Have you seen this?
http://www.earthlings.com/earthlings/video-full.php
Its beautiful, and painful at the same time....and worth the watch.
Hope this finds you well my friend.
Nikki
Rescuing spiders and saving slugs
Posted By Harry on February 7, 2011
Rescuing a spider
Today is Plato’s birthday. We would have wished him by our bedside as we awoke but today it had to be down along the river where has a prime spot overlooking his favourite jigsaw puzzle piece of Nature. When I spent time with him this morning we spoke about death, his death, for the first time in almost 3 weeks; Sue and I are expecting our first child, you see, and since we heard the news all my conversations with Plato have been about life and not death. About how to rescue spiders from bathtubs. And how to save slugs from being driven over at the local rubbish tip.
It’s been a long road for Sue and I – almost ten years of foul-tasting herbal fertility concoctions, religiously heeding the advice of ‘natural’ fertility therapists, gingerly handing over warm early-morning jars to fertility ‘experts’, and baring our inner beings to adoption support officers and fellow travelers. But the call 3 weeks ago makes all of that seem strangely necessary: he’s 6 months old and will soon be joining us at Avondale. And Plato, ever-wise Plato, was always going to be a big part of his life.
Plato, like his human mate Harry, became gentler as the living years accumulated. We (and by the way Sue’s very much in on this!) want our little boy’s sense of, and actions in, this world to start off at least as gentle as Plato’s was when he moved on, and as Sue’s and mine will be when we join him again. Every parent wants their child to do better than they did. I want our child’s better to be gentler.
I want him to be aware of his choices – food, clothing and recreational. Does a fellow being have to suffer for them? When we take a father-and-son stroll down to the river to visit Plato and pass one of our numerous Tiger snakes sunning himself on a nearby rock I want him to say a quiet Hello. How are you today? Thank you for being a part of our family. and not rush to the garden shed in search of a deadly spade. Avondale’s bird and animal family are to be not his pets, but his family. Just like Sue and I. They’ll talk to him. Care for him. Nurture him. I want him to love them the same way.
And when we do a run to the rubbish tip and he sees his mum gently pick a slug off wet cardboard about to be thrown in the bin and walk over to some greenery to place her on I want him to think nothing of it. Such actions must be normal, everday actions. Not extraordinary events. Being given such an honour to help teach a fellow human being how to be in this world I want to teach what I’ve learnt well. Like how to rescue a spider.
Daddy, can you help me please? There’s a spider in the bath and I can’t reach him.
That’s a lucky spider then because if you could reach him to pick him up you might mistakenly pull his legs off.
But how do we rescue him then?
Well, spiders get stuck in baths because the sides of the bath are too smooth for them to get a grip on to walk up and out. So what you need to do is give them a type of ladder.
But we can’t put a ladder in the bath!
Not a real ladder, just something rough that they can get a grip on. Your mum and I find toilet paper works very well. Here I’ll show you how.
You write eloquently about teaching human animals how to be in the world, the world will likely thank you for that….most current human animals have been taught poorly and behave poorly…good to read about positive teachings.
Thank you VG for your kind words. The responsibility of looking after such a young child, of bearing such significant responsibility for the way he’ll be in this world (I’m a big believer that Nurture is 90% plus) is both daunting and exciting. The world has to become a gentler place. A non-violent place. Every one of our actions has an impact on whether that will occur or not. I’ll be one extra happy dad if he chooses to be a leader in this for those around him.
Congrats on the upcoming arrival of your son! I’m sure it’s bittersweet to welcome a new arrival, especially such a long-awaited one, without Plato’s physical presence there too…
Thanks Deb.
Bittersweet is a good way to describe it; I always regarded Plato as my son. But Plato was never going to leave and a different part of him is still very much here.
To VE and Harry, I say: Agreed. How we are taught makes all the difference.
When we ponder whether it’s nuture or nature that shapes us, though, I’d like to think that we’re each like a perfectly formed little seed, whose innate goodness requires watering, healthy soil, and proper cultivation in order to sprout and be fruitful.
Thinking about the basis of the relationships you describe, Harry — those between you and your sons and slugs and spiders — brings to mind these two verses by English poet Joseph Swain (1761-1796):
Let love, in one delightful stream,
Through every bosom flow;
And union sweet, and dear esteem
In every action glow.
Love is the golden chain that binds
The hearts that faithful prove;
And he’s an heir of heaven who finds
His bosom glow with love.