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How Token brought the gift of copper to humankind—and how the angry gods punished Token and us.
Our Penny God did not always inhabit the fallen penny. He came down to earth for our sake, and for our sake he suffered.
In the first green age of the cosmos, the gods dwelled remote in the chilly splendor of the empyrean, while the apes lived, mated and died no different from all the other animals (a little bit smarter, quite a lot uglier) here below. The apes were content with their lot, to the extent that they were able to reflect upon their lives at all, or to see beyond each day’s small struggles and victories. But some among the gods were not content. They had nectar and ambrosia and dark chocolate; they had strength, beauty, immortality, HD flat screen TVs and state-of-the-art stereo systems; but still they were not content.
One among them, let’s call him Jove (not his real name), looked down upon the primates and saw an opportunity to raise his own status with the other gods. He tempted the apes with the two gifts he himself most coveted: power and sex.
The orangutans, gorillas and chimpanzees did not trust the smooth-talking god and backed away. The bonobos snatched the gift of sex and ran off to the trees with it. Only the humans stayed to listen and, ultimately, to accept both gifts from the hands of the treacherous god.
Claiming dominion over every living thing that moveth upon the earth, humans hunted other species to extinction while they themselves increased and multiplied. They contracted smallpox, dysentery and other terrible but nameless contagions as a consequence, even as they fought and murdered each other endlessly in competition for Jove’s gifts. But, as quickly as they died from wars and plagues, just as rapidly and promiscuously did they breed out of season and overpopulate themselves again. They were profoundly miserable, even the ones who had scored big-time in the grab for power and sex, and in their misery they discovered a need for gods. They worshiped Jove.
Jove now styled himself king of the gods and flaunted his status like a new Rolex. Most of the other gods were envious and impressed. They wanted a piece of the action, their own sweet share of incense and sacrifice. In exchange for various (mostly sexual) favors, Jove doled out deity franchises. His favorite mistress, Venus, became the sex goddess. As a reward for looking the other way, the sadistic bully Mars got to be the god of war, which he quite enjoyed. The beautiful bimbo Athena stupidly settled for being the almost-unknown goddess of wisdom. As an in-joke (which she never got), Jove made his wife Juno the goddess of marriage.
But the god Token, who had never liked Jove anyway, pitied the poor humans for all that they had brought their suffering on themselves. It was impossible to return them to the contented animal existence they had once enjoyed. But he could—and did—give them a gift that would ameliorate some of the unhappiness of their fallen state, the gift of copper.
Token showed humans the abundant pure copper deposits lying at the earth’s surface, then taught them how to use it to produce beautifully wrought tools and ornaments. For once, they had useful work to give their lives meaning. With bronze they could produce enduring sculptures and resounding musical instruments. With copper pans they could make some very fine sauces, soufflés and omelets. Humans discovered that food was almost as good as sex and that art could be much more gratifying than power.
Though they made great monumental bronzes of Jove, Juno, Mars and Venus, they soon came to admire the sculptor more than his increasingly remote and mythical subjects. They stopped worshiping Jove.
Enraged with spite, Jove hurled Token from the empyrean. For a whole summer’s day, from morn to noon to dewy eve, Token fell, blazing, through the void, until he came at last to earth and lay there unmoving, helplessly crippled by his great fall.
To revenge himself on humankind, Jove tempted them once again with two more gifts—gold and steel. Almost at once, humans forgot the beauty and utility of copper. Some even preferred gold to sex, or exchanged sex for more gold. They dug deep gaping mines for ore and built great foul-smelling furnaces in the power-mad race to forge more deadly weapons, first swords, then firearms. More miserable than ever, they again worshiped the gods.
And so it went on, from sorry age to sorry age, until the humans discovered for themselves the last great evil, plastic and her shape-shifting spawn, polystyrene, polyurethane, polyethylene, polyvinylchloride, polypropylene and polyester. These could all be fashioned into incredibly cheap goods that break more easily than they decompose—hideous, redundant, but nigh-everlasting creations. At last, weeping with shame, the gods departed the earth and pretended to themselves they had never sought adoration by humans. But not Token.
Although lame and greatly diminished in his godhead, Token had never abandoned humankind to their harsh, and largely deserved, fate. Always hiding from the vengeful Jove, he lurked in humble copper pennies, for by this means he could pass from hand to hand, person to person, especially among the poorest, and exert his remaining divine powers to improve their lot.
Nor was Token alone. Eros also despised Jove and the power-hungry Olympians. After Token’s expulsion, Eros slipped away to earth to comfort him, but did not manage to do so unseen. An enraged Jove clipped Eros’ wings, dooming him to a life on earth.
Token and Eros roam the world, sometimes in partnership and sometimes in rivalry. And when they can (which is not often) they punish the arrogant and greedy by withholding their precious gifts of luck and love.
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