Tag: Books

First Week Jitters

First Day Jitters

It was the first day of school. I had the First Day Jitters book read aloud to me by our professor, and was still as nervous as Ms Sarah.

All the advice from the children, fellow teachers, professors, aunts and parents who’d been teachers, friends and family rattling away merrily in my head.

Do I smile? Should I be friendly?

Strict? No nonsense?

If only the children knew! I felt like they were observing and wondering what to make of me.

Trying their luck?

I saw over the next few days how exactly they tried their luck.

“Can I sit there next to Joseph?”

“Why? What happened to your spot?”

Shrug.

“Usually no. But I’ll allow it today.” I said. I was telling the son all the ways in which they were asking me for this and that as I picked him up from his high school, and he drew in his breath sharply.

“Oooh! Rookie mistake Amma!”

I looked over at him puzzled.

“If they are asking you – they k-n-o-w it isn’t allowed! It’s why they aren’t asking the main teacher – because it will be shut down so quickly!” , he said zipping his hands through the air, and I blinked, and then laughed.

“You’re right. So initially, say no to everything?”

“Most things! You want them to like you too. And only for the first few days. After that, they’ll get used to getting directions from you.”, he said sounding sage-like.

It is true. Children are like that, aren’t they? I thought of all the little ways in which they settled in  with their new teachers.

  • They pushed in their chairs when they got up. Yes.Good Job.
  • They did that thing where they lean back on their chairs on two legs.No.We do not that. It is dangerous.

 

  • Thank you for listening.
  • People who do not listen are going to miss this.

 

  • Thank you for doing your classroom jobs.
  • Why didn’t you do your job?

The human spirit

I also saw plenty of things that warm the human spirit too. The kind of things that I hope we retain as we grow older. For instance, we played a small game to wrap up the day one day. The children partnered up with each other and played. It was a quick paced game based on reflexes and the children were quick to react.

“So how many of you didn’t win a single round?”, asked the teacher, and one of the children raised their hand. “Got to work on your reflexes buddy!” She said good-naturedly and moved on.

I watched the game with interest and smiled at the moans when they lost and the whoops of joy when they won.

At the end of the game, she asked the partners to agree on the winner between them and come for a quick treat of candy. One of the children who sat many desks away from the child who hadn’t won a single round walked around in the mayhem and shared his candy with him. No fanfare – just friendship.

The bond between them was laughter. They were able to see together the same absurdities and incongruities in things. The most trivial and unnoticeable thing to others would tickle them to death.”

R K Narayan – Swami & His Friends

I smiled the whole way home.

 

The Inner Self & The Outer Self

Our Inner & Outer Selves

I am sitting in a classroom, my heart bursting at the warm atmosphere. The teacher has given an activity in which they sketch their personality – their inner and outer selves. I do not remember doing something like this in school. But oh! What a wonderful activity?! I don’t think I actively thought about inner personality & outer personality the ways in which these children are taught to in as early as elementary school, and it is such a refreshing change. 

The past few months have been a completely different perspective on life than what has been playing out in the larger world and the dichotomy of being alive and welcome in a classroom seems so different from what is happening elsewhere. I cannot believe that hateful forces are at work outside our elementary classrooms. 

In all our teaching classes, we are taught ways in which we can embrace each child’s culture, make them feel like their perspective is welcome, and prepare them for the future.

The activities in our schools and with children seem so unifying and geared towards belonging. It is what the teachers are trained to do  – and they do it with competence, warmth and flair. The hum of work and chatter is a strangely comforting rhythm when monetary rewards are taken away from one. 

Teachers ask children their names – how they’d like to be called, and how they would like to respect each other, and maybe these are things that the children in adults have forgotten. But the children are marvelous teachers and I am grateful that I get to learn from them. The cheaters at four-square are not appreciated and a sense of fairness pervades the playgrounds. 

A Year to Learn About Ourselves

So what happens to all that as we grow? They vote ‘Be patient’ as a virtue to be upheld in the classroom almost universally. Yet, as adults, we seem to forget. 

The more I live life, the more I come back to the simple tenets in life. Every ten years, adults should be allowed the freedom and beautiful belonging that comes from an elementary school classroom. A year in which we are allowed to embrace art, music, dance, theatre, physical education, math, science, language and literature, history and geography with fresh perspectives, and equal fervor. 

“You aren’t just given happiness, you have to pick it up here and there all through the day.” 

― Miss Read, Fresh from the Country

Reinforce our faith in humanity through the finer things in life without expectation. Every decade. If I ever get to design a utopian society, this is just what I would do. A year in which all your worries drop at least for those few hours in the classroom.

K-Pop & Cultural References

“Would you like to explain your drawing to me?” I asked the children as they handed their drawing to me. Mild music floated around us, as the children stopped to show me what they had done. One child truly had done a fantastic job. “This, here are my favorite K-Pop albums.” she said, pointing to something that I had to squint at to decipher, while I drudged up the only K-Pop music I remembered. “Oh! The only one I know is Gangnam Style!” I said, looking sheepish. I really do need to get my cultural references in order. The other day, I told them the most recent movie I watched was Pride & Prejudice, and they gave me looks they reserved for their favorite dinosaur. It was true, but why didn’t I think of watching Spiderman the week before school started?

She gave me an indulgent look, and said, “Oh – that is good – but a little old. You can try Crazy by Le SSeraFim. ” She waited patiently as I wrote it down. I just watched it, and I can see why it appealed to her.  It is catchy with brilliant visuals.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6B5gQXlB-0&list=RDn6B5gQXlB-0&start_radio=1

Another boy’s drawing was filled with baseball. I made a mental note to look up some baseball facts, remembering the famous Leslie Vs Recht Baseball Study on learning cognition.

I had this sudden gratitude that here I was surrounded by 30 different personalities, and I knew not what I would learn from them as I taught my way through the curriculum. The hour of art had done marvels for us all. Teachers and students alike emerged happy and refreshed from the exercise, and I smiled in thanks.

Pinecones & the Secrets of the Universe

I was in a class in which we were learning how to teach art. This class was particularly fascinating for me. For the class had a very hands-on make-your-art-while-learning approach to it. One session we learnt free-play, another session: elements of music. One time we all went downstairs and broke off into small groups choreographing dance routines with little themes. Birds in a storm, ritual-rhythm-like movements, a morning routine etc. Teaching through drama, poetry (this is where I learnt about black-out poetry), and one time we learnt how to extract pine nuts from a pinecone. 

The Secrets of the Universe

There are many reasons that I loved that particular activity. I have always loved pinecones. There is something about them. Like it is hiding all the layers and secrets of life itself inside that protective cone. I thought if I could ever design a home for myself, it would be like living inside a pine cone hanging off a handsome, bounteous pine tree, swaying in the breeze, holding my own in the storm, and gently lulling fellow living beings to a peaceful state as they rest under my boughs. 

Of course, human-beings are never as accomplished as all that, and instead, I spent many wonderful evenings gazing lovingly at the pine trees nearby. Watching a pine cone drop from the boughs above, trying to pry it open to see  what lies inside. 

I was reminded of Hope Jahren’s book, Lab Girl while musing about the pine cones.

In the book, Dr Jahren writes about the science and its demands on its lovers. Her writing is lyrical, and when she writes of her research and her little moments of leap, it is nothing short of poetic. For instance, she writes of the time she was studying the structural makeup of the seeds of hackberry trees, and she unmistakably finds traces of Opal in the seeds:

“It was opal and this was something I could draw a circle around and testify to as being true. While looking at the graph, I thought about how I now knew something for certain that only an hour ago had been an absolute unknown, and I slowly began to appreciate how my life had just changed.

I was the only person in an infinite exploding universe who knew that this powder was made of opal. In a wide, wide world full of unimaginable numbers of people, I was – in addition to being small and insufficient—special. I was not only a quirky bundle of genes, but I was also unique existentially because of the tiny detail that I knew about Creation,…Until I phoned someone, the concrete knowledge that opal was the mineral that fortified each seed on each hackberry tree was mine alone.”

Not that we learnt anything that was ours alone during that lesson with pinecones, but it felt just as special. Like the pinecones were divulging the little secrets of the universe to us, to hold carefully and pass on.

Pine nuts are nuts!

It was a fascinating experience to see how pine nuts were extracted from the pinecone. The pine cones do not open wherever they please. It has to be under certain temperatures and even then, it is a tricky business. Once the pine nuts can be extracted, it isn’t a simple task to extract the flesh within them which is the edible part of the whole thing. 

So we sat there polishing the nuts against sandpaper chatting amiably with each other on how much effort it takes. I could very well imagine this being a community-building, all-the-aunts-and-grandmas-singing-together kind of activity. 

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/N1OeoaHGeLM

Of course, now there are mechanical shakers and crushers to do some of the work. But still, the process remains an expensive, labor-intensive process. Pine nuts are expensive – “Pine nuts are nuts!”

By the end of extracting the flesh from within the nuts though,I had a renewed sense of appreciation for the expensive packets in stores. 

I sat there one evening gazing up at the tree and saw the squirrels in the neighborhood loosen a pine cone from the tree. It fell with a soft thud upon the grass below. A single pine cone in a suburban lawn. Holding the secrets of the universe or at least the universes of pine trees in them.

Literary Conversations

I was talking to a friend recently.

“Are you driving?” She said, astute as ever. I smiled to myself in the car. She had me there. She knew from the relaxed way in which I was carrying on the conversation that I must have time and not flibberty-gibbeting around like I usually do.

“Yes!” I confessed – the sheepish feeling in my heart oozing into my voice, and she laughed.

“In that case we can talk about books!”, she said, and my heart warmed toward her. Bless her.

I told her about a book that I read recently:

The Care & Management of Lies – By Jacqueline Winspear

The tone of the writing on Jacqueline Winspear is somewhat similar to Miss Read (one of my favorite authors) – full of warmth and everyday practicality. Winspear was introduced to me by one of my son’s teachers, and I enjoyed this book more than her more famous series based on Maisie Dobbs, the detective. 

The main character, Kezzie’s treatment of food preparation borders on irreverent and artsy enough to be charming, though the food recipes do get to be a bit much towards the end.

I identified with the young bride Kezzie married to a farmer, Tom, with these short lines:

“They were in the first flush of marriage, and this was another source of fascination for the young husband, that this wife of his had no attachment to her prowess as a cook. She didn’t seem to care that pastry might be underdone, meat overdone, that bread was too doughy in the crumb, too hard on the crust, or that the men looked at their eggs and bacon and then at each other every morning. She seemed like a sprite assigned to a factory job, flitting from stove to table, then out to the kitchen garden, cutting rosemary to garnish an egg on toast-and not one of the farmworkers had ever seen garnish, nor would the word be part of their vocabulary.”

How could I not? Kezzie’s flair for the artistic, and the unconventional had me smiling. After all, I share the same sentiment towards cooking even after all these years. When I say things like, “No need to make a big deal – I’ll figure something for dinner.” I can see the looks being exchanged as though this means starving the family. It doesn’t. The family is well-fed. Ask the weighing scale. It just means, I will not think about it when I am looking for the deer shaped cloud with the sun peeping out from its antlers.

In turn, she told me about a similarly warm-toned book, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. I look forward to reading it. That got us talking about how the same things that life has to offer can be written in bleak ways, or in uplifting ways. After all, the book I had just read was set in The First World War, and the whole world was buffeted by its ill-effects. It isn’t fairy-tale material. It isn’t bedtime reading material. And yet, somehow the sentiment of the book felt welcoming.

On the other hand, Grapes of Wrath – By John Steinbeck had me moping for days afterward. Good writing – but bleak in outlook.

We spoke of this and that, and hung up.

Relatable optimism?

So, what is it that makes the tone of a story appealing to you? Plenty of people like Steinbeck & Dostoevsky. I do too. Just not for comfort reading. The same sentiment seems to rule my entertainment options. Life is hard enough – I don’t need my entertainment to be the same. Maybe that is the reason sitcoms are so popular with society.

Could it relatable optimism and a familiar feeling of laughter and comfort at the end of the day?

Related: https://nourishncherish.org/2012/07/25/slimy-brazil-sprout-rice-recipe/

What are your favorite bedtime books?

Bedtime Books 

The past few nights have been hot. I would’ve used the term ‘sweltering’ but after reading about chinchillas, I am not sure. They are the ones that live in the sweltering volcanic regions. I live in a place that is hot in summer. It is hot till the air conditioner kicks in. I was over-stimulated and was looking for something soothing to calm down and go to bed.

I sighed, and picked up a book from my latest set of creature books. (I need to put up a separate post on them soon)

The Bedtime Book of Nighttime Animals: More Than 100 Creatures Who Come Out to Play When You Go to Bed

Why this strange fascination for creature books?

What is this strange fascination with children’s books on creatures, you ask. To that, I say, if you aren’t reading them, you’re missing out on life. Take for instance this set of books that I have been reading, admiring and glancing through every chance I get. Sometimes, we think being a human is all there is to life. But is it? A book like this is marvelous to imagine all the creatures out and about on Earth just as we tuck ourselves into bed. I felt a pang for the times the children and I would read these kind of books when they were toddlers. So, maybe it is just a little piece of that I cling to when reading these books. 

I know the children as toddlers would have been enthralled by the names of the creatures in this book: Tasmanian devils, roborovski monsters, spinner dolphins, pipstrelles, kakapo, natterjack toad, kuhli loach. If I were a rap singer with any sort of talent, just imagine rapping the names of the creatures who are up at night.

Imagine being a kinkajou?

Still unable to sleep, I sat with a strange urge for a midnight snack and wondered whether to get out of bed, go downstairs, and then decided against it. Now, if I were a kinkajou that would not be a problem at all, would it?

The kinkajous live on trees, and think nothing of hanging from them for a midnight snack. They love to raid beehives for honey, and being nocturnal means that the bees must be in residence when they do so. If that isn’t brave, I don’t what is.

  • Why does the kinkajou not get stung by bees? Because the bees are asleep!
  • And what of blood sugar at night? The kinkajou doesn’t care.

I flipped a few more pages, and there staring at me was the roborovski hamster. It is the smallest and fastest hamster in the world. Why the long name, Roborovski? I think it is brilliant.  “Roborovski hamster – come here this instant!” And he vanishes before you finish calling his name. See? 

As I nodded off to sleep, I couldn’t help thinking of the cute chinchillas who are so smart that when caught by predators, they simply shrug off their fur and take off into the silver night. They manage to sleep during the day in hot volcanic regions, I am sure I should be able to sleep now, I told myself and thought of all the happy creatures sleeping at night and all the ones enjoying themselves in the light of the stars.

Equal opportunity mispronunciations

I was attending a graduation ceremony in the USA and wondering how they managed to get so many of the names mispronounced. In fact, at that point, more than 3/4th of the names were mispronounced in one way or the other. Latin American names, Indian names, Chinese names, Jewish names, African American names, Greek names, Arabic names—everyone’s names were equally butchered. Equal-opportunity mispronunciations.

The world, whether we like it or acknowledge it, has become more global in its make-up than it has ever been. So, learning how to say each other’s name, is more important than ever. For that, learning the importance of one’s name is quite as important, isn’t it?

Sitting outdoors on that sunny afternoon,  I reflected on Suma Subramaniam’s book, My Name is as Long as a River.

My Name is as Long as a River By: Suma Subramanian

Suma Subramaniam writes about South Indian life, and is a member of the WNDB (We Need Diverse Books) initiative.

This particular book is especially relevant as there are many children with long names in schools these days.

In the book, the child is named after the river Kaveri. In fact her full name is: Kaveri Thanjavur Jayalakshmi Ganesan.

Kaveri : the name of the river she is named after. A beautiful river in South India, it is the harbinger of prosperity in the South. The rice fields, temple towns, and estuaries are the centres of culture and history millennia old. The Kaveri river waters literally help feed millions of people.

Kaveri is embarrassed by her long name in the USA, and has shortened it to Kav because it is consistently mispronounced, but after visiting her grandmother along the banks of the river Kaveri, she learns the significance of her beautiful name.

“Ganesan is my father.

Jayalakshmi is my mother.

Thanjavur is where I was born.

Kaveri is who I am.

My name is: Kaveri Thanjavur Jayalakshmi Ganesan.”

Tara Anand’s illustrations combined with Suma Subramaniam’s writing makes it a truly wonderful book, and one I think many teachers will love to use in their diverse classrooms.

What’s in a name?

For a person whose name is as long as a river, I loved the book. I know that the daughter has shortened her name with a beautiful Tamil meaning to mean something ‘brave and bold’ in Irish. I have a Starbucks-name, a more lilting explanation for those who are in the mood to try a few Hawaiian excursions into the language if they really want to pronounce my name, and so on.

I‘ve often asked children to help me understand the significance, meaning and cultural importance of their names. There are so many origins of names – some religious, some mythical, some nature-based, some philosophical references: the list is truly as varied as the names themselves.

It is curious how willingly they answer this question when younger, and then seem to almost drift away as teens for the same question. Like they would all just love to be called the same thing: wall, plant, brick. I understand it, wanting to blend in is an innate characteristic (Be a Roman in Rome & all that – the adage didn’t start yesterday did it?)

At some point in early adulthood though, the innate need to return to your unique name, hopefully, kicks in.

The magic of names

My thoughts drifted to Ursula K Le Guin, whose writings, if I remember correctly, also had a lot of interesting names. Naming was important to her. It set the place, the setting, even the story forward. How easily we can imagine an island kingdom, separate from a desert oasis town, or a hillside rural area by the names alone?

Now, pluck all these characters and have them live together in a university, and the resulting entertainment from the names is enough to tide guests through a whole afternoon.

“To weave the magic of a thing, you see, one must find its true name out… for there is great power, and great peril, in a name.” — A Wizard of Earthsea

In a non-fiction essay , Ursula Le Guin talks about the responsibility of choosing names. 

“To make up a name of a person or a place is to open the way to the world of languages the name belongs to. It’s a gate to Elsewhere.” – Ursula K Le Guin

J K Rowling’s Harry Potter series has so many interesting names, and etymologies once you get past the story, and actually delve into the details. The first time I realized Sirius & Remus names with respect to their alter-ego/animagus forms, I felt a jolt of pleasure.

Mythologies the world over have fantastic names for their characters. What is in a name then? Is it’s meaning important? Is there a specific magic to what we have been named? Is it linked to something greater or is it just a name?

The first sounds to which we respond uniquely.

What does your name mean to you? I’d love to know.

Free Play: Free to Play? Play to be Free? Just Play!

“Many animals learn by playing.”, my professor said, as she laid things out on the floor.

I nodded. I knew it. I have watched children play, I remember playing for many pleasurable hours myself. It is why I can be entranced watching squirrels play. I have always appreciated imaginative play.

What I did not realize is that I have forgotten how to do so myself.

I watched with a little awe and some glee as our professor set out things for free play. There were sticks, magnetic stickers, crochet scarves, yarn, finger puppets, lego blocks, kidney beans. Piles of things to play with, and I suddenly felt a sense of overwhelm. You see? I don’t remember when I played without an expected outcome. Years? Decades?

Didn’t I have to make something?

What do you mean – I can just do something that I like?

It was then that the activity really hit me. Unstructured play is a luxury – even for the children. When told to do anything, we do not know how to do that.

AI generated from article

Play morphs with age too

Thinking back, even play has morphed with time and age. Rules came into play – team games, board games, level-based games: they all tried to make their way into your life. But playing just so we could? The more adult we became, the less we did that. Even though, we tried our best to incorporate games into our lives, the nature of the games morphed. There were competitive games, skill-based games, team-based games. But just playing with the materials available to us?

How long since you just took some play-doh and squished it? Without making a fish or a heart out of it?

At the end of the 20 minute session, I realized that I was still quite confused. Did I play correctly? Our training to play it right meant we have forgotten what it is to play.

Did I feel happy? I genuinely do not know.

Did I feel satisfied? I am not sure.

Did I have a good time? Maybe – I meandered, but I was assured that was the right thing.

I came home, expecting to regale the husband and children and ask if they are willing to entertain free play. The son had gone for his running practice, the husband had gone for tennis, and came home miffed about a game they should have won but didn’t. And I stood there, running awfully late behind my dinner making schedule to be chatting about playing.

Is Play the Basis of Culture?

I remember writing about the recess being the basis of culture in an article over a decade ago. I relished that thought now. Why do we not have scheduled recesses in offices and work spots? A time when everybody is expected to be doing nothing?

I spent the next hour and a half cooking, cleaning, scrubbing and taking out the trash, with no energy left to think of playing. But I thought to myself. How wonderful it would be if household robots enabled us to play again. Just for the sake of it.

Wishful thinking I know. But I did know that of all the laments of adulthood, the fact that we no longer skip while walking, prance while doing the laundry, or twirl while making toast, or have free play  sessions with our pals is my biggest lament.

As I sank into bed, exhausted by my day, I reflected on the unstructured play session: Did I enjoy it? I still do not know. But I remember golden shining moments like little fireflies in a jar of moments when we played as children. Joyously, without agenda, and without expectations.

It is a happy talent to know how to play.

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

How do we relearn that art, and embrace it in our lives again?

Buddha & The Doves in Love

Where miniature buddhas take a deep breath

It was one of those quiet week-end mornings. I was cooking. I had not yet switched on any music. Just cooking.

I glanced out of the bay window in my kitchen for a moment, and couldn’t help smiling.  The buddha statue in the backyard is always a serene sight for those wishing for a quiet moment. It is doubly so in spring and early summer. The little statue is surrounded by sweet smelling star jasmine, making it look like a spot where miniature buddhas take a deep breath. 

That particular morning – there were two doves feeding each other. Probably fruit from the trees nearby. It was the most heart warming sight. 

Do we notice the quiet moments only in contrast to something else?

Usually, when I notice moments like this, it is in contrast to the busy things going on in my life just then. I’ve always wondered whether I appreciate moments like these because of the contrast. But this time, it was different. I had a slow morning. I got up in a leisurely manner with neither alarm nor sunrise giving me the slightest nudge. I was feeling well rested, and savored my coffee as I pottered around the kitchen prepping for the cooking. 

The birds were having an equally relaxed loving morning by the looks of it. It did not even occur to me to get my phone and take a picture till they had started to flit away from each other. 

I remembered a passage from one of Miss Read’s books, Village Diary by Miss Read ,  in which she noticed the starlings as she was going about her domestic tasks.

The Secret To Blooming Like a Flower

Quote:

As I ironed, I amused myself by watching a starling at the edge of the garden bed. He was busy detaching the petals from an anemone…

This short scene, I thought as I pressed handkerchiefs, is typical of the richness that surrounds the country dweller and which contributes to his well-being. As he works, he sees about him other ways of life being pursued at their tempo – not only animal life, but that of crops and trees, of flowers and insects – all set within the greater cycle of the four seasons. It has a therapeutic value, this awareness of myriad forms and the varied pace of other lives.

Doves in Love

The sweet interlude of the doves in love done with, I started cooking. The pace and labor of human food preparation is always so much more frenzied and complicated.

I glanced at the Buddha statue nestling amidst the star jasmines, and found his sweet contented smile still in place, like he remembered the doves playing around him that morning.

P & L : Build Your P In Life

Life with Purpose or Passion?

I sat with a set of children’s books in my arms. I looked down fondly at the pile next to me – I did love this particular selection. For nestling in there were the kind of careers that I had not imagined since being a child myself – A balloonist, giraffologist, naturalist.

The Giraffologist – Anne and her Tower of Giraffes – by Karlin Gray and Aparna Varma

I picked up the book on Dr Annie and read about how she decided on a lifetime studying giraffes. What remarkable creatures? No wonder it fascinated a young girl all those decades ago when zoos did not have them. World travel and exotic creatures felt almost impossible. She tried studying zoology just so she could learn more about giraffes. But nobody had studied them in any detail.

As I looked at the pictures in the book, Dr Annie came to life again. In her gentle understanding of these creatures in a time when they only graced black-and-white illustrations of some books.

Butterflies open up Etymology

I thought of Maria Sibylla Merian and her love for butterflies in the 18th century. She raised caterpillars and painstakingly drew and described metamorphosis. I am not sure if it was a revolutionary discovery, but it certainly seems to have opened up the world of etymology to the western world.

Sylvia Earle – the oceanographer who spent more than 7000 hours underwater, in a lifelong journey to understand the astounding diversity of life in the marine world.

The fact that these women kept at their areas of passion is inspiring – I wonder what their personalities were like. Beyond the obvious curiosity, intelligence, perseverance etc. What were the forces that shaped them?

Life’s Calling, Yearning or Liking

I remember reading in Stephen Cope’s book, The Great Work Of Your Life – A Guide for the Journey to your True Calling, about Jane Goodall’s mother encouragement when she couldn’t find her daughter one day. She searched for her for 4 hours only to find that the young child had simply been curious to find out about how an egg came to this world. Jane had spent the afternoon in the chicken coop waiting for the hens to lay eggs. Instead of chastising her for it, her mother saw a passion in the young child and nurtured it instead.

I was a little wary of the book when I picked it up. Purpose, and finding your life’s purpose etc were things that had given me enough existential grief over the years. When people told me we each were born with a purpose, I felt a little lost. Like everyone was born with a map( “Here you go – keep it safe and look it up when ever you want!”), just before arriving, and I had missed picking it up – dreaming I suppose.

I feel no great calling to study deer as much as I love gazing at them. I never felt the urgent yearning to study Compiler Design though I thoroughly enjoyed the subject. I did not seem to have that intense humanitarian strain either that came to Mother Teresa in life. In fact, apart from musing and writing about life in general, I am not sure I had any inner force driving my inner purpose etc. All I knew was that I could spend hours in nature and in my own imagination. I liked company, but was also quite capable of amusing myself.

Where did that lead?

I remembered reading Mark Twain’s words:

“The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.”

I don’t remember the former, and I am waiting for the latter. I am well aware that I am in the second innings of my life, so I am not sure the realization that Mark Twain had, is coming for me.

What appealed to me more was a concept I read in passing somewhere: Build your purpose.

So while I find it wonderful that for some people their purpose seems apparent to them, and their motivations align beautifully with their life’s journeys, I think that for many of us, the meandering journey is life. The purpose is built along the way. If we can find things to be passionate about, that is great, but it isn’t a given. 

This wasn’t the first time I mused on professions and its link as a means of economic prosperity. If the two weren’t linked. If money was not the primary driver, what kinds of jobs would people choose?

What Would You Do?

I remembered the Elephant Keeper I had met and befriended on a day trip in Ireland. She & I were the only ones who had come without companions on that sight-seeing trip, so we took to talking to each other. It was the most fascinating day-in-the-life I had heard from someone in person. She lived on a farm, worked with elephants, and sent me pictures and videos of the gentle giants in her care. Her love for them evident in each of them.

What would each of you have chosen if livelihoods, and societies weren’t involved in the decision-making? The wackier the jobs the more I’d like to hear them. So, please let me know.

Up to my neck!

The Giraffologist 

I sat with a set of children’s books in my arms. I looked down fondly at the one in my hands. The first one was about a giraffologist – the title pulling my attention almost immediately. What a delightful sounding profession?

The Giraffologist – Anne and her Tower of Giraffes – by Karlin Gray and Aparna Varma

The book is based on Dr Annie Innis Dagg who was the world’s first giraffologist. The world’s first primatologist, Dr Jane Goodall, is of course well-known. But Dr Annie, who went to Africa to study her favorite animals, giraffes, just 4 years later is practically unheard of. That is the weird nature of public attention.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener-waterloo/new-heritage-minute-anne-innis-dagg-giraffes-1.7648146

Dr Annie’s life and work was made into a documentary in Canada honoring her work towards preserving these tall creatures.

The daughter’s drawing of a giraffe:

Bill Bryson’s book, The Body – A Guide for Occupants

I was thinking of giraffes and their beautiful necks one day after reading Bill Bryson’s book, The Body – A Guide for Occupants. One section of the book dealt with how prone we are to choke. One particularly sad anecdote about a person who had a gold coin lodged in his throat was especially excruciating. If nothing else, I am glad we now live in a time and age when surgical techniques have come so far from the ones outlined in the book. (The coin only fell out when he was hoisted by his foot and swung like a pendulum. )

Beautiful Necks Everywhere!

Our evolution into bipedalism means that necks took on a truly unique structure to support the head, and provide a forward looking face for navigation. I stopped and chuckled at that. I was on a walk, and just like that, I started noticing necks everywhere. The crane, the gray heron, the hummingbird, the dog, squirrel and the cat.

I got home to look up the giraffe’s neck again.

Did you know that both giraffes and humans have the exact same number of bones in our necks : 7

Yet, the giraffe’s neck supports its long neck, and its heart supports pumping blood all the way up there. All those jokes about tall folks( How’s-the-weather-up-there?) suddenly feels biologically profound.

In any case, the understanding of our biology, our evolution, and our unique places in the planet is shaped by so many factors –  How many giraffes with weird ears and longer tails evolved before the long necked ones that we know and love?

I craned my neck to look at a white egret crook its neck and plunge into the waters with precision and force for its breakfast, and gently massaged my own neck. ‘Up to my neck with worries’ took on a new meaning too, and I hoped giraffes and herons never had to use that phrase, when worried.