Jonathan Shuster

Storytelling
March 13, 2015
Of Flowers and Serpents
Story of Quetzalcoatl:
It was a cold night in June
Cold enough to freeze
The captain said to John
Tell me a story please
The story went like this:

Legend has it that at the end of creation the gods and humans
lived in harmony and everyone was happy. Everyone except the god
Quetzalcoatl, who was angry that the humans were subject to the
other gods. So he decided to adopt human form to share the
knowledge of the gods with the people of the world.
Upon arrival in the human world, Quetzalcoatl changed from his
feathered serpent form into a tall, bearded white man. He wandered
many lands until he came across Tollan, a city among the reeds. When
he arrived, they were offering a sacrifice up to his brother Tezcatlipoca.
Angered by the barbarity of the sacrifice, Quetzalcoatl halted the
execution. The priest preforming the sacrifice shouted angrily and
raised his hands to the sky. As he did so, an evil wind started to blow
and the sky darkened, threatening a massive storm of thunder and
lightning. Quetzalcoatl calmed the people of Tollan and assured them
that while he was there Tollan would flourish and everyone would be

safe. He raised his head to the sky and blew away the clouds, letting
the sun pour down on the people of Tollan.
From that moment on, the Toltecs worshiped him as a god, but
he rejected any luxuries they brought him and taught them to live with
humility and purity of soul. Soon after, Tollan grew and prospered. The
god in human form taught them how to cultivate seeds, to work gold,
jade, and obsidian, how to dye cotton, the art of astronomy, and he
enriched their writing. He created an order of maidens dedicated to
cleaning the temples and promoted the worship of gods but forbade
human sacrifice. Instead he taught the people self -sacrifice by
pricking themselves with cactus thorns. In short, Tollan became and
grand and beautiful city.
But Quetzalcoatls brother Tezcatlipoca was not happy with what
Quetzalcoatl was doing in the human world, so he devised an evil plan
to destroy his brothers image. One day, Tezcatlipoca disguised
himself as an old man and brought a gift to Quetzalcoatl, who received
the gift with joy and humility, realizing that it was cactus that produced
a sweet, delicious nectar. What Quetzalcoatl did not know was that the
nectar was octli, an intoxicating liquid that had yet to be discovered.
Quetzalcoatl drank, and sang and drank like never before. He
was so ecstatic and full of desire that he took one of the maidens from
the order and made love to her, breaking his celibacy. In the morning
he felt groggy and ashamed, and made the hardest decision of his life,

for he was no longer worthy to lead Tollan. He headed to the sea and
built a boat out of snakes, and sailed toward the setting sun, promising
the people of Tollan that he would return to avenge his betrayal.

The Legend of Quetzalcoatl, as written by Chela Orozco

Analysis:
In case you were wondering, I have very little idea what inspired
me to tell this story. I was lying in bed trying to think of stories from
my childhood, and all I could come up with were biblical stories. I grew
up in a Jewish household and attended Jewish elementary school so
those stories were the ones I grew up hearing as a child. However, I
didnt want to tell another biblical story because I had already told the
story of Moses in class. So I asked my mother what other stories she
told/read my sister and I as children and she gave me a few
suggestions, but none of them fit into the theme of overarching
scientific/creation stories. In short, I was in a pickle. The next night I
was lying in bed thinking of books I read as a kid and I remembered
this book I had of dragons, like a dragon encyclopedia. One of the
dragons in the book was Quetzalcoatl, the feathered serpent, and this
gave me the idea to tell the story which eventually led to the downfall
of the Toltec empire (with plenty of help from Hernn Corts). The little
rhyme at the beginning is a limerick my father used to tell me as I child

when I would ask for a story. It would end the story went like this: it
was a cold night in June, cold enough to freeze a never-ending cycle
of cold nights in June. Id had this rhyme in my back pocket for a while
and wanted to use it in a poem/spoken word piece, so I was originally
going to write a spoken word piece about my father for my personal
story but I found disturbingly few stories that I could tell about my
father. I have memories sure, but no stories, which is a whole separate
problem. In any case, I felt like the rhyme went better with this story
than with my personal story, so thats where the beginning comes
from.
The story itself is a key part in the near absolute beginning of
settler colonialism, which drastically changed how stories were told in
the western world. As Hernn Corts wiped out the Toltecs, he
imposed western ideals on the people of Mexico, and played a key part
in bringing settler colonialism to the Americas. Part of the settler
colonialism brought by Cortez involves imagination as we see it
through western eyes, as something that has become a mental
practice. According to author Joe Sheridan, imagination as we see it
today is complete construct of settler colonialism, and has resulted in
the destruction of imagination as defined by natives. To the Cortez it
must have seemed as if the Toltecs imagined Quetzalcoatl coming
down from the sky and leaving on a boat of serpents because it wasnt
explainable by the science of the era. But to the Toltecs, how they

imagined the arrival and story of Quetzalcoatl is completely different

than anything people in living in western society could comprehend,
and so they truly believed than Cortes was Quetzalcoatl himself,
returning to avenge his betrayal. Its amazing that something as
simple as a story can lead to the death of a culture and a way of
thinking.
As far as emotions go, there is not a very diverse range in this
story compared to many other stories. The primary emotion present is
an overall unhappiness, which drives the characters to act. That being
said, there are not a lot of other emotions in the story to learn from,
and there is no positive emotion at the end of the story to wrap it all up
nicely, like we so often see in western stories.
Like I mentioned above, the core elements of this story are all
based on dissatisfaction. Quetzalcoatl was unsatisfied with how the
world worked, so he came down to earth to change it. Then
Tezcatlipoca was unsatisfied with how things were going so he decided
to come to earth to change them. Besides these two major examples
of dissatisfaction, the priest was dissatisfied when Quetzalcoatl broke
up his ceremony and Quetzalcoatl was unhappy with himself after he
broke his vow of celibacy. That is four examples of how dissatisfaction
drove this story, and can teach us a lesson: it is very hard if not
impossible to satisfy everyone. First Quetzalcoatl was displeased, then
Tezcatlipoca was unhappy, and then Quetzalcoatl was unhappy again.

It is important to recognize that it is impossible to please all of

humanity, so we must try our best to make the most amounts of
people the happiest.
This is a story I would tell to teach someone the lesson that it is
often impossible to please everyone. This is an important lesson for
people to learn, because only once you realize that pleasing everyone
is impossible are you able to please the most amount of people. It is
also an important story in the definition of imagination. Most people
past the age of twelve believe that they know the definition of
imagination, but in reality they only know a definition of imagination.
They dont know the native definition, the one that existed before
European settlers arrived. This story can be used to help teach people
another way to look at imagination.
Theres a bit of irony I want to point out in the story, mostly
because I found it interesting. Quetzalcoatl came to the human world
because was unhappy that humans we subject to the gods, but in the
end humanity was just a piece in a game the god were playing. The
humans were still subjected to the gods because the actions of the
gods affected them, as if they were just bystanders as the gods
interacted with each other. So in reality Quetzalcoatl didnt accomplish
his goal breaking humanity free from the gods.

Story of the Flower:

It was senior year of high school, lunchtime. Im sitting with the

lunch crew, which was a diverse group of sophomores, juniors, and
seniors. A lot of the kids did musical theater, I didnt, but a lot of them
did. Lunch was progressing along at its normal pace, when one of the
sophomore girls showed up about halfway through with a rose. And
this rose is sort of wilted. It wilted enough that you wouldnt
necessarily give it to someone, but not wilted enough that you would
throw it out if it were in a vase.
A few minutes later I decided its time to have some shenanigans
with this rose. So I say, Next cute girl that walks around the corner,
Im going to give her this rose and say I think youre really beautiful.
So a couple prospects walk by, but Im waiting for just the right person.
This pretty girl walks around the corner and Im like, Shes the one.
Shes a few years younger than me and Ive never talked to her but I
go up to her and start to say I think youre really beautiful. As Im
saying this, my friend who gave me the rose runs up from behind
saying No dont do her, dont do her! I think to myself, Oh thats
only because she knows her. So I finish saying I think youre really
beautiful. And the girl bursts into tears and has to be shepherded off
to the bathroom.
And Im just standing there in absolute shock and despair. I had
no idea what was going on. Like, I just told a girl she was pretty and
she had an emotional breakdown. So, confused and sad I go to my

next class, where were making straw dolls and Im trying to sow some
clothing onto it, and I poke myself with the needle and its not working
and I still dont get what I did wrong and I was having a really bad time
with everything.
I dont remember exactly when I found this out, whether it was
right after the incident or later that day, but I found out why she was
crying. A couple days before there had been a random drive by
shooting in a suburb north of Seattle, and the girl who was shot,
although she didnt go to my school, did play on my high schools
lacrosse team, and the girl I gave the flower to was really good friends
with this girl. So when I gave her the flower so was just so emotionally
unstable that she burst into tears.
Later than night, I was thinking to my self, Man, I got to do
something about this. So I ask my friend in yearbook to pull her out
of class. I find out what her sixth period is from my other friend (along
her name, which is Caroline). The next day at lunch I go to the grocery
store and buy a dozen of the prettiest roses I can find. Sixth period
rolls around, I have my friend pull her out of class, and Im there with
the roses. I say, I thought you deserved some real flowers, and hand
her the roses. She says, Thank you. And thats it.
Analysis:
I can safely say that this story is one of the most just straight
unfortunate things that has ever happened to me. I was trying to do

something nice, and it just turned out that it was apparently one of the
worst things I couldve possible done at the time. It wasnt as if telling
her she was pretty couldve been interpreted as me making fun of her
either, because she was a genuinely very pretty girl. Whenever I think
back on that story all I can do is sigh, and think that was just unlucky.
Unfortunately the incident did effect my actions in the future, and for
about a year I was tremendously hesitant about doing nice things for
random people for fear that they might burst into tears. Luckily, losing
bets with my frisbee teammates has in a way forced me to be able to
give things to random people, and none of them have started crying
yet.
One of the core elements of the story is the rose, which the
whole story centers around in a way. The rose is a physical symbol of
my kindness, or at least attempted kindness. There was only one rose
when I tried to do a small nice thing (but also pretty forward), but a
dozen when I did something that was truly kind, even though both
actions came from the heart. Here we can see the power of a
metaphor, which according to George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, allows
us to take an idea and put it into physical form. We as humans use
metaphors without even realizing it, but metaphor is especially
powerful in stories. It allows the author to imply something key
without specifically explaining it, which not only engages the listeners
but can also lead them to see more metaphors in their own life and

make deeper connections within their own stories. Another key part of
the story is the driving-by shooting. Although the shooting itself is a
minimal part of the story (time wise), it makes the story in all reality;
without it the story would be drastically different. I wouldve just been
giving a rose to a pretty girl and it wouldve ended there, but the
shooting turns a simple act (giving a girl a rose) into something much
larger, something larger than just her and me.
There are a couple lessons that I think can be gleaned from story.
First of all, listen to your friends and trust them. I did not trust my
friend that she had a genuinely good reason to stop me from giving
this girl the rose, and it resulted in a less than pleasant situation.
Second, is that in some instances it is a good idea to scale yourself
back. I am a very outgoing and social person, who has no problem
doing semi-weird and out-there things like giving a random girl a
flower. But not everyone else in the world is like me. A lot of people
are more introverted and find acts like the one I preformed to be weird
and even creepy. So, for the sake of others it is often a good idea to
wind down ones own personality a little. Finally, the most important
lesson to learn from this story is that sometimes there is nothing you
can do about a situation, but when you can do something to make the
situation better, you are obligated to do so. There was no way I
couldve known that Caroline was good friends with a girl who was just
shot, and I realize that what had happened wasnt my fault. Once Id

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moved on, I was able to take a step back from the situation and ask
myself, What can I do to make this right? This story does not say
that you can knowingly make bad decisions and then make up for them
by giving a girl flowers. But it is saying that if something is out of your
control and you can do something to improve it, do it.
Emotionally there is a lot going on in this story. At first the
emotions are negative: sadness, despair, confusion. But then (staying
true to most stories) it ends in a positive emotional state (thankfulness,
relief). There are also two important emotional lessons in this story.
The first is that if you are in an emotional rut, you can pick yourself up.
I was in despair after I made this girl cry, but I told myself, Being lost
isnt going to get you anywhere, so pick yourself up and do something
about it. And it doesnt even have to be that harsh. Something as
simple as good music or good food can brighten your day. On the
other hand, if you are in a extremely low emotional place, you can rely
on others to help you out of it. The girls friends were helping her out
of the situation or something nice from a stranger can bring you up.
They two ideas may seem opposite, but they do not conflict. Instead
they exist in a state of non-binary dualism, where the ideas are
different but complimentary. You cant always pick yourself up and
your friends cant always help you out, but a combination of the two in
different proportions can lead to an emotional turn around.

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There are a few times I could tell this story. One is as a comedic
story, because to me the story is honestly a little funny, just that
something so unfortunate would happen. Many times Ive told this
story when people dare me to give something to someone random, or
when my friends suggest that I get a girl flowers and they chuckle a
little bit at it. But when I tell the stories in those contexts, the lessons
fall through and arent driven home. To make this story powerful, I
would tell it to someone who needs to realize that some things are just
blatantly out of his or her control, and that just because something bad
happened because of their action doesnt necessarily mean its their
fault. For me, I hesitate to teach lessons like this to people my age or
older than me, because I feel like I come off as condescending. Maybe
that is not the case but the fear has detoured me from trying to teach
any real lesson with this story, even though a powerful one is smackdab in the middle of it.

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