#50finethings 41 – 45

Photo with kind permission of the official twitter account for Brú na Bóinne, Newgrange and Knowth

#50finethings:  41 – 45

“I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading! How much sooner one tires of anything than of a book! — When I have a house of my own, I shall be miserable if I have not an excellent library.”
― Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

“Isn’t it odd how much fatter a book gets when you’ve read it several times?” Mo had said…”As if something were left between the pages every time you read it. Feelings, thoughts, sounds, smells…and then, when you look at the book again many years later, you find yourself there, too, a slightly younger self, slightly different, as if the book had preserved you like a pressed flower…both strange and familiar.”
― Cornelia Funke, Inkspell

There’s a short video that goes viral, sometimes, of a bird helping a hedgehog to cross a busy road.  The bird seems to be nudging and pushing the hedgehog to the safer side of the street, out of the way of the fast and heavy cars.  One of the drivers stops, to film the helpful kindness of the bird, and decides to share this on a social media platform.  It’s there we remark that the bird is not trying to help the hedgehog cross the road at all.

The bird is trying to eat him.

It’s unclear if the bird thinks the hedgehog’s spikes are worms, or if he’s trying to devour the entire creature, but what we do know is that the hedgehog is in danger.  The hedgehog can do very little.  Its best hope is that a vehicle travelling in the other direction, will mow down the bird, shockingly and violently.

Seemingly we are on the side of the hedgehog, and not the bird.

If January is the month of lists and lies, then September must be the month of sign-ups.  New courses, crisp uniforms, and goals for the academic year, as we cross our fingers and hope that this is the semester that we fulfil our true potential, and apply ourselves properly.  We pack our leather satchels full of hope and excitement, and yet we also feel that we are out of our own league.  It’s like going to Anne’s Bakery on Moore Street, and ordering an egg white omelette, on rye bread, with a hazelnut coffee, made with almond milk; it’s the wrong order, in the wrong place and we should simply go somewhere else.

September should instead be a time of slowing down.  We ought to bring out those winter blankets and become autumn book worms.  We should simply read articles about awe, and those moons around Saturn, for no other reason than the equinox.  We should harvest our nuts and berries in preparation for the colder months, and we should bid farewell to the summer.

We need to read to escape more news of Billionaires who buy rockets to fly near to space, and who buy luxury bunkers to hide in when the next pandemic, war, drought, or flood comes.  The Billionaires fill those underground safety nests with bowling allies, swimming pools and cinemas and we can only ask, what films will they watch after the apocalypse?

Don’t cry for the Billionaires when they die.

Or cry but know that for the Billionaires, we are just hedgehogs, or maybe worms.

If the Billionaires cared for us, they would sell just one of their paintings, to help cure malaria. They would sell one of their super yachts, and put an end to homelessness.  They could sell one of their private jets, so that the air we breathe is clearer; or perhaps they could stop buying rockets.

The Billionaires don’t worry about worms.

Perhaps they should.

It’s we the worms who keep the eco-system going and without us, the soil would rot and fail.  Sometimes we’re enormous, at other times microscopic, our strength is in our numbers, and how unseen we seem.

We are Darwin’s “ploughs,” who lived when dinosaurs ruled.  We’re adaptable little invertebrates, and we glisten in the sun.

We have one good ticket for this ride, and there seems to be a strict no-refund policy. Fair, unkind, good, or bad, we must play the hand we’re dealt, as there’s simply no other choice.  Be kind, generous, laugh, and leave it better than how we found it.  Not exactly a meaning of life, but a list of fine things we could do.

Happy new harvest moon, little worm, and a happy, gentle equinox.

I’ll see you here next time.

#50finethings 41 – 45

41:  Read about worms:  War of the Worms, by Perri Class

42:  Read about awe:  Oh wow!  How getting more awe can improve your life – and even make you a nicer person, by Eleanor Morgan

43:  Read about Saturn, and a moon that strayed too close:  Saturn’s rings could be remains of moon that strayed too close, say scientists, by Hannah Devlin

44:   Join the Cost of Living Protest in Dublin, organised by the Cost of Living Coalition:  Thousands march across Dublin in cost of living crisis, by Ceimin Burke

45:  Visit the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin and enjoy looking at ancient books and manuscripts: https://chesterbeatty.ie/