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Stone Soup
It’s a shockingly frigid weekend and in conditions like these, even a pot of Stone Soup seems ideal. There’s a lot that we can still learn from this simple folktale that applies to current events.
Cooperation
Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much. ~Helen Keller
This isn’t just any year.
This is the 250th year of the American experiment.
I was around for the Bicentennial. I remember people wearing Colonial garb and stuff that was Red, White & Blue.
We were into it. No matter how staggeringly incompetent Jimmy Carter was, people were unabashedly proud to be American.
Can we say the same thing today?
Some of us can, despite the problems.
Some of us won’t, despite the blessings.
It’s not as if we’re living in separate countries.
It’s all the same place from sea to shining sea.
It’s as if we’re at the fault line between separate dimensions of reality.
When you’re on one side, this makes perfect sense and is self-evident.
When you’re on the other side of that divide, this makes no damn sense and you must be fuckin’ crazy for even trying to think that it does.
Frankly, I’m at a loss as to how to rebind the fabric of reality.
It would be easier to find common ground if we were discussing different perspectives on a single concept, but we’re miles past that.
We’re talking past each other about things that do not and literally cannot line up in each other’s points of view.
Vice appears to be virtue, no matter which side you’re on.
It’s rather disheartening, but we really need to figure out how to get back on track.
The Secret
Kids Book Read Aloud: Stone Soup by Marcia Brown
This charming tale holds the key to any outcome that’s worthwhile.
The soldiers arrived as strangers. The peasants have seen this before.
They know the soldiers are going to be asking for resources they can’t honestly spare.
They give them a plausible story in hopes they’ll simply move on and ask someone else for food and a bed.
We’re looking at two groups of people whose perspectives look right past each other.
Both think they are being reasonable. Both think the other is being unreasonable.
Conflict ends when the soldiers choose a paradigm shift.
It could be considered a trick, but the story as told does not support that conclusion.
The soldiers propose to make soup that will feed the peasants instead of demanding or begging, and propose to share the knowledge of how to make this soup as their contribution to the eventual feast.
On its face, this is absurd.
Because they state absurdity with confidence, the peasants’ curiosity overtakes their hesitancy.
Paradigm shift.
Once they start boiling stones, the absurdity becomes performative. They suggest something simple to make the stone soup just a bit better.
This would be even better with carrots.
Well, boy howdy, they’ve been hiding the carrots because they were afraid of being eaten out of house and home by wandering soldiers (as usual).
Not this time.
This stone soup (eye roll deserved) would be a bit better with carrots but there’s no point asking for what you don’t have.
Curiosity leads to action. How can it hurt to throw some carrots in and make the soup better?
So on and so forth. With each ingredient, the community collaborates in a soup fit for a king.
Because the community as a whole has contributed a little bit, according to their means, the soup is actually community-sized in the end.
Everybody did their little bit to accomplish something big.
Not just big, but good.
Because their contributions were freely given, with a common goal (good soup for everyone), it wound up being a civic wonder.
This is the moral of the story.
People working in concert with good intention and common goals can accomplish ends that are good for everyone equally.
So, how do we make that paradigm shift in our funhouse mirror views of each other?
How do you stitch fragmented realities into a common framework that everyone can largely agree on?
If you figure it out, maybe run for office. Our current bunch aren’t big on solving things and we could stand a change from self-perpetuating office holders holding office for the sake of holding office.
We need people with the Cincinnatus perspective: Get in. Get it done. Get it to stay done. Go back to your garden.
That’s the kind of people we need in office and we need those offices to have term limits. The sooner the better.
🔎 What Is Art Without An Audience?
A work of art is complete only as it becomes an experience for others than the one who created it. ~John Dewey, Art as Experience (1934)
Here’s the thing.
Art doesn’t exist in a vacuum.
It is, by its nature, intended to either be performed or displayed for others.
I feel a personal compulsion to create. Writing is cathartic to me, so it is self-rewarding in that respect.
What I write is ultimately intended to be consumed by people who might regard it kindly.
Nothing is for everyone.
Some people enjoy watching various forms of dance.
Some people think the dancers are simply deranged people having a spasm to music.
I do not have a universal audience.
I have a specific audience.
I write nerd stuff for nerd consumers and possibly nerd-adjacent people who simply enjoy a challenging read.
Is my stuff challenging?
I don’t know how you really measure that, but I have layers of meaning and nuances that sneak up on you.
Am I some crafty artisan who sculpts in five dimensions?
Not necessarily.
I try to tie things together that are unobvious.
That way, when you see how seemingly unrelated things converge later, you look back through the threads that are now being braided, you get that little spark of recognition.
If you can tell a tale that is able to be taken at face value and simply follow along, but these little convergences jump up until the coincidence can no longer be dismissed as such…
Hopefully, that counts as art because it’s not for me to say.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, after all.
That’s all for today. See you back on Wednesday for wintry stillness…