Humble Pie

OK, before we get to tonight's subject matter, can I (and I am sure I write for so many!) just say how utterly exhausted I am by having to join a site seemingly every time I want information on the Web? This is where the Internet will fail. I have index cards, thickly covered with scribbled user names and passwords, that are my online life. What if I ever lose them? (Reason for rant: Found an old friend on Spoke. Can I just email her from there? No, have to join, download Outlook, blah blah. Joined, then remembered. I have Heidi's phone number. Easy. Pick up phone. Dial. Talk. Or leave message.)

Screw you, Spoke and all your ilk!

Oh, and my password?

Its: p29rsdfanr9q9qq8ds87t233s;vjss/fldgnqhzh;a/rmtrgaroty.

In case anyone asks.

Deep breaths.

What was driven home to me in India, and which I did not address nearly enough, was, and is, an awareness of the poverty of my knowledge about the history of the rest of the world. I did mention it briefly in an earlier post, and have found, now that I am back, I have a real interest and desire to learn India's history.

But it isn't just travel that opens your eyes to your own ignorance. It takes only a bit of observation of the world around you.

One example. Dogs and I are walking this evening, and, now that the days are longer, we dally, to make up for all those short strolls in the dead of winter. A miniscule glint of spring-leaf green, swaying, catches my eyes as we enter the park. Hanging by an invisible thread is an iridescent, tiny caterpillar, trying, I think, to pull itself up along this invisible thread, swaying all the while in the most delicate breath of a breeze. 

This creature curls and pulls itself up, again and again, then stops, seemingly exhausted. Being human, I stop to watch (eyeglasses resting down at the bottom of my nose). Then, again being human, I interfere. I pick up a small twig and touch it to the green swayer.

No. Get away, its body language says. I drop the twig, watch for a few more moments and the girls (most patient beasts!) and I walk away, leaving this beautiful small creation to its task.

What was this little creature and what was it doing? I have no idea, and multiply that by so much and the sum is both awe-inspiring and embarrassing. More math: Multiply me by billions and you have a sum that must be quite a negative number for our planet. The beasts and the bugs live only as nature programs them. They have no greed, lust or passion. Only an imperative to continue on. Blessedly, they have no capacity for questioning it.

And here we are, living among these survivors, not questioning, but demanding accommodation. With our wonderful brains, I would think that we would be the ones who could accommodate our habits to our planet-mates.

If you've read along this far, you might appreciate this article by Leon Kreitzman that appeared recently in The New York Times. He (much as I dislike the word) deconstructs how warming changes the food chain from bottom to top, in a very small section of it.

Observe and report. If we all pay more attention, perhaps we all will take more care.