Worlds of Wolves

"You know, Ive always wondered.....what would the world be like if something like a mass extinction happened. Most of life was whiped from the face of the planet. Water dwindling to drink holes. Volcanos covering hundreds of miles of land. Earthquakes splitting the earth, causing life to fall into the cracks. Tornatos tearing apart families, friends, tearing the spirit from the bodies. Animals vanishing. Forests, homes, people burning away. If something went wrong all at once to cause the world to start over.....what would be left?

"Would there be any survivors? Humans left to regenerate? Would there be enought to survive?" She looked quisically at the people seated in front of her. They all looked like they were in deep thought. Kara looked at the first woman who stood up. The woman's voice was hoarse and scratchy.

"God wouldnt let that happen. He would take us all to heaven before He destroyed the earth." Her tone was difiant.

"Yes. For those who believe that, yes He would save you. But think about...lets say the Flood. For all you who believe in this particular religion. Why did God restart life? Restart the world?" Kara looked at the croud again. Narowing her eyes on a young lad who rose from his chair. He couldnt have looked more than seven or eight years old.

The child's parents were looking at him, shocked that he dared stand up. "My church says that God took two of every animal and all the good people into safty while the rest were flooded with rain. But that always made me wonder.." He looked nervously at his parents before drawing in a shaky breath and continuing. "God says he loves us all. So yeah, even if we do something bad he already punishes us. We get sick. Some people dont have food. The people we love die." His tone got harsher on the last statement as he glared at his parents.

Kara listened to the kid, thinking that he was speaking more maturely than some of the adults even. He was an old soul, even from here, while he stood in the back of the auditorium, she could see old eyes in a young face.

He coughed a little before going on. "In a way God already punishes us for those bad things that we do. Just like if I get in trouble I get sent to my room or I get a toy taken away. Something dear to me gets taken for a while. But He loves us. Why would he kill us? At church they said that God was sad by all the people who were sinning. Weeelll doesnt everyone sin at one point? We all talk back. We've stolen candy from the cupboards. We kill spiders and bugs and many people are killed. Arent those all sinning?

So if those people were sinning why did God flood them and kill them? If he loves us, he would forgive us, not kill us right? So, since our world is so mean. We have war, we hate our neighbors sometimes. We yell, we get jealous of our friends' bikes and toys. If we do all that now, isn't it possible that God will kill all of us again? Not everyone could be saved I have to admit. But to me it doesnt make sense." He looked up at me innocently. "Please, Im confused. Help me understand, and my mama and daddy too." His parents were looking very angry with him.

The room was quiet as the child returned to his seat. Everyone could hear his mother whispering harshly into her son's ear. "Dont you dare stand up again young man or you'll--" Kara cut the mother off.

"What's your name." She said looking directly at him while he ignored his mother's threats.

"Joel." He said in a soft voice.

"Joel. Would you like to join me up here? I could really use your help." She said sweetly as his mother shot daggers at Kara with her eyes.

"He will most certainly not go--" Joel cut her off this time.

"Yeah. I'd love to." He bounced out of his seat and walked up the long isle until he got to the stange stairs. As he bounced up each step his smile slipped a little.

"It's okay. Dont be nervous. I have a question Joel. Do you think you can answer." Kara knelt at his eye level. They boy's blond curls bounced as he nodded his head enthusiastically.

"Okay. If almost everything was to be killed and whiped out, what little creatures do you think would survive? Think small."

Joel thought for a couple minutes, a frown on his face. "...small...?" His forhead creased in concentration. "Maybe a mouse. 'Cause you said that everything on the face of the earth....some mice live under the ground, right?"

"Right." Her eyes brightened at the little boys perceptiveness and understanding. "The mice could live through it. They did when the dinosaurs disapeared along with all the big animals, huh?" He nodded his head again.

"Can you think what other animals would maybe survive, if they dug holes in the ground to live in? Not caves, but something like tunnels." Kara stood up now, looking kindly down at Joel as he thought again.

"I dont know a lot of animals..." he admitted. "But moles I think live in tunnels."

"Yeah they do." She beamed down at him, her respect growing. "Did you know that polar bears dig holes to hibernate in?" He shook his head no. "Yeah, instead of caves, they're tunnels that they climb into. The wolves do to."

His face lit up when Kara said wolves, she knew he like them. She asked another, simpler question. "What's your favorite animal, Joel?"

He grinned up at Kara. "Wolf."

She smiled. "I thought so. But yes, the wolves dig tunnels of sorts for their dens. Atleast the arctic wolves do. Here.." She indicated to a second chair that had appeared on stage while everyone was watching Joel thinking. "Why not sit here beside me while I talk to everyone at the same time for a minute."

"Okay." He chirpped as he plonked himself in the small, child sized, yellow, plastic chair.

"Arctic wolves spend time in their dens, under the surface. There isnt much destruction to fear where they are besides loss of food. But if the mice survives, especially in the arctic with those wolves, the wolves wouldnt have that much trouble finding food. They could scrounge the dead around them for a while and then resort to eating mice.

"The arctic wolves actually eat rats when the caribou or other animal is scarce in the land. They dont, like many believe, live off of the larger kill. It is actually quite rare that they will get a good kill. And wolves will not hunt unless they are at their ends hungry. They dont over indulge. But if the rats survive just like the last world wide extinction, ending the life of dinosaurs, they could survive this time. And the wolves, hidden in their dens until it is safe enought to enter into the air again, would feed on the rats until the world started populating again with other animal and plant matter.

"The wolves could also spread the world, the continent their on, they would spread out, mate, and feed off of rats that essenscially live everywhere. The wolves could survive along with other, burrowing animals." Kara took a breath to calm her energized nervs. Sometimes she put a little too much emotion into these speaches while she was trying to get her point accross.

She turned to Joel again. "Joel? Do you ever hear of the stories about the wolves that turn into man? Like werewolves?" He nodded solumnly. She guessed his parents had banned this track of thinking.

"Did you know that in certain ways, humans are very much like wolves? That when it comes to family and such, the wolves then become the closest relating things to us?" Kara quizzed him with her bright green eyes.

Joel shook his head, confusion writen on his face. Kara turned to the croud again. "Wolves are very faithful to those that they create a family with. The pups stay for years with their parents, most dont even leave their family unless if they've found a mate. Wolves are faithful to only a single mate. If the mate dies, they will not go searching for another, but lay in solitude, search for another pack to live with, or continue raising their young and staying with their offspring. It kind of sounds like humans.

"Our children stay with us as they grow and most of the time, until they are ready to move on by themselves into the larger world. We fall in love and if it is true love, we stay forever with that one love. We are faithful until the end and beyond. If the love dies, most dont remarry, instead living in the world by themselves or living close to their children or own parents. Does it not sound like the wolves? Could the world restart, better, healthier, happier if the wolves survive while everything else dies besides those very very few exceptions?" Kara looked at the croud.

Not a single person made a sound while they ran over the things in their minds. No one coughed or sneezed. No one yawned, all was silent until someone's pen dropped on the ground. Half the people jumped while the rest whipped their head around to see who had broken the silence. Then everything remained silent.

Kara gave the people a minute more to think before she started again. "I've always wondered, what it would be like....living in a empty world." She closed her eyes. "Sometimes I thought about those things that I would miss if I was alive in that empty world. But I also thought about what I would hear." She opened her eyes.

The speaker sucked in a breath. "I have a story to tell." The croud became more attentive, some leaning forward in their seats. Kara was glad that she captured the croud so well.

"One night, I was thinking about what I would hear in a nearly empty world. I had no clue at this point what might survive and what might not. I was listening to the things around me. My fishtank in the living room was bubbling, reminding me of running water. I heard the creak of the house settling like it sometimes does on it's foundation, reminding me of a tree falling. And then for a while everything was quiet." Kara lowered her voice. It was nearing a whisper as she spoke into her microphone.

"I started pondering what animals might be left. The silence becoming earie. I actually checked outside my window to check that I wasnt, like in my immagination, the only one in an empty world. But my imagination continued to wonder about the animals, which ones would die? Which ones were best suited for surviving. And then a wolf howled from in the distance." Kara stopped, letting her words sink in. "The wolf. My favorite animal." She smiled at Joel. "As I researched, I found that it was, with a small chance, the wolf could survive. But besides that....what would the world be like? That's what I leave you with today. Think about it. What do you think an empty, silent world be like? What would be left? What would be gone?"

Kara turned to Joel. "You can go back now, thank you so very much. It was nice to meat you Joel." She smiled widly at the child as he got up and took his leave.

She turned back to the croud one last time. "Thank you for your time today. Think on this, you may find it interesting." And Kara turned away.

As she left, she heard the auditorium filing out in near silence. She smiled at the reactions she had gotten. Kara loved it when she left them all thinking. All silent. It was good to know she was heard.