Only a Dozen

"There have only been about a half dozen genuinely important events in the four-billion-year saga of life on Earth: single-celled life, multicelled life, differentiation into plants and animals, movement of animals from water to land, and the advent of mammals and consciousness."

Elon Musk

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Dear Kate,

This is our twelfth post together, a One-Dozen milestone :)

So I picked this quote, speaks about a dozen but worth only half and admittedly so by the speaker, and the tragedy doubles for him being a visionary, planning to go to outer space and back--or maybe not.

It's perplexing, isn't it, someone with a great vision yet seeing so little?  And he is not alone in being reductionistic.

Stephen Hawking once said, “The human race is just a chemical scum on a moderate-sized planet, orbiting around a very average star in the outer suburb of one among a hundred billion galaxies. We are so insignificant that I can't believe the whole universe exists for our benefit. That would be like saying that you would disappear if I closed my eyes.”

Maybe it's not fair to take these quotes out of their context.  Nevertheless the cadence speaks about the music: only-half-a-dozen important, "moderate," "just," "scum"--chemical scum, "average"--very average, "insignificant"--so insignificant. And you would "disappear."  If not now, finally.  Soon enough.

But they were articulating "facts," weren't they?  And facts are "truths," aren't they?  In scientific empiricism we trust.

Still if a high-school science teacher (and the quotes really remind me of my own) is to speak to this student this way, this student would do himself and his class good to ask: "Teacher, what are you really trying to say?  Tell me the 'truth' about you before the bell rings, please."

I've written about scientism more than a few times elsewhere, and I don't want to repeat myself today.

Today I only want to dream a little, be a "visionary" myself and see if what I am seeing is just as insignificant, inconsequential, moderate and average.

I am dreaming what if my science teacher is to say, "Let me tell you today what the textbook says, and the way I am telling it speaks about my insights and my prejudices, my strengths and my weaknesses, my knowledge and my ignorance, my culture and my unculturedness.  And I encourage you to cultivate the sensitivity and sensibility to question me without being cynical, to be teachable but need not succumb to conformity.  Respect is the currency of this learning community, love our table manner, trust the very truth of Truth.  We know a lot, but not enough.  We never will.  And it is in this spirit that I am humbled to pursue truth with you.  Be my student.  Be my teacher.  It is good to be alive, together."

What if my teacher were to say that when I was in high-school?  I am probably a scientist now.  And a good one, I truly believe, as this teacher believed in me.

And then I imagine what if a preacher on pulpit is to admit his theology and reading of the Bible is informed by how much he hates his father (for many good reasons) or his low self-esteem or cultural bigotry, how his fears often paralyze him and preaching is a form of self-exorcism he performs that frequently burns his patient and trusting neighbors (for no good reason)?  What if that happens?  On Christian radio?  On TV?  At an evangelical rally?  What if we Christians are to do this even if only to each other?  That might well be the onset of an oft-fabled "revival."

What if all of us are just a little bit more honest about where we are coming from, to articulate a bit more clearly the words between and behind our lines, to speak truths about ourselves as the tenet of our truth-speaking about anything or anyone else?

What if?

Yours, Alex

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Dear Alex,

A dozen + two half dozens of hours sweep around the clock in full circle to mark a day of life.  From days in months to millenniums, most of our mono- and multi-celled existence mount on monotony, not marvel.  

What is important in our world ought to be relatively important at a more personal scale to me, us.  Rise in wealth inequality, aging folks, apathy.  Drop in health access, reading, employment.  The bad list persists yet I am not sure how to intervene.  I am only one.  One cannot possibly expect or be expected to think or do much out of one ordinary lolling of a life in one moment or day or more.  

More than a dozen of “genuinely important events" ago, I went to Hong Kong Museum of Art’s 2010 exhibition “Lofty Integrity: Donation of Works by Wu Guanzhong”.  Hailed as the father of modern Chinese painter, Wu married Western oil painting with Chinese brush strokes and calligraphy.  In reminiscence of his 90-year saga of treading through war, poverty, cultural revolution, muck and mirth, he penned his own final narrative for the show just before his passing:

“On a single log bridge, a lone man, with his back towards us, headed for the unknown in the distance.  Sixty years have gone past and he has returned to that same bridge, only aged and wounded.  There he is, up on the bridge, this time facing the world.”  (Translated)

I wonder how might Wu fit in the billion-year accordion folds of historical importance?  Would he qualify for “differentiation” into communal living, “movement” of social headlines to bedroom conversations, and the “advent” of the imagination in ink wash and tenuous minds?  Sketches on sketches in monotony, he gradually lifted shapes and silhouettes from common landscapes onto rice paper, banality unveiling beauty, the brute of hot sweat to operatic flight in hope and dream.  

And what about your rock-star late mentor and pastor, Eugene Peterson?  Where would he rest on the annals of greatness?  In his book, “The Pastor”, he often credited the harvest of his labor to his wife, Jan, in her generous, subdued ways of serving and caring for neighbors, strangers and pilgrims.  Jan’s multi-cellular vision of loving one and all may not have been recognized by most but the One in charge and the ones whose changed charged lives have become living sagas know about her significance beyond a half dozen medals invisible.  

Yesterday evening I heard a small voice before leaving my work building.  Good night!  She waved at me from down the corridor of rooms with dim and daunting, terrific and towering tales to tell, a figure of grace tugging a cart of towels and trash.  Her smile, her sound of cheer, wistfully mine in the cleft of time on a day spent for growth gain toil and loss, would be something “genuinely important” in the panorama of my life overlapping on dozens of worlds, yours, ours in one.  

Yours, Kate