Wednesday, June 4, 2014

anthills

I saw the Aleph from every point and angle, and in the Aleph I saw the earth and in the earth the Aleph and in the Aleph the earth; I saw my own face and my own bowels; I saw your face; and I felt dizzy and wept, for my eyes had seen that secret and conjectured object whose name is common to all men but which no man has looked upon — the unimaginable universe.
Jorge Luis Borges 

My grandson and I are out for a walk around his apartment complex of buildings. Along the edge of the asphalt, in the many cracks left by the creaks and heaves of winter, are anthills. Spring is turning to summer, truly, if the ants are rebuilding.

He is two and a half and the world belongs to him to do with as he pleases. When we play hide-and-seek around the big maples on the hill, he strips a sapling branch of its leaves before I can stop him. Now, as we walk the road, he swipes an anthill low, and in one small moment of horror I cry “no!” wanting him to obey and not run ahead and swipe as he does. “They took a long time to build the entrance to their home,” I say, but he is bent on swipe-swipe-swiping, though I grab his hand firmly against it.

I have just read about two-year-olds and the determination to do what it is they want to do until distracted. It does no good simply to fight, and there will be no spanking as there was of me, to break my will, to shape it into something not my own.

It will take time to build this boy, with the deliberateness of ants. In spite of my momentary horror, I whisk him up in feigned joy to play a new game. It works, and he is distracted from destruction.

But it was he who carried worms last summer off the asphalt into the grass to save them from cars, he who kissed ladybugs on the tree trunk and let them play along his small palms and shoulders. He who stared at the lake fly on the blue beach chair five minutes before it flew away. Were anthills an abstraction because he saw no ants, even from his small stature?

Someone taught me not to step on anthills by bending low to watch a worker cross the sidewalk carrying a single bit of earth in his mandibles. Close enough to see his mandibles! I transcended his ugliness (monster-like if movies are to be believed). I thought, how beautiful to have such mechanisms for industrious use.

In this memory I am relieved, seeing that I am not the teacher.



18 comments:

  1. Oh, Ruth -- this is wonderful. I can "see" you together on that walk, see you trying hard to teach, to remind -- and then realizing the distraction! This is true, I think, of learning throughout one's life. To distract, to examine. Beautifully stated.

    On another note, had dinner at Red Haven tonight -- and I was thinking of you. Summer is getting crazy and we'll be at the lake a lot after the wedding, but I think lunch is in the cards!

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    1. Jeanie, I had to use distraction several times on this particular walk, and I was very grateful I had read what I'd read, because I'm afraid when I was a parent of young ones, I fought their wills. Though it's challenging, now I am quite fascinated and charmed by James's developing will, identity, spirit. He is very sweet and loves all creatures, except he is shy with humans sometimes (when he's not flirting).

      Yes, we must plan lunch.

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  2. Ah, the joys and torments of (grand) parenting! How we long for our beautiful children to be pure and noble.
    How we treasure and nurture the least speck of empathy.
    And then we realize that we have pretty normal children after all - whom we love just as fiercely all the same - faults and all.
    Henry had a major meltdown having lost at Uno three times in a row. Oh dearie me...
    and yes to no smacking and forcing as we were forced to do things.
    All we can do is offer unconditional love and hugs and give thanks that we can share in their world just a little bit.

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    1. Elizabeth, you said it.

      We have to realize (what perhaps our parents didn't) that meltdowns and other willful episodes are necessary for development. It is no wonder we have become submissive to things we should not be; our wills have been bent. Strange society.

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  3. Ah, lesson after lesson...
    He'll learn. From you, from someone else. He'll learn, and ants will endure to do what ants do to save this world we call home.

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    1. Rosaria, I made a lot of mistakes as a parent, especially when they were little. But I remember thinking then that if only I loved them, at least that, even if I failed, there would be redemption, and all would be well.

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  4. "I have just read about two-year-olds and the determination to do what it is they want to do until distracted. It does no good simply to fight, and there will be no spanking as there was of me, to break my will, to shape it into something not my own."

    Thanks so much for this post. Although I have no children, I have just become a Great Aunt and in recent months was volunteering in a daycare center. What a joy to be with children whose wills are not being broken!

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    1. am, thank you for your comment and perspective from family and the daycare center. Suddenly my imagination fills with children in that place, whose wills are not being broken, and I feel tearfully joyful.

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  5. Love the Borges quote, and it appears that you, albiet not the ultimate teacher, are doing your part to introduce Baby James to "the unimaginable universe." Let us hope that he, like you, will learn to transcend the initial perceptions of ugliness.

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    1. George, I found this quote and want to read "The Aleph" (it is open on my laptop, and I have not found time yet). I wonder if you have read it?

      Thank you for your words. I do hope I can help James find doors and windows of discovery, especially into the ways we are connected with al things.

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  6. it's a wonderful story, ruth, so much more complicated than we understand.

    i remember some years ago sitting with james talking passionately about peace, until i realized that as i sat on the rock over-looking a bay while arguing my heart, i was absentmindedly stepping on ants.

    when was it that we began to think of mankind as good, or when was it that we defined (or redefined, or redefined again) what good is? and how do we achieve it? by failure, of course. by learning to abhor the violence in ourselves. and so there is no other way, no law that has already written that must not be tested. the very nature of humanity necessitates that we must be violent until we learn otherwise. this realization does not come easy to me.

    if not a teacher, you're one heck of a facilitator:)

    now, can we all learn fast enough?

    xo
    erin

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    1. Erin, and your response expresses the complications so well. Our consciousness opens just so far, and we don't even know what we are unconscious about.

      I am reading a long article, which is taking me a long time, because I read it a few minutes at a time, and then I have to pause and take it in. Every American should read it and try to understand what we are built on. But I guess a person has to have a certain amount of consciousness to want to be more conscious. The article is by Ta-Nehisi Coates, a black historian who is teaching me how our nation has been built on slavery, something I "knew" but didn't understand. (Still don't, but I'm beginning.) It is The Case for Reparations.

      About facilitating, I am learning, slowly, that it is not up to me to find answers, in any context. This is a great relief. :)

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  7. You "got" me dead in my tracks at the Borges quote, Ruth, which I immediately sent in an email to a friend with whom I had just been Skyping. It was exactly what I was trying to say to her, albeit inadequately!

    Then I read the rest and my heart just melted into yours. We are of the same flesh, of course, so no wonder your stories become as though they were mine. I really do want to cross this over to V&V, if possible?

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    1. Boots, that Borges quote cut through a lot for me, too. As I mentioned to George above, I have the short story open to read. (I have four tabs open of stuff to read that have been open a week.)

      Yes, we are of the same flesh, and I love that, and that your heart melted into mine. I'd be pleased to share this at V&V.

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  8. I love this story and your response, Ruth. Sounds like he's doing just what he should be doing at 2 1/2. We're the noticers, questioners, cheerleaders, teachers when asked, non-violent leaders, explorers of the unimagined universe and playmates. It's a grand role!

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  9. Ants are fascinating, however old you are. I sometimes suspect we're more like them in our social interaction than we like to think.

    I read tht Borges story not very long ago. You've reminded me - I put down the book with a few stories to go. I think I'll go back to it.

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  10. To have grandchildren I imagine, would be to witness that Aleph, the same way your grandson is witnessing his own. The two year old takes apart to learn. You see the Aleph in the mandibles of the ant, he wipes it from the earth to see the power in his hands.

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  11. Your last line grabbed my attention. Years ago one of my students reminded me that "students learn in spite of their teachers."

    It seems to me that your role (of which I have no direct experience) is to help these little ones discover their "motivated abilities," to help them discern as they grow what it is that they do well and that they find great satisfaction in.

    I could argue a bit with you here, since your project is to educe this discovery process. Just as the ant builds one grain at a time, you are helping him discover himself one moment at a time. Your place in his life tells me that his world is in good hands. You see his face and in doing so help him to see it, too.

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All responses are welcome.