By
Per Jespersen
In Mark and
Deena’s school they have been working with Nature for a week. They have learnt
about many animals, plants and trees, so they felt they know a lot about
Nature, although they found Nature very complicated. Especially the food chains
caught them and they had a huge discussion in class, partly about the beauty of
Nature and partly about the enigmas you find everywhere in Nature.
How could a tree
know how to grow?
How could a seed
know how to grow into the same sort of a tree as it came from?
How could flocks
of birds know where to fly when they left the Northern countries in the fall?
How could clouds
rain or snow?
How did rivers
find their way to the sea?
Why were the
oceans salt and the lakes fresh?
There were so
many questions that they could spend a whole lifetime answering them.
When the two
children came home they went on discussing the subject Nature.
“It’s strange to
think,” Deena said, “that we are part of Nature. We are used to think about
ourselves as being different from Nature – departed from Nature.”
“I think that we
take ourselves away from Nature,” Mark said.
“How?”
“By destroying it
through pollution and our behaviour.”
“What kind of
behaviour?”
Mark pondered a
little. “Take Dolphia – she paints and paints. Is that a natural thing to do?”
“It sure is. She
uses her fantasy to paint.”
“But Nature has
no such thing as fantasy.”
“I think it has.
It creates new species all the time.”
“Because it has
to. If new species are not created Nature will die. It has to create all the
time – as Dolphia does. I don’t see the difference.”
They went into
the kitchen to get some food. Here they sat for an hour, eating and discussing.
Nature was still the subject, and they could not agree on the issue.
“Listen,” Mark said.
„I think ----.“
There was a knock
on the door. They wondered who it could be, but hearing the singing outside the
door, they knew that it could only be Dolphia. She did not come very often, so
something special must have happened.
They opened the
door and saw Dolphia standing with a huge hat with flowers and grapes. And she
had a painting under her arm and continued her singing.
“So,” Deena siad.
“You have made the best painting ever!”
“How could you
know?”
“We see it in
your eyes. Total happiness. Come in and let’s see. Do you want a cup of
coffee?”
“I never drink
coffee at this time of the day. I’m a very decent lady.
Mark laughed.
“Oh, is that so! Let’s see your painting, then.”
“It’s very big,”
Dolphia said. “Come down the stairs, and I’ll show you. You’ll get surprised.”
They rushed down
the stairs and saw a huge painting. And it was not a sunset, but a landscape
from a forest with a flock of starlings sitting in a tall oak tree. The
painting was so good that they could almost hear the birds sing.
“How could you do
that, Dolphia?”
“Intuition. All
artists are so intuitive. It’s really very hard. I do weep a lot. But this
painting has made so happy, that I ---- .” Now she started weeping again.
But Deena broke
in, “Dolphia, don’t weep so much. Be happy. Your new painting is marvellous.
The best you’ve made.”
“I can’t paint
without weeping. It’s part of the working conditions of mine. I guess you can’t
imagine how difficult it is.
“But Dolphia,”
Deena siad. “Your painting is Nature.”
“I know.”
“We discuss
Nature in school. After having seen your painting, we all of a sudden
understand what Nature is.”
“Oh, I’m so
proud,” Dolhia said.
“You know there
are so many questions to Nature which can’t be answered. Your painting tells us
that Nature should not be understood, but enjoyed. The more you understand, the
less you can enjoy it. And we have to feel that we are part of Nature, which is
God-given. It’s a gift to us and we have to handle it with respect and love.”
“My goodness,”
Deena said. “Mark, you sound like a grown-up man.”
“No, I’m a child.
But it doesn’t mean, that I can’t understand.”
Deena wondered.
Then she said, “Mark, you are cleverer than I thought. I see why the Red
Indians prayed to Nature. We should do the same. Nature is more valuable than
the whole mankind.”
“You haven’t
heard the best thing,” Dolphia said.
“No, what’s
that?”
“The painting is
sold.”
“But how did you
do that? You never sell your paintings.”
“No, but a man
came up to me while I was painting. He is the director of the science museum in
this very town. And he saw me paint and heard me both sing and weep. I guess he
got so touched by the whole thing that he decided to give me a price for the
painting. It will be seen by many visitors at the museum.
“Congratulations,”
Mark said. “I hope you got a good price for it.”
“A decent lady
don’t talk about money,” Dolhia said happily.
“So it was a good
price.”
“You are my best
friends, so I should tell you the price. But being a real lady I can’t. But I
can afford to buy a new teepot for my tea, and there is even a little left for
buying tea as well.”
Mark laughed.
“How practical.”
They all looked
at the painting, and Mark was especially fascinated by the flocks of starlings
in the oak tree. He knew they they were on their way south as winter was close.
He knew that huge flock of these birds spent the nights in the reed close to
the rivers and lakes, and that they flocked in millions just before sunset. A
phenomenon called “Black Sun”.
And suddenly the
colours of the painting paled and a glowing light of the setting sun crept into
the canvas. “Dolphia, the sun is setting.”
“It does every
day, my turtle,” Dolphia smiled.
“Oh, does it. But
look!” All the starlings took off from the tree and left the painting in a huge
flock and flew towards the river.
“Dolphia,” Mark
and Deena said in chorus. “You have made the best painting ever made.”
“I only have one
cencern,” she said.
“And that is?”
“Will the
starlings ever come back?”
“Oh sure,” Mark
said. “They come back after sunrise. Dolphia, you know that the sun rises once
a day. Every morning in fact.”
“Oh, I didn’t
know that. But I see that there is a pattern there. Thank you. I already know
what the next painting should be like.”
“A sunrise?”
“Yes, for the
first time in my life I’m going to paint a sunrise.”
“So that the
starlings can return,” Mark asked.
“Exactly, my
little starling. How clever you are.”
1) Do you consider human beings to be part of Nature?
2) Is it so, as the children seem to mean, that we try to
get away from Nature in our way of living?
3) Is the reason why we try to escape Nature that there
are so many concepts in Nature that we cannot comprehend?
4) Is Mark right, that the more we understand the less we
can enjoy?
5) Give examples.
6) A scientist once said, that the less he knew about the
planet Mars the more fascinated he was. Is that so?
7) Is the consequence that we should stop our
investigations and just enjoy?
8) That was the fact in ancient China. They had no
scientist but listened to poets’ poems, knew them by heart and thus enjoyed the
beauty of a flower without trying to understand anything?
9) Is science killing our emotions for Nature?
10)
Is there a
defference between a philosophical attitude to Nature and a scientific
attitude?
11) Is our digitalized world removing us from Nature? Try
to explain! And take a huge discussion as Mark and Deena had about Nature and
our role there.