The Archives of Fudgemore

A History of Truth Seekers

Volume 2 Issue 2: A Great Discovery

by Bao Luo

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by School of Unusual Arts

61 Adelaide Street, Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada Schoo lofunusualarts.com

ISSN 2816 -2781 (Online Version)

ISSN 2816-2773 (Print)

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The Great Discovery

In which Fudge and Fudge discover a cave

and what they found there,

and how they gave it to Fudgemore for safekeeping.

Pinkie Fudge got his name from early childhood owing to the funny color of his skin. He could have been called Orangie, but it wasn’t a name, so they called him Pinkie instead. He was a world-renowned archeologist as well as an historian. Ever since he was little, Pinkie Fudge was inordinately fond of carrots and that’s why his skin had a funny color, and its why he always appeared with bulging pockets.

Larissa Fudge was a super healthy historian who completely fell for “the man of carrots” as she called him. Most people by the way are more interested in “men of letters” than “men of carrots”, and it was really lucky for both of them that they had met each other. They shared so many critical interests. Most particular among them was a common interest in the truth, and facts be known, these two are the only historians in the world that can be depended upon to at least try to tell the truth.

Truth does not suddenly appear, nor is it a definite thing, nor is it a thing at all, but it is rather a direction that a great person must walk towards. Such people are called truth seekers, and among them are counted, without further introduction, Pinkie and Larissa Fudge.

Now the question of what it is to be a hero or heroine is a central question which faces humankind. And that is because our heroes and heroines are not only people, whether imaginary or not, but are in fact symbols of what every child must want to be like. Fudge and Fudge looked out upon the world and wondered, what stories of what popularly celebrated persons are there that embody truth, wisdom, or any proper understanding of the world?

Whom shall our children look up to?

Now the past is hard to decipher as every historian knows. But this does not stop such historians from trying, and Larissa and Pinkie Fudge knew, with absolute certainty that there were such things as true heroes and heroines, but was anything ever written about them? And they looked and they looked everywhere and found but little, until one day Larissa fudge came upon a story which changed the course of their search.

The story goes like this. A certain man lost the keys to his house. His neighbor saw him searching under the street lamp on his hands and knees and came out to help him. After some time searching to no avail, the neighbor asked him “where do you think you lost your keys?”.

The man replied “over there” and pointed to his house which was shrouded in darkness. The neighbor replied “ if you lost them over there, then why on earth are we looking over here?”.

To which the man replied “ because it is too dark over there and we won’t be able to see anything!”.

On hearing this story Larissa Fudge got excited and shouted “Fudge!” to which Fudge replied

“What is it my dear?”

“All this time we have been searching in libraries for clues to the stories related to the heroes and heroines that have embodied the threefold meaning of life! How stupid can we be! Why of course the truth, although light itself, must not be hidden in the light, but in the darkness! We must therefore continue our search for the obvious in no other place than the obscure, and what more obscure place to look than in a certain cave!”

And thus their search in libraries was abbreviated and the search for a certain cave began.

In the last hundred years, various libraries have been unearthed, from the Nag Hamadi library in Egypt to the Dead Sea Scrolls found in the caves of Qumran. But Larissa and Pinky Fudge were not looking for ancient texts. They were looking for stories that we can all relate to which might shed light on the threefold meaning of life, and therefore, they were looking for something extraordinarily ordinary.

“The certain cave must not be so obscure” Pinky began his deductions. “In fact, it must be very obvious to anyone who cares to look. The certain cave itself must not be hard to find. The problem must be in how we look at it when we do find it.

“That makes perfect sense” said Larissa “For often do we look out at things, but rarely do we see them”.

“Indeed” Pinky responded, “when was the last time we looked at a map and saw it for the first time?”

Then they got out a bunch of maps they had looked at many times and saw them all for the first time. And sure as the number two is not three, on the fourth map they saw the name of a certain town, and outside the town a certain road, and off the certain road but a ways, it was there…a certain cave.

So they packed their bags and Larissa packed two pair of sunglasses. And Fudge wondered and asked “what are those for?” “I just thought that since a double negative equals a positive, that double darkness might reveal the light” she answered. “Good thinking replied Fudge”, and they were off.

As soon as they arrived at a certain town, they rented a car and drove down a certain road. At a certain place they found a certain path. They put on their backpacks and walked up the path, and as simple as grandmas marmalade, there it was, a certain cave.

“Truth is before us” said Larissa, “and all we had to do was to free our minds of the fact that it wasn’t”

“Before we go in, I must have a carrot” said Pinky, “ and he reached in his coat pocket and pulled out a carrot and ate it. “Food is true” he said “and truth is food. Now let us see what we can see”. And they squirmed their way into the cave.

At first all they saw was darkness. Neither could they see even their hands in front of their eyes.

And the sensation was all new to them and they both realized how much they had depended upon their eyes to see. So they felt their way around and all around was rough stone, except for one place.

“What is this?” asked Pinky.

“Is this question not an attempt to categorize the unknown? “Responded Larissa. “And is not the categorization of the unknown based on past experience? And is not what we are looking for something of which we know nothing? Is it not better therefore for us to experience for a while without knowing?” And this they did, and no one knows how long it took them, for pure experience and time have never met each other.

Finally, Larissa reached in her purse and said “it is time” and she gave to each of them a pair of sunglasses. No sooner had they put them on than the darkness clarified and what appeared before them was a large cauldron of a hat, carved of polished stone. And they marveled and to each other they wondered what was inside. Then Pinky, looking expectantly at Larissa Fudge, reached his hand down into the hat and felt something.

Now as cliché as it may seem, sometimes it happens that reality is as absurd as a magic show, and this case was no exception. The first thing he pulled out of the great stone hat, by its very ears, was a rabbit. The rabbit wriggled and wiggled and tried to say something that they could understand, but alas, there was a language barrier and all that could be communicated between them was surprise and tenderness. This, being enough of a genuine exchange on both parties, the rabbit made a silent agreement with Pinkie Fudge and rented his coat pocket for a modest fee and an immodest amount of time. And the apartment came furnished with carrots.

Pinkie and the rabbit were never separated from that day forth. But enough about the rabbit.

As you can see, they are very distracting creatures.

Now curiosity got the better of all three of them. The Fudges put their hands on the rim of the hat and peered down into it. The rabbit put his paws on the rim of the hat and peered down into it. Nothing. Nothing but darkness.

“Well, here goes” said Pinky “and he reached his hand all the way to the bottom and he felt something, something…Yes he felt what felt like manuscripts of some sort. Carefully gathering one in his hands he pulled it up. And it was there. The first of many illuminated manuscripts.

And the title must have astonished them all, including the rabbit. For written in writing were the words “A History of Truth Seekers, being a description of the way to truth and meaning”

and the title of this one was, “Obifus the Liar”. And this was a singularly intriguing title.

Now at this point you are probably wondering if this story is true, because it is strange after all to enter a cave without a flashlight. That’s what I thought too. But silly me, I had forgotten about the sunglasses and how that all works.

Now there is obviously much more to tell about what happened, and perhaps we will be able to read about it someday. But for the purposes of getting on with it, so to speak, the most important thing to know is, that many precious manuscripts were found. And among them were such titles as Iffetayo’s bucket and the snake, Del Samara the candy maker, Earnesto and the Juggler, The Hall of Statues, Donya’s Beans, Obifus the Liar and who knows how many more? And all were about extraordinary people who had understood something about the threefold meaning of life which is common to all peoples of all races and cultures of all time, and is the only hope we have of saving the world. And you would have to be crazy not to be interested, but then, well, just look at the world. Finally, the last thing you need to know is where the manuscripts are kept and guarded. Relax, they are safe in the archives of Fudgemore. And about Fudgemore and how he became an archivist, well, I hope to hear that story some day.

The End

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