State of Affairs

Circa 1250 Before the Common Era was the beginning of the greatest war in the history of mankind, prior to World War I.

The Gods of Greece were going about their normal business, turning beautiful women into cows and having battles of music amongst each other when, one day, they were all invited to a great party, setting the stage for a wildly fun time.

The party was for Thetis, a sea nymph (a daughter of the sea, usually of the God Oceanus or Nereus) to celebrate her marriage to Peleus, a human who would find fame as father of Achilles.

Eris, Goddess of discord, decided to start the fun at this party (which she was not invited to), marking an apple to read, “For The Most Beautiful.” Let’s break for a minute and talk about the lack of gender here; the Ancient Greeks were unabashed; they were a sexually liberated people, and it was rare for words to be gender-charged. “Beautiful” could have meant anyone at all.

As it happened, the apple found its way in front of three lovely ladies, Hera – Queen of the Gods; Athena – Goddess of War and Wisdom; and Aphrodite – Goddess of Love.

All three Goddesses claimed the apple for themselves, because they could not decide who the intended was, they asked Zeus – God of all Gods, Father of all Gods and all Mortals – for his opinion.

Being that Zeus was picking between his wife and his daughters (not that he has had a hard time picking - ever) he decided that someone else must make the decision. Somebody fair.

Enter Paris. Paris was born to King Piram and Queen Hecuba of the Kingdom of Troy, but he was different from all of his siblings, before he was born, a seer – a magician who can see into the future – prophesized that Paris would be the end of Troy, and that the kingdom would fall apart if he were allowed to live.

Piram ordered a local shepherd to take Paris and leave him on Mount Ida, the shepherd agreed it would be best. That shepherd would later return to the point of abandonment where he would find Paris still alive and – remarkably – well! Perhaps out of pity, the shepherd took mercy on the baby and took him home.

Paris was a handsome man, finding and marrying a mountain nymph (also known as Oreads, they were effectively judges of the forest) he would later find himself in combat with his brothers. Piram was to hold a festival – what is a festival without prizes? Piram needed a bull and sent several of his servants and sons to find the best bull in the land.

The sons decided that the best bull was Paris’ and so they took the animal; to get it back, Paris was made to join the festival and had to fight to reclaim his bull. After defeating the last of Piram’s sons, the shepherd spoke the truth and the whole world learned who Paris truly was.

King Piram and his wife were delighted at the news and restored Paris to his rule (conveniently forgetting about the prophecy), and all was well.

One day Paris was invited to a wedding; in the time between the festival and the wedding Paris managed to make a reputation for himself as a fine governor, his fairness was the talk of the land. Perhaps due to his impeccable judgement, Zeus asked Paris to decide which of the three goddesses was the most beautiful.

To sway the young prince, Hera offered control over all of Europe and all of Asia.

Athena promised wisdom, and to make Paris the greatest warrior the world would ever see.

Aphrodite offers Paris only one thing: the most beautiful woman in the world.

The young and already married Paris – a likely dandy – chose Aphrodite. Suddenly lines were drawn, Athena and Hera were angry with Troy for the selection by its young prince, and the people would soon pay the price.

Aphrodite told Paris of Helen, a beautiful woman in Sparta. There were a few problems with this, however, Helen had no idea she had been prom ised to Paris. Worse, Helen was already married to Menelaus, King of Sparta.

The Trojan War would very quickly erupt after Paris took Helen from her home. Menelaus quickly developed an army, unwittingly helping to connect Greece to itself, and sailed for Troy.

The Gods took their sides, Hera and Athena fought alongside Sparta with several other Gods. Aphrodite fought for Troy, she was not the only deity fighting for the city, though, as Apollo, God of Light and the Sun stepped up to help the Trojans.

Apollo is God of the Sun, mythology holds that he pilots a chariot to guide the sun across the sky. He had other skills, though, he was a God of music, God of Poetry and of Archery, but most poignantly he was God of Healing, Plague and Disease.

To drive back the pesky Greeks, Apollo drew an arrow from his quiver and fired it. The arrow sailed suffering through the wind, cursed with an infirmity that would tear apart the invading army.

Disease would strike across Greece, thought by scholars to have been an “Alphavirus,” the Greek people knew the only way to end the disease was to end the conflict. Before the Greeks would build a giant wooden horse and lie their way to victory, the Trojans would blow a great loss to Greece, it wasn’t Apollo’s arrow striking Achille’s heel, it was the loss of livestock and life from what was considered a disease impossible to avoid. (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25551854/ this is a link to a the US National Institute of Health’s peer reviewed paper on the plague Apollo called upon the Greeks.)

This would not be the last plague to afflict Greece, but what is different from then and now is that we have science to follow, and advice to avoid the needless death of our friends, family and countrymen. We know that masks work, maybe it isn’t manly but neither was hiding in a wooden horse.

Hiding in a wooden horse worked. It ended the war, bringing peace and normalcy back to the land. Masks aren’t backhanded, and they work.

Our county numbers are skyrocketing and it would be easy to blame Apollo for firing his arrow but the truth is that we have no one to blame but ourselves. It was our movement that spread COVID-19 everywhere, it will be us staying home that stops the disease from spreading – enough selfishness, let’s work to get this virus under control and get back to normal by staying home and wearing our masks. Have a happy and safe Thanksgiving, keep your gatherings small, lets keep Apollo and his arrows out of our home.