiful, yellow fur. It was brilliant too; its intelligence surpassed all other animals except for 2: the serpent and the human. He was so intelligent even, that he and God conversed with each other sometimes, and God considered him his best creation.

  In time however he became prideful and started to take advantage of the other animals. He stopped treating them as equals and started treating them as slaves. He even had forced them to begin making a shrine to him. When God heard about his cruel, dishonest, prideful ways he cursed him saying”you have lost my blessing, I will take from you your beauty: your yellow fur will be ruined with brown splotches, your head will be dented and ugly, your neck will become long so that your height will alienate you from the other animals, and worst of all you will lose your ability to talk and your intelligence and you will become dumb like the others.

Terrified, the giraffe ran away from God. He ran past his shrine, he ran for hours, while he was running he tripped and hit his head on a rock leaving a long narrow dent in his forehead. Still terrified he got up and continued to run, disoriented, he tripped again and fell in the mud, when he rose, as God had told him, he had dirty brown splotches all over his body. Too tired to run, he walked for a little while and saw something shiny in a thicket; sticking his head in the thicket he searched around, hoping it was some sort of food. He searched and searched but he couldn't find anything but leaves. When he tried to pull his head out of the thicket he noticed that he was stuck.  He pulled and pulled and pulled, but he couldn't pull his head free.  The more he pulled the longer his neck got, finally after about 8 hours of being stuck God came and freed him from the thicket.

Sobbing, the giraffe begged him to change him back to a beautiful creature. “Your physical change is complete” God said.”From now on you will be a stupid, mute creature just like the rest of the animals.” The giraffe tried to scream but the only thing that came out was a muted garble. The giraffe's transformation was complete; he had been transformed from a beautiful, cunning creature into a long-necked, dented fore headed, ugly creature.
2011 Adam Edwards ©