The Year of the Flood

Adam One gathers everyone for the April Fish Day—a day when the Gardeners make fun of each other by attaching a fish of recycled cloth to another person’s back and yelling, “April Fish!” The day is known elsewhere as April Fool’s Day, but the Gardeners celebrate it a little differently. On this day, they “humbly accept [their] own silliness” (234) and praise God’s playfulness by being playful themselves.

Adam One preaches that the fish used to be a secret symbol of faith for early Christians in times of oppression, and that Jesus’s first two apostles were fishermen. He emphasizes that humans shouldn’t consider themselves smarter than fish and should “wear the label of God’s Fools gladly” (234). During their meditation, Adam One asks God to bring to life “the Great Dead Zone in the Gulf of Mexico, and the Great Dead Zone in Lake Erie, and the Great Zone in the Black Sea” (235), which were devasted by human actions.

They end the gathering by singing a hymn called “Oh Lord, You Know Our Foolishness,” in which they acknowledge that humans often behave foolishly by doubting God’s existence and power, and ask God for forgiveness.