Member-only story
Once upon a time there was a tender of sheep.
This shepherd was male, as most shepherds were. There was nothing that said a shepherd had to be male. It was just rather expected; there had never been a female shepherd of this flock before. Other flocks had, on occasion, female shepherds, and those flocks were not necessarily worse off.
Our shepherd looked to be older than he was inside. For, in truth, he was an example of what the wise men who studied the maturation process would call ‘arrested development.’ Though he was big on the outside, and resembled a man, he was small on the inside — a mere lad.
There was a part of him that had never matured. This could not be guessed by looking at him, but, once he opened his mouth, and acted, it wasn’t long before this became evident to the majority of observers.
He attributed it to the way he had been raised.
The words that he uttered were not ones of kindness, of understanding, of compassion. Or of wisdom. He was unwilling to give anyone the benefit of the doubt. If he perceived anyone might be criticizing him, he counterattacked. He attacked some who had not attacked him, but who simply did not agree with him. Constructive criticism was impossible with him.
His skin, which had an odd orange hue — no one was quite sure how it got that way…
