Hello God, It's Me, Georgie
by Feath MacKirin

"Hello God, it's me, Georgie."

"GOOD MORNING, GEORGIE. WHAT CAN I DO FOR YOU TODAY?"

"Well, God, it's like this. Now that I've freed the American people ... freed the Iraqi people ... Now that I've domesticated Iraq, I need to make sure they get with the program, find the right page, as it were. They need to know the right path, which foot path to use, it's a one way street, you know?"

"UM. GO ON."

"So, I'm mindful of the difference in our cultures -- that reminds me, God, did you know there are black people in Iraq?"

"YES, GEORGIE, I AM ALL KNOWING."

"Oh, right. Well, I'm mindful of our differences, and those differences are what I want to address, show them the right path, the True God's path -- that's you, God."

"THANK YOU FOR POINTING THAT OUT, GEORGIE. I WAS WORRIED FOR JUST A MOMENT."

"Sure, no problem, God. Just ask anytime, and I'll help you out. I'm here to help you out, do Your Will."

"GET TO THE POINT, GEORGIE."

"Right, well, what I wanted to ask You, was about this memo I got from my in house Priest, what was his name? He's from Texas -- I mean, Florida, a good boy, the son of my brother's business partner."

"DOES IT MATTER? YOU HAVE A DIRECT LINE TO ME."

"Oh, yeah. So I got this memo, right here, that kind of confuses me, as, well, you know, it doesn't seem right. I'm thinking you need to clarify a few things. I'm thinking there's got to be a mistake."

God looks over Georgie's shoulder at the memo. "THE NINE COMMANDMENTS. WHAT SEEMS TO BE THE PROBLEM, GEORGIE?"

"Pretty much ALL of them, God." Georgie stabs point 1. "Have no other Gods."

God pulled up a pew and sat down. He pulled up an icy cold glass of water.
"Now, God, that's just plain silly."

"EXCUSE ME?" God choked on his water.

"Well, Jesus is our lord, too, right? And he's not you, he's your son."

"IT'S KIND OF COMPLICATED, GEORGIE. JESUS IS NOT ME, TRUE, BUT IT'S OKAY TO WORSHIP HIM, CAUSE, WELL, HE'S JESUS." And he had damn good P.R. (supplied by Moi) and everyone likes him better.

"And what about the Holy Ghost?"

"I AM THE ONLY GOD, GEORGIE. DON'T LISTEN TO THEM. HAVE THEY BEEN TALKING BEHIND MY BACK?"

"Oh, no, Lord. Well, they do sometimes, whisper to me in the night, but I don't listen to their ravings! I know there is only You!"

"GOOD BOY, GEORGIE. I'LL LET YOU FIND OSAMA AS A REWARD FOR THAT ONE!"

"Oh, thank you, God! Now, Number two."

"DO NOT MAKE IDOLS." God recited from memory.

"Yeah, that one. That there HAS to be wrong. I mean to say, that's just not Christian! That's from that heathen religion that the Muslim men do." Georgie pointed to the life size Jesus nailed to a cross he had hanging on the bedroom wall, right where he could see it when he woke up each morning. "I mean, that's not an idol, is it? It's just a representation of your son, taking away our sins for us."

"AH -"

"And that's another thing, God, if you take my meaning, if he took all our sins for us; we are sinless, aren't we?"

"LET'S STAY WITH ONE SUBJECT AT A TIME, GEORGIE. NO IDOLS." He needed a nice, soothing tea. He pulled up a cuppa, perfectly sugared.

"Right, no idols. But a cross isn't an idol, right? It's just representing Christianity, what I believe in, You, in your magnificent glory, right?"

"GEORGIE, YOU do KNOW WHAT AN IDOL IS, RIGHT?"

"Sure I do, Lord, I'm not ignorant. My daughter idolizes rock starts. That's what's wrong with this country! Rock star's as idols! Thanks for clarifying that for me, God!" Georgie makes a note: Rumsie: make rock stars illegal.

God knocked back his tea, and pulled out a wine cooler. "WAS THERE ANYTHING ELSE BOTHERING YOU?"

"Yeah. Number three: Don't take your name in vain. I looked up vain in the dictionary, that is, I wanted to make sure I knew what vain was."

"YES?" God knew what was coming.

"God Damn it, it doesn't say a thing about cursing. "In an irreverent or disrespectful manner", it says. Now, I can see maybe 'God fuck a fairy' or 'God is a dirty old man', but it don't say no where, that vain means cussing. Seems to me, by that I mean, it just seems, that asking you to damn something to the nine pits of hell isn't using vanity at all."

"YOU HAVE TO TAKE INTO ACCOUNT WHAT LANGUAGE I WROTE THAT IN, AND WHEN, THAT IS, THE TIMES, IT WAS..." Lucifer! Now I'm talking like him.

"Well, that's just it, God. We don't live in that time no more." Georgie gave God his 'steely eyed' look, the one he'd perfected for TV a couple of years ago. "And you just told me that Jesus isn't you. So, following that logic, it is perfectly acceptable to use Jesus' name in cussing. So, I'm thinking, that is, I think and what I'm thinking is this just doesn't work anymore, any which way you think on it. Maybe you should take this one off?"

God blinked, laboriously working his way through Georgie's reasoning.

"SURE, GEORGIE. WHY NOT? NO ONE EVER LISTENS TO IT, ANYWAY." God snapped his fingers. He tossed the empty bottle over his shoulder, where an angel caught it and took it back up to heaven. "WELL, IT'S BEEN FUN, GEORGIE, BUT I GOT TO-" God shuffled to his feet.

"We was talking about something, isn't we? But...I forget...oh, yes. The third commandment."

"YES, GEORGIE?" God sighed and sat back down. After a thought, he pulled up a strawberry daiquiri.

"Number three: Keep the Sabbath day. That doesn't mean, by that I mean, you don't mean, that I can ONLY take 1 day off a week, right? I mean, what I mean is, I can take more than 1 day off a week, right?"

"WELL...YES. BUT, REALLY, WHAT I WAS AIMING FOR WAS A THIRTY SIX HOUR WORK WEEK, 6 HOURS A DAY, 6 DAYS A WEEK... BUT SOMEONE DIDN'T LIKE THE 36/6/6." God realized Georgie was having trouble with all the numbers. "YES. YOU CAN TAKE MORE TIME OFF."

"Good, good! Glad to get that cleared up." Georgie smiled and leaned back in his chair, the sunlight coming through the window behind him giving him a halo.

"SO, IF THAT'S ALL..."

"Well, there's point four."

God sat back down. He only just noticed his daiquiri was empty. He replaced it with a whisky.

"Honor your parents."

"SURELY, YOU DON'T HAVE A PROBLEM WITH -"

"My daddy just don't understand what it's like now a days. It's not like what it used to be back then, things aren't so clear cut, there are threats that he just never had to deal with. My daddy, I'm just saying, my daddy is a moron, and shouldn't be let out of the house."

"BUT -"

"And have you taken a look at my momma lately? You want to be mortally embarrassed for your whole life; you have a momma like mine."

"WELL -"

"I'm just saying is all..."

"OKAY OKAY, YOU HAVE A POINT. I WON'T HOLD YOU ACCOUNTABLE FOR THIS ONE." God finished the whiskey, and made the next a double. "NEXT." He said, getting depressed.

"Thou shall not kill."

"WHAT DO YOU NOT UNDERSTAND ABOUT THAT, GEORGIE?" He sipped while he waited.

"Well, God, you mean, when you say thou shall not kill, you really mean, thou shall not kill the good guys, right?"

"UM, WELL..."

"I mean, you really mean, BAD guys are okay to kill, right?"

"AH, WELL...YEAH. SURE, IT'S OKAY TO KILL BAD GUYS. BUT ONLY BAD GUYS!"

"And the bad guys, I mean to say, those guys who aren't good, are the ones that are against Us, right?"

God blinked, following this reasoning.

"And, when you say, thou shall not kill, you mean, pull the trigger yourself, right?"

"UM. WELL..."

"Sometimes I worry about Our solders, out in the field, killing in the name of Our Lord, that's you God, sowing discontent, I mean, sowing democracy in the deserts. I worry about them. I worry about their souls."

"YOU SHOULDN'T BE WORRYING ABOUT THEM, GEORGIE. YOU SHOULD WORRY ABOUT YOUR OWN SOUL."

"And they're not God Fearing either. They don't believe in you. The heathen Iraqi, I mean to say, not our God Fearing righteous boys in uniform. Boys and girls, I mean to say, all the boys and girls, who are in the glorious uniform of the United States. So it's okay, right? They're bad guys, they're heathens, and I'm not actually killing them."

"WELL, GEORGIE, ACTUALLY --"

"And you told me to kill Hussein, so, I'm in good standing with you there, right?"

"OH, YEAH. THAT'S RIGHT. I DID, DIDN'T I?" God snapped back the double whisky to have it instantly refill. "I GUESS THAT MAKES YOU OKAY IN MY BOOKS. IS THAT ALL? CAN I GO NOW?"

"Well, God, there is the next point. Just a quick one, really. "Thou shall not commit adultery"."

"GEORGIE!" God was shocked.

"Well, Jesus Christ on a pogo stick, Laura's turned as cold as an ice cube on me. I'm only human!"

"GEORGIE, GEORGIE, WHAT AM I GOING TO DO WITH YOU?"

"But she came on to me, God! That's got to mean something! She's really a nice girl. Gen is sweet, and kind, and thoughtful, and damn she gives good head."

"BUT GEORGIE, I GAVE YOU A WIFE FOR THIS STUFF."

"God, haven't you noticed? She won't have anything to do with me. Ever since The Day, she's turned her back on me, won't let me touch her. She's always yelling at me, telling me what to do, disagreeing with my word - Your word. We've had to keep her from the press, and the only time we let her out is when there's a sniper pointed at her head, in case she takes it into her head to speak her mind. I gotta get laid, man! And Ms. Flowers comes whenever I ask her to."

"FLOWERS?"

"Yeah, Genny's a nice girl. You would like her."

God studied Georgie's face. "YOU REALLY aren't MUCH FOR STUDING HISTORY, ARE YOU?"

"Who needs history, when you MAKE history?"

God rubbed his nose and smiled a little. "OKAY, GEORGIE. JUST FOR YOU, THOUGH, WE'LL IGNORE THE ADULTERY ONE. I'LL MAKE IT ALL LAURA'S FAULT, HOWS THAT?"

"Well, that's about where the guilt belongs, so I'm okay with that."

God slapped his knees, standing. "RIGHT, SO I'LL BE PUSHING OFF NOW, IT'S-"

"Now, God, I've still got one or two questions, if you know what I mean."

"I WAS AFRAID OF THAT." God sat and finished his third double whisky. A self rolled 'cigarette' appeared in his hand, already lit. He drew on it, holding the smoke in his lungs. "GO ON," he said without breathing out.

"Do not steal."

God nodded, still holding his breath.

"Stealing implies taking something that doesn't belong to you, right?" Georgie said ticking off one finger. God nodded. "And if it belongs to you, you're not stealing, because it already IS yours, right?" He continued, finding the next finger. God nodded again. "Good, that's settled! So that Iraqi oil is mine now, and I can give it to anyone I want."

God choked. "YOU AMAZE EVEN ME." He drew deeply on the cigarette. He waved his hand in a 'continue' gesture.

"Commandment number eight. Do not falsely accuse."

God raised an eyebrow.

Georgie turned red. "It was bad intelligence! That is to say, what I mean is, the intelligence given to me was bad! I did not falsely accuse Hussein at all!"

"BUT GEORGIE, EVERYTHING YOU SAID WAS FA-"

"It's not my fault!" Georgie screamed, his face turning purple.

"RIGHT. I'LL MAKE A NOTE OF THAT. AND WHAT ABOUT THE LAST COMMANDMENT, GEORGIE? ANY QUESTIONS ON THAT? THOU SHALL NOT COVET."

Georgie snorted. "What do I want that stinky old country for, anyway?"

"OIL?" God asked, pulling up a super sized container of Freedom Fries.

"How many times I gotta say it? I'm there to liberate the poor Iraqi people, not take the oil! The oil is Iraqi's only resource worth its weight in gold, I'm just protecting it until we can get a government in there that knows who their friends are, that is to say, knows what they are doing, and which side their butter is breaded on. And I know my good friend's will keep that oil coming in for our great country, until such a time as the new democratic Iraqi puppets, I mean to say, Iraqi government can take care of itself without us holding their hands, and showing them the way to do things."

"WHAT ABOUT FAME, GEORGIE?"

"Fame? Well, somma us is just born for fame, Lord. It's my cross, as I understand it, the load on my shoulders, just like your son. I must bear it, stoically. Just as Jesus took on his cross for all the people sins, so will I take on this cross, to protect the people from evil. It is my calling, God, as you know, my calling, my cross to bear, to take all the evil and direct it at me, and fight back with the might and powers of these great United States. But do I actively seek fame? No! No, I say!"

"SO YOU'RE GOOD ON THE COVETING, RIGHT?"

"Sure, Lord. If I want anything, I'll just have my daddy buy it."

"GOOD, GOOD," God said, no longer really listening. "WELL, I REALLY NEED TO BE GOING NOW, GEORGIE. I HAVE TO FINISH UP MY ARMAGEDDON PLANS. YOU KNOW HOW IT IS."

"Sure do, God! No rest for the wicked, hum?"

"AH. YEAH. RIGHT. SEE YOU LATER, OKAY LITTLE BUDDY?"

"Sure, God. Night now."