physical
exercises, two one-minute spurts of the sinner-saint game, and one three minute period of emotional roulette - the Die
choosing self pity, an emotion he found himself expressing with enthusiasm. Then he placed the two green dice on the
easy chair in front of him and, kneeling on the rug, intoned a prayer:
Great God blob Die, I worship thee;
Awaken me this morn With thy green gaze,
Quicken my dead life With thy plastic breath,
Spill into the arid spaces of my soul Thy green vinegar.
A hundred hungry birds scatter my seed,
You roll them into cubes and plant me.
The people I fear are
Puppets poking puppets,
Playthings costumed by my mind.
When you fall,
O Die,
The strings collapse and I walk free.
I am thy grateful urn, O Die, Fill me.
Dr. Rhinehart felt a serene joy such as always came to him when he surrendered his will to the Die: the peace which
passeth understanding. He wrote upon the white, blank paper the options for his life for the next year.
If the dice total two, three or twelve: he would leave his wife and children forever. He recorded this option with dread.
He'd given it once chance in nine.
He gave one chance in five (dice total of four or five) that he would completely abandon the use of his dice for at least
three months. He desired this option as a dying man the wonder drug to end his ills and feared it as a healthy man does
a threat to his balls.
Dice total six (one chance in seven): be would begin revolutionary activity against the injustice of the established
order. He didn't know what he had in mind by the option, but it gave him pleasure to think of thwarting the police,
who were making him so uncomfortable. He began daydreaming about joining forces with Arturo or Eric until a police
siren on the street outside his apartment building so frightened him that he thought of erasing the option (the mere
writing of it might be a crime) and then decided to go quickly on to the others.
Dice total of seven (one chance in six): he would devote the entire next year to the development of dice theory and
therapy. Recording this brought such pleasant excitement that he considered giving it the totals of eight and nine as
well, but fought back such human weakness and went on.
Dice total of eight (one chance in seven): he would write an autobiographical account of this adventures.
Dice total nine, ten or eleven (one chance in four): he would leave the profession of psychiatry, including dice therapy,
for one year, letting the dice choose a new profession. He recorded this with pride; he would not be the prisoner of his
fascination for his beloved dice therapy.
Examining his six options, Dr. Rhinehart was pleased; they showed imagination and daring. Each of them represented
both threat and treat, both the danger of disaster and the possibility of new power.
He placed the paper by his side and the two green dice in front of him on the floor.
'Tuck me in, Dad,' a voice said from the other end of the room. It was his son Larry, practically asleep on his feet.
Dr. Rhinehart arose irritably, marched to the swaying boy, lifted him up into his arms and carried him back to his bed.
Larry was asleep as soon as his father had pulled the sheet up to his neck again, and Dr. Rhinehart rushed back to his
position on his knees in the living room.
The dice in position before him, he knelt silently for two minutes and prayed. He then picked up the two dice and
began shaking them gaily in the bowl of his hands.
Tremble in my hands, O Die, As I so shake in yours.
And holding the dice above his head he intoned aloud `Great bleak Blocks of God, descend, quiver, create. Into your
hands I commit my soul.'
The dice fell: a one and a two - three. He was to leave his wife and children forever.
Chapter Fifty-six
How about that?
Chapter Fifty-seven
The heavens declare the glory of Chance;
And the firmament showeth his handywork.
Day unto day uttereth accident,
And night unto night showeth whim.
There is no speech nor language
Where their voice is not heard.
Their line is gone out through all the earth,
And their deeds to the end of the world.
In them hath Chance set a tabernacle for the sun,
Whose going forth is from the end of the heaven,
And his circuit unto the ends of it:
And there is nothing hid from the heat thereof.
The law of Chance is perfect, converting the soul:
The testimony of Chance is sure, making wise the simple.
The statutes of Chance are right, rejoicing the heart:
The commandment of Chance is pure, enlightening the eyes.
The fear of Chance is clean, enduring forever:
The judgments of Chance are true and righteous altogether.
from The Book of the Die
Chapter Fifty-eight
Freedom, Reader, is an awful thing: so Jean-Paul Sartre, Erich Fromm, Albert Camus and dictators throughout
