Always thinking
April 18, 2010
Ginger is worried. She asks questions. She ponders weighty issues. She is delving into existentialism. She is also wonderfully phleghmatic at times. Witness her commentary below.
Example One. J and I made a passing comment about being grandparents one day in the future. There was no real seriousness to it but Ginger responded drily: “That’s if you last that long”. Our creaky bones and cavernous wrinkles obviously set up that retort.
Example Two. Imagine utside under the hills hoist eating sandwiches in the company of some chooks and dad. Out of the blue Ginger pipes up: “Why are we all here?” What in the backyard? Under the clothesline? Excatly where? Err, no, more poignantly, why are people born here on this Earth, live a life and die is precisely what she means. Why indeed. J responded with some erudite five-year old friendly comment and added that many people have asked themselves the same thing. It’s called philosophy.
Example 3. Ginger is nearly 6. Her grandmother R died about a month ago. I thought she was doing fine but one evening about a week ago she got up from bed as soon as her dad and I came downstairs. She was in distress and weeping claiming that she was worried she was going to die.
We took her back to bed and sat with her. She was crying a great deal with much emtional angst explaining how worried she was. She was worried because she doesn’t want to die. She then made a huge existentialist leap: I wish I had never been born so I wouldn’t have to worry about dying. Broke my heart.
We were pretty shocked at her angst but we tried to validate what was clearly some inner turmoil. We explained everyone dies but it was likely that she wouldn’t die for a long time to come. She would grow up and have lots of other things to do and think about first. She eventually fell asleep.
As an aside, I too miss R very much. Perhaps I’ll write about her one day so that the possum and the bunny rabbit can remember how much she loved them and they, her.
