My daughter Alyssa, like many preschoolers, has made a habit of demonstrating to us the vastness of her intellect.
It has astounded me at times. You can get lost in there, thus it is not territory that one approaches with frivolity. In fact, like her mother’s purse, my daughter’s brain is a place that I explore only when absolutely necessary.
Just the other day we let her go by herself to the end of our cul-de-sac to get the mail. Watching her from our front window, Karen saw her suddenly stop and bend down. The mail was all but forgotten as Alyssa skipped back to the house cradling a dead, dried worm in her little palm.“Look Mommy! A dead worm!” she called from the porch. Then she carefully backed up a couple steps and as gently as she was able laid her immobile friend on our parking pad. The desiccated fish bait broke in half. “I’ll just put it here so that when the rain comes the water will make it alive again.”
I told you, didn’t I?!
Astounding.
My other daughter Kaitlyn just started grade one, and takes her role as the more educated sibling very seriously. Noticing that the shriveled Lumbricus terrestris hadn’t moved due to days of hot, dry weather, she decided to take matters into her own hands.
This is where the water hose comes into the story.
Kaitlyn gave that little worm… well… let’s call it a healthy squirt, and it disintegrated.
They both shrugged and walked into the house for a snack.
Lesson for this week:
I come across a lot of people who, like Alyssa and Kaitlyn, seem to have the mysteries of the universe all figured out. Their Bibles are nothing less than fifty pound cosmic text books, and their creeds are immobile massifs of ancient meditation.
I’m not saying that we shouldn’t be sure of some things, or that Truth is all subjective. Not at all.
What I am saying is that the most important subjects should be approached with the greatest dose of humility. We can only breathe and think and love according to what we know today, but the hues of tomorrow’s light might paint a clearer picture.
I’m creeping up on 40 years old. After roughly another forty years I plan on graduating from this preschool. All of us do, eventually. I believe that’s when the real learning begins.
