In second grade my class took an IQ test. That was my first full year of school. I remember sitting on the school superintendent ' s lap - must have been no legal problem then - and reading to him when I was five. Subsequent declaration was that I could skip first grade. Later I aced the Stanford -Binet multiple -choice, true -false test. One question I missed, and I was so embarrassed about, was "A boulevard is a wide street." I answered "no". In my hometown boulevards were those strips of grass between the sidewalk and the curb. Thus the typical shortcoming of any "intelligence quotient" test. But I got a 139.
Fast forward seventy years. The Arizona afternoon was sunny and I was biking home on a thirty-mile route. There were choices to make: should I take the wide swing up Desert Bell, or the steeper, more direct route up Esperanza, or the bumpier lane along Continental? I knew what each hill entailed, so I didn't have to scope it out.
At the corner of Esperanza and Portillo was a terra cotta bench, and I gratefully flopped down in the half-shade, taking a swig of water and looking down at the large gravel stones carpeting the ground.
Wait! One of the stones is moving. No, it's a flat round yellow seed that is going forward. Approximately one centimeter long. No wind. But why is it moving steadily forward?
A tiny ant was propelling it. She had the seed - three times longer than her and much wider - in her jaws, I guess, and was relentlessly transporting it where she wanted to end up.
Then she would stop, drop the seed, and go ahead without it. Backtracking, she would check another stone, around it or over. That ant would then go back and pick up her treasure, proceeding forward until there was another route decision to make. Sometimes her detective work clearly involved at least three possible ways, and after checking each one out she always ended up on the path with least obstacles. While I watched she progressed over one meter with her valuable seed.
No way was she relying on instinct. That ant had to make choices, and good ones based on logic, eliminating less desirable paths.
How would that tiny, almost microscopic creature do on an intelligence test? Pretty well. It's just us limited mortals who need to readjust our assessment of smarts in this great world God made.
A boulevard is a wide street. All depends on the path - and the goal you have to reach.
Marilyn Jaeger, February 19, 2016
Excellent short story! There is an art to this efficiency, and Ivan Klima, a Czech writer I've met a couple times, is a recent enthusiast for one-page short stories, and I'd like to think a 'once-a-week' routine to capture such occasions of plot and epiphany would fit our symposia well. That's what I'm trying to do with my poetry volume 'Lost Menagerie', this week's effort below (or see the original format at http://lostmenagerie.blogspot.cz/2016/02/honing-hume.html)
ReplyDeleteHoning Hume
Waiting to see what will be in review of the photograph
and I’m gonna gather evidence
whether it’s more white, black or gray
Waiting to hear what is clear in the trust of the telephone
and I’m gonna offer utterance
whether it’s the right thing to say
Waiting to feel what may heal in the balm of the charlatan
and I’m gonna lean on common sense
whether it’s the trend of the day
Waiting to smell what could tell in no time of a hurricane
and I’m gonna secure confidence
whether it’s a maverick to tame
Waiting to taste what was based in the very first eucharist
and I’m gonna relish circumstance
whether it’s a last time to pray
’cause I’m waiting, feigning elegance
whether in a lab or foyer
Groping to know where to go in the void of this universe