101% American
  • Home
  • Reality Check
  • Stuarts-Blog

A DAY TO DANCE

9/11/2011

 
A Day to Dance
    A program on the Natural History Channel shows amazing bonds between animals: an orangutan and a hound dog, a lioness and a baby oryx, a baby hippo and a giant tortoise, an elephant and a chow mix dog, a cat and a crow. Astonishing to watch the cat playfully bat the unconcerned crow, the orangutan hug the hound dog, the oryx, (an African deer) cuddle up next to the lioness. Experts explained, but the best explanation came from an animal keeper who said, “Love expresses itself in amazing ways.” 
    An opposite expression is seen in Earth’s most successful family: the Formicidae. Ants. More than 12,000 species inhabit every continent but Antarctica. Ant “farms” are popular toys, a thin glass box of dirt, with ant food, a magnifying glass, and a box of live ants, or you can use ants from the park or your back yard. But you must never mix in ants from another colony. If you do, instant mayhem. One colony attacks, destroys, and often eats the other.
    Love and fear are survival strategies. Love flowers into creativity. Fear generates defense. Both are necessary. Among ants, identity belongs to the colony. Creating new individuals is left to specialists. Strangers are attacked and destroyed. Scientists characterize entire ant colonies as single organisms. If so, it is an organism ruled by hate. Humano sapiens, given free will, seeks a balance.
    Murderers, torturers, tyrants, thieves, cheats, are ruled by hatred. Hate drove Osama bin Laden. Hate drove Bernie Madoff. Hate drives pitchmen and purveyers of worthless g
oods. Hate drives hypocritical pandering politicians. Against the power of hate, can love ever prevail? Are hate-driven people happy? Does happiness even matter? 
    Writer, Olaf Stapledon, imagined a planet dominated by love until destroyed by another planet driven by hate. People of the love planet, knowing they would die, entered a state of bliss until they ceased to exist.
    Late afternoon on the day the Twin Towers had been destroyed, I taught a dance class, entered to see a question in every face. Dare we dance on this terrible day? Responding to that unvoiced question, I said, “This is a good day to dance.” And dance we did.

   
Martha
9/12/2011 08:36:53 am

Dancing for you: a form of prayer, I think. Maybe especially on that day, even in the form of a class.


Comments are closed.
    Picture

    Author (Yuma, AZ, 1944)

    Being 90 years in this world,  with great kids,  great grandkids, great wives (two, one at a time) and great memories, I wonder why some people seem to have stopped loving the U.S.A.? I will wonder in print right here. If you wonder too, or can provide some answers, please comment.
                                   Stuart Hodes

    Picture
           With my friend, Nero.
                   April, 2012.
        Photo by Ray Madrigal

    Archives

    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly