One bright day, a man bumped on another human being that is almost his mirror image. Their legs, their bellies, their heads, their hands displayed congruency. The coincidence made him excited, panicky and satisfied simultaneously. He didn’t have an experience of looking his replica even in his nightmares or daydreams before.
“I am here and how am I supposed to be found there?” He murmured for a while baffled. He questioned himself “Have I repeated myself in the universe? How could that be? Or am I subject to illusion?”
He smiled the first historical human smile in the universe. He had an experience of exchanging smile-like gestures with other creatures before. But he smiled the real one for the real human; he got closer, his eyes fluttered for a while upon beholding a new guest.
Upon seeing her more he said “She is the bone of my bone, the flesh of my flesh,… let her be called a woman,”
He was surprised by the new guest who was already his second self.“I go by Adam. I’m the first human in the universe,” he said looking at his flesh comparing it with the guest’s flesh.
“I’m the first member of the fair sex in the universe,” the smile she tipped him with warmed his body like the rays of the sun.
The phrase a first member of the fairsex made him to ponder for a while. Then he decided she should be called a woman. He had named every animal on the land before the woman came.
“I Christian you with the name Eve,” he grabbed her hand.
She unzipped her lips to portray shiny teeth.
Adam added “Wo” on his name of “man” and it became “woman”, the prefix “wo” is the unconscious exclamatory utterance of Adam up on beholding Eve’s sight.
Adam wished to hold her shoulder and feel her whole body. He wanted to explore the geography of woman.
They were both naked, and were not ashamed. He called her Eve (a woman) as he called all creatures by their name before.
Her physical structure was a little bit different from that of his, and the body that he didn’t have and that she had, made him to gaze on strange parts for a moment not ashamed. Days and nights came and went. The chilly nights made them to sleep closer. Her body heat by conduction warmed his body.
Then the first man and woman shared at eventide record moments of happiness. Adam made Eve his wife. They spent days and nights together. Adam cherished the time he spent with Eve. Both became eager to live a lot. Step by step they gave birth to a child.
Adam got a child, totally another version of him in every image which is programmed. Gradually, they became three, four, five… Life continued. His children got the other of their images— the bones of their bones, the fleshes of their fleshes. This way, the number of human beings across the globe exceeded the billion marks. They have kept the word of God to be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth.
All the people you come across in this universe are the other you, who are created in the image of the first woman and the first man—the other of me, the other of you and the other of human race that share the same root.
BY DESALEGN DAGNE
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD WEDNESDAY 3 JANUARY 2023
