“Our
jeweler is the best. No one in the world
can match his skill,” crowed Ruby to her friends. “I was talking the other day to my new friend
Diamond. She’s from some other shop, and
she said that she got sent here so that real perfection could be achieved. She says that our Andy’s work is so
legendary, people say that he creates all of us out of nothing. Any time he makes one of us, we’re absolutely
perfect, just the way he wants us to be.”
“I
heard,” cut in Pearl , “that he
doesn’t even have to find materials to make us either. He just goes into his workshop, and comes out
again, with a new perfect gem in his hands.”
“I love how each of us is made unique. No cut is the same, no shape the carbon copy
of the next one. I can’t imagine how
Andy can do it. He’s made so many of us, and has never used the same design
twice. Wow,” Emerald sighed contentedly.
Ladomar
grimaced as he walked past the gems’ shelf.
They were at it again. Talking
about their favorite subject. Andy. It was all they talked about as they awaited
their purpose. It was always ‘Andy this’
and ‘Andy that’. Ladomar was sick of
it. Everywhere he went, it was Andy’s
name that he heard. No one ever mentioned
his name; no one talked about who was always in Andy’s shadow. Everyone forgot that Andy had an
assistant. Ladomar thought that even
Andy himself forgot now and then. He
tried to tune out what the jewels were saying as he went about his work in the
shop, cleaning up, straightening everything, making it all perfect. But no matter how he tried to drown out the
jewels’ voices, their words were always grating against his ears. And the worst of it was that it was all
true. There was no one who could even
come close to claiming the skill that Andy possessed. Ladomar still had no idea how Andy was able
to create so many unique, perfect pieces.
In all his years working for him, Ladomar still hadn’t learned the
secret. And that’s what cut the deepest.
At
first, he was content to remain in the shadows, was thrilled to be so close to
the one who could do so many fantastic things.
He had been in utter awe of Andy.
But as time went on, he got used to the wonders, until they ceased to be
wonderful to him. He began hoping that
Andy would start treating him like an apprentice, start teaching him how to
make such wonderful jewels. But with
each passing day, Andy kept up his work, saying only a few words to Ladomar,
and never invited him into his private workshop. Ladomar had even tried bringing up the matter
to Andy, and ask him to teach him. But
on every occasion, Andy had walked by preoccupied, not hearing him, or had not
answered the question, and one time told him a solitary “No.” Ladomar couldn’t believe it. He had worked for Andy for so long, and had
asked for nothing else, and Andy wouldn’t even teach him? All Ladomar wanted was to be as great of a
jeweler as Andy was. Surely that wasn’t
too much, right? He deserved the chance
to be Andy’s apprentice. Assisting him
just wasn’t enough. So Ladomar began to
feel resentment against Andy, began to hate the sound of his name, began to
long for the day when his name would be praised just as highly- no, higher-
than Andy’s name.
So
here he was again, running the jewel shop, hearing the gems go on and on about
their maker, and still no closer to becoming a great jeweler himself than he
had been on his first day. He couldn’t
take it anymore. Ladomar waited until
Andy left, and went into his private workshop.
He hoped, at the very least, that the room would hold all of the secrets
of great jewel-making. His whole being
jittered with anticipation as he closed his fingers on the knob, turned the
handle, and pushed open the door. The
room was black as he entered, and Ladomar fumbled around a bit before finding
the light switch. Finally, he could
learn as much as Andy knew, and then he could leave, and start his own jewelry
shop. He could- …do nothing! A single bulb lit up the room, revealing a
wood floor and green walls. Nothing was
in that room. Not even dust
bunnies. Ladomar couldn’t believe
it. He started looking around for a trap
door. There had to be something. Surely Andy didn’t actually make the gems out
of nothing. There had to be a process that
Ladomar could duplicate. He had to be
better than Andy. He- … Ladomar turned
back to the door at the sound of Andy’s return.
“What
are you doing in here?” asked Andy. His
voice was calm, and his eyes told Ladomar that there would be no way out of
this. Andy already knew what Ladomar was
going to say, already knew all the excuses that he could conjure up.
“I
want to be as great as you. Greater than
you. I can’t just be your assistant
anymore. I need to learn.” Ladomar’s voice was defiant.
Andy’s
voice was kind as he replied, “Ladomar, you know I revere you highly. I have put you in charge of running my shop,
have given you the highest position. But
you cannot be like me. You were brought
in here to serve. That is your
place. Please return to it.”
“No!” shouted Ladomar. “I will not!
I deserve to be greater than you.
I’ve done so much for you! I’ve
heard your name be praised everywhere I go, and no one acknowledges my
existence! I’m tired of living in your
shadow! I deserve my own spotlight!”
“Ladomar,
please, calm yourself. Return to your
place. Forget these desires for
greatness. Be great in what you have
been called to do.”
“No!”
“Then
I must ask you to leave. I cannot allow
you ruin this place with your attitude.” Andy was as calm as ever.
“Fine! I’ll leave!
But don’t ever expect me to come back!”
Ladomar stormed out of the little work room, and in his rage, threw
around all of the beautiful gems Andy had made.
The gems cracked and broke into shards, and Ladomar threw most out onto
the street. He then went to go lick his
wounds in the company of his friends.
Sapphire
was shy when she arrived at Andy’s shop.
The other jewels who were there were very helpful though. They did not try to push her, didn’t try to
get her to share with them her experiences.
So for the first few days, she just listened. She heard Ruby talk about her experiences.
“I
remember that day. I remember Ladomar
suddenly went crazy. He went into Andy’s
private workshop, which no one is ever supposed to do, and he started yelling
at Andy, saying he should be greater than him.
When Andy told him- nicely, mind you- to please go back to running the
shop, he lost it. He stormed out, and
the next thing I knew, he had picked me up and thrown me across the room. I hit the wall, crashed onto the floor, and
saw pieces of me shattered around me. It
was so horrible. I was broken. Cracked.
No longer perfect, like Andy had made me. But Andy fixed me. He saw past all of my brokenness, and put me
back together. I still have a few scars,
but I am whole again, because of him.”
Ruby’s story was
one of the better ones. Some jewels had
spent some time outside of the shop, like Sapphire had, but had gotten to be
returned to the store sooner than she. Their
stories were similar to hers, but also similar to Ruby’s. Topaz told of how he had seen Ladomar one day
on the streets, and how he and the friends he had with him would come up to
broken jewels, like him, and would try to tell them all these bad things about
Andy, or would try to twist the truth into a lie. Some jewels were young enough to believe
Ladomar, and would then let themselves get more cracked and broken before they
realized what was going on. Other gems
were wise enough to know the wholeness that Andy could give them, and slowly
tried to work their way back into his shop.
None of them had made it on their own, though. Topaz told of a few people who were loyal to
Andy who had helped return them. Topaz
himself was still in the process of being made new. He still had a giant gash going through him,
and a small chip here and there muddled his outline, but he wasn’t completely
shattered like Sapphire was.
Some jewels
refused to admit that they had a story.
They never wanted to see their own brokenness, never admitted to being
completely shattered. Garnett was one of
those jewels. “I am just fine the way I
am, this is who I’m supposed to be,” she would declare haughtily. “If Andy didn’t want me to be like this, he
wouldn’t have let it happen,” she’d say with a sneer. Each day, the gems could see a new piece of
her cracking or chipping off.
Other jewels
focused too much on their brokenness.
All that they could think of was how they were chipped, cracked, gouged,
and how they could do nothing to fix it.
They lived for the days when Andy would spend time with them, putting
the pieces back, smoothing out the cracks.
But then they would return from his workshop and see only the pieces
that were missing, the cracks that were not yet filled.
As she herself
went through the process of being made new, Sapphire looked at those around her
and watched. It seemed to her like there
were three categories of gems. The first
category saw only the beauty of what Andy had done. They didn’t bother to look at the
imperfections, and they acted like they weren’t even there. It was as if their view of life was zoomed
out so far that they couldn’t see any details.
The second category saw only the flaws, but never looked beyond them to
see the beauty of Andy’s creation. These
gems looked at life through a lens zoomed in.
Sapphire loved the
days when it was her turn to spend some time with Andy in his workshop. He would talk to her, tell her that he loved
her, and tell her that he had a special purpose for her. And slowly, he started putting her pieces
back together. As she was being mended,
she thought she belonged to the third category of gems. She saw that she still had flaws and marks on
her, but she could also see the beauty of what Andy was doing for her. It was like she viewed life at the right
spot- not too far away, and not too close.
Sometimes she would struggle with leaning towards one view or another,
but after spending time with Andy, she got better at seeing the picture from
the right distance. For that, she
thanked Andy, and praised him for his greatness. She also hoped that the other gems could
learn to see their lives through that lens as well. She hoped that the gems would stop listening
to the twisted lies that Ladomar told them, and would instead listen to what
Andy had to tell them. Sapphire loved
having that perspective, and tried to share it with her friends as often as she
could.
Author’s Note
This story is a
creative rendering of a true story found in the Bible, and of some of my own
musings. Because of this, there is a lot
of parallelism between my story and the Bible’s account. The part that is based on my own musings is
how my mind creatively translated my thoughts of brokenness and how we are like
Andy’s jewels. Andy’s jewels can’t
really do anything for themselves.
They’re incapable of fixing themselves, and must rely on Andy to do
that. There’s also a lot of meaning
behind the names “Andy” and “Ladomar.”
Ladomar, of course, is based on Lucifer.
When I started thinking about writing this story, I wanted to pick a
name that both started with an “L” and reflected on the character. “Ladomar” is Hungarian, and means
“trapper.” Andy’s name isn’t quite as
meaningful, but it is based on a reference.
There is a joke that goes: “Do you know God’s first name? It’s
Andy. ‘And He walks with me, And He
talks with me, And He tells me I am His own.’
So since Andy is the God figure in this story, I thought it would be a
fitting name for his character.
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