A DragonEye view on Lust and Greed

Let me start with the basics of Faerie dragons:  We're immortal.  We're androgynous.  We don't reproduce.  We were created at the beginning of time from God's greatest imaginings and have been around ever since.  So we have no use for lust.

Greed, however, is a different matter.

Of the seven deadly sins, dragons are most prone to greed, wrath, and pride.  (Although, to be fair, what you humans call "pride" is really just a natural acknowledgement that we are the superior species on Earth--but that's another post.)

What's the deal with dragons and greed?  We're natural hoarders, like I mentioned in my Apologia on Dragon Greed. At any rate, I'm not here to psychoanalyze my species.  I want to compare lust and greed.

I've had the unique position of being in human form, with all its accompanying, irritating hormonal consequences, once "helped along" by a curse I still owe a demon a roasting over.  So, I've felt lust, and I've got to tell you, it's not all that different from greed.  For one, it's a basic emotional desire--object or person, it's still that kind of feeling.  At its heart, it's about possession: permanently or until you lose interest, the goal is to own that object or person in some way.  It's the same for lusting for power: you want to make it yours.

Of course, there's a certain biological mechanism involved.  If humans weren't attracted to each other, there wouldn't be much "fruitful and multiplying" going on.  Since dragons don't procreate, we don't have that mechanism, and thus don't lust.  However, as hoarders, we do have the mechanism for collecting, which makes us susceptible to greed.  Every species has its weak point.  The problem, as I see it, is when you let that biological drive get the better of the spirit God gave you, i.e., your conscience.

Of course, that also means the remedy is the same for both--a clear conscience guided by perspective and prayer and some proper education in moral values.  Works for greed as well as lust.

Unless, of course, you're a dragon cursed into human form and influenced by enchanted perfume, but that's a story I don't plan on sharing anytime soon.

An Apologia on Dragon Greed

I got asked the other day about the dragon hoarding instinct and if it wasn't really just a sin to want to acquire stuff.  (Not that I'm getting to do that much in my current situation, mind you, especially since SOME PEOPLE have yet to purchase my latest adventure, Live and Let Fly.  What's wrong with you? Why are you denying yourself hours of entertainment and me any my writer our piddly royalties?)

C'mon.  You know you want it.

What was I talking about again? Oh, yeah.  Greed.

Here's the short of it:  Dragons have a hoarding instinct.  We are built to want stuff--and not necessarily gold and jewels.  That, ironically enough, is a stereotype placed on us by humans.  I have a friend, Hrrowrssh, who had a fondness for joints.  You know--elbows, knees, hips.  He's got a collection stretching to the Paleolithic.  He actually had the dwarves carve out a mountain so he could display them.  I once spent fifteen years with him, just going through the collection.  My favorites were the ones of things he'd eaten himself.  My own tastes change.  I like relics--or things I suspect will make great relics someday.  I'm quite a connoisseur at it, actually.  I know a lot of you probably think any old piece of junk becomes a relic if it's old enough, but real relics have history, meaning, and significance.  Your singing fish plaque ain't gonna cut it, no matter how many thousands of years it survives.

Now you can blow off our desire to acquire as simple sin, but it has its uses.  For one, where are you going to find a better collection of joints in both universes.  (And you can laugh, but the paleontologist of your era have been drooling over my friend's odd habit.)  I have object (now priceless) that would have been erased from history by now, some for civilizations long forgotten.

"Well, what good is that, if you're the only one who has them?" you ask.  Three words:  Lance of Longinus--and if you don't get the significance, you will once Karina publishes "Greater Treasures."  next month, maybe.  Suffice to say, some relics should not be left to other species.  Dragons know how to hoard, protect...and leave well enough alone.  I'll tell you more about the lance some other time.

For that matter, it's a misconception that dragons greedily hang onto their wealth.  We have been known to display certain selections--if the visiting party can keep their paws off it.   Think of all the trouble tourists have caused with flash photography, greasy fingerprints, and "no one will miss this pretty rock."  We will also redistribute on occasion.  I sold an artifact I'd kept for 8000 years to a museum because it completed its collection.

Dragons have rules, just like humans have rules for gaining wealth.  We don't raze villages in order to get a sparkly.  However, if that village has come after one of us with the proverbial pitchforks and torches and we raze the village in self-defense, why not grab the sparkly?  Hrrowrssh never went around biting the elbows off interesting creatures, but if he certainly took them off his prey.  We are always glad to accept gifts, trade, grant favors for items, etc.--dragon commerce.  And yes, we have a stash of gold and jewels--but usually that's in case we see something we just have to have.

Dragons are not Inherently Evil

Once again, Karina has gotten into a discussion about dragons and how she should not write the adventures of one because they are creatures of evil.

This, of course, hearkens back to Revelations, to whit:
Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads.Revelation 12:3

 So, naturally, I'd like to draw your attention to Exhibit A:

Count the heads, please.  Thank you.

But say, you don't buy that.  After all a dragon is a dragon, no matter how many heads, right?  And if the bible says the dragon is  the symbol of evil, then all dragons are evil.

Well, let's talk serpents, shall we?  It wasn't a dragon that tempted Eve, but a serpent, right?  And when the Israelites complained against God, what invaded their camp?  Serpents.  But I see serpents all over this earth.  You keep them as pets--even good Christians do.  But some are "good snakes," you say?

So some snakes are good, but all dragons are bad?  Speciest, if you ask me.

Oh, but let's look a little further.  When the Israelites were being attacked by the serpents, what did Moses do?  Drive them out?  No--he took it to God:

and Yahweh replied, 'Make a fiery serpent and raise it as a standard. Anyone who is bitten and looks at it will survive.' Moses then made a serpent out of bronze and raised it as a standard, and anyone who was bitten by a serpent and looked at the bronze serpent survived. Numbers 21: 8-9

So, God used the serpent for His will. 

Hmmm.. that sounds familiar.

What I did in school

One of the kids from Church asked me to go to show-and-tell this week. 

The teacher had a fire extinguisher handy.  Seriously?  I may be from the Middle East, but I have more self-control than that.  Anyway, the kids were sufficiently impressed and I used my charm on Mrs. Willoughby, so it turned out all right.  The kids asked the usual second grade level of questions--no Mensans there*--and then I invited them to pet me.

That's why I bother with these things, you know.  Who needs a masseuse when you can have 30 little kids give you a good scale rub?  and the little hands are perfect for scratching behind my cheek crests.  No, I do not thump my leg like a dog.  I can, however, be coaxed into a purr. It always ends too soon, but I go home happy and relaxed.

Stan calls me a sensualist.  I just tell him it's a dragon thing.  He wouldn't understand.

*In Magic, Mensa and Mayhem, Vern does show-and tell for the kids of Mensans.  That's where he learned his tail spikes are called thagomizer.

Dragon Dreams

Karina recently lent me a book by Larry Correia called Monster Hunter International: Legion.  Great book, very diverting, and made me glad I didn't have the problems these guys have had.  If you like lots of action with heavy-duty baddies and heavy artillery, go check it out.

I just want to talk about the dragon.  (SPOILER ALERT)

"Management" lives in a cave deep under a ritzy hotel where he is surrounded by gold jewels, fancy cars piled high--and I do mean piled; it's not like he was going to drive them--precious works of art, expensive wines...  You name it, he had it, or sold it off when he got bored.  He also had super high-tech stuff and owned major stock in companies.  (Loved the comments, "Yes, but they are using techonolgy that I own 40 percent of..." etc.  Knowledge wasn't even at his clawtips--he had bluetooth and voice commands for that.  Oh, this dragon was equipped.

I know what I want to be when I outlive the St. George's geas!

I so want to be Management, but even better for me, there's no such thing as PUFF (government bounty for monsters in Correia's books), so I can come and go as I please.

I'll be dreaming sweet dragon dreams tonight!

Check out Larry Correia's book: http://www.amazon.com/Monster-Hunter-Legion-Limited-Edition/dp/1451637977

Don't Call Me "Momma!"

Spoiler Alert:  If you've not read "Coyote Fires," then go check it out now.  http://coyotefires.karinafabian.com.  The fundraiser is over, so just enjoy the story before Karina takes it down.

Read it?  Good.  Then let me make this clear.  I hatched that phoenix egg by breathing fire on it.  That's it.  I'm as much a mother as an incubator is.  And labor jokes aside, it was hard and I was tired.  So don't go calling me "Momma."

Incidentally, we made $234, not counting the money made from book sales, which MuseItUp needs to get back with us on.  Thanks to all who donated:

Margaret Realy

Christina Weigand

Tim Ward

Amanda Borenstadt

Jeff Bickley

C.F. Vici

Charlotte Babb

Janet Parfitt

Matthew E H Green

Christel Sparks

Lisa Mladinich

Teresa Schnellmann

Beth Barany

Dindy Robinson

Lea Schizas

Chris Speakman

Penny Lockwood Ehrenkranz

Jolynn Oshea-Walker

Arthur Powers

Ellen Gable Hrkach

Michele Graf

My Life Isn't All Laughs, You Know

Last week, Karina presented a bit of a tale I'm telling her to her crit group.  They loved it--why wouldn't they?--but everyone wondered when the jokes and pratfalls were going to start.  They thought it seemed kind of dark.

That's because it is.

Is your life always funny?  Trust me, mine hasn't been, and in the legendary definition of adventure, I've had a lot of danger and discomfort.  However, like to many dangerous and uncomfortable situations, they've also been interesting, so I choose to tell them.  Why Karina tends to make these shorter stories and write the funny ones as novellas, I don't know.

Here's the piece she submitted.  She's finishing the story this week.

Dante assigned Judas his own special place in Hell for betraying his Savior.  I was wondering what horrible sin I’d committed to deserve my own unique inferno.

I slunk my way along the streets of the Faerie side of Los Lagos, trying to ignore how the glare of neon signs and pixie flash did nothing to dispel the gloom.  A temperature inversion had trapped the noxious fumes of Mundane technology, shrouding the autumn afternoon in a dismal, dirty gray fog.  People had been warned to stay indoors.  The Mundanes, insular by nature, anyway, were only too glad to hole up with their televisions and Xboxes, but the Faerie were still too new to this dimension to give up their social ways.  The many races that made their homes in this “brave new world” wouldn’t let a little smog get in the way of their gossip and shopping.

With my treasure left behind in the mountains of Caraparavalenciana, I didn’t have the means for shopping—even if dragons did shop—and I was hoping to avoid any gossip about why the resident undersized drake was prowling the streets.  Unfortunately, the higher you got, the thicker the air; my nose balked at the idea of flying.  I kept to the back alleys until I got to my destination, then flapped my way to the second story of a ramshackle hotel that dared to call itself The Ritz.  It was putting someone on, that’s for sure.

I didn’t care about the digs.  I’d come to visit another Judas in his hell.