(particularly the temples and reliefs of gods that had a "Re" attached to their names), none of it would have been so bloody had the believers allowed him to clean away their chiseled nonsense the way one would the crayon happy markings of children on the walls of the family home. Gabriele's motives for creating a non-melodic lullaby about a god that had been extinct for thousands of years were even a little unclear unto her. Perhaps the reasons for the avant-garde lullaby could have come from that one afternoon when she was four. On that day she had become less interested in nursing a wounded bird and so began to play with her tiny plastic toy soldiers beside her mother who was clipping wet shirts and military trousers on the clothesline. The noon sun was slapping both their faces the way the heat from an oven evaporates the grease put on two baked potatoes. Gabriele, bothered by the heat, turned away from the soldiers and then took a glance at the sun. She turned toward her mother and mentioned some eagerness for Christmas. Her mother turned toward Gabriele with stoic facial expressions and then crassly spoke in German that Gabriele should stop thinking about Christmas since it was a long way off. The mother snapped the clothes on the line with more forceful pinches and then asked her daughter if she didn't think she was a bit old to pursue such nonsense as Christmas. Gabriele said that she didn't understand and so her mother unhesitatingly told her that there was no such thing as Santa Claus. Gabriele saw her mother smile sadly. She sensed a kindness in this smashing of ignorance and innocence the way she had seen Aunt Peggy smash a horse fly on one of her uncle's stallions.