herding cats
The 5-year-old’s kindergarten class went on a pumpkin patch field trip last week, and I was among the lucky (?) parents chosen to serve as a chaperone for the afternoon. Following a noisy bus ride, noisy presentation on the life cycle of the pumpkin, noisy but informative hayride, noisy trip through the animal barn, noisy pig races, noisy pumpkin selection process, noisy playtime on various structures constructed from an overwhelming quantity of hay, noisy snack time and noisy bus ride home I found myself coming to several conclusions:
1) Elementary school teachers are saints.
2) Kindergarteners are cute, curious and completely exhausting.
3) Noise may well be a property inversely proportional to size.
4) I had a headache.
Sharing these revelations with my mother over the weekend, she commented with the deserving smugness born of years in the trenches, I mean elementary schools, “I’ve always said it’s like herding cats.”
My first reaction was to agree entirely, but the more I think about it, the more I have concluded that Stanley the Outdoor Cat is significantly more tractable. After all, the only measure required to secure Stanley’s total compliance is a hearty shake of the kibble sack, at which point he comes galloping along the Stanley Thru-Way he has carved through our grass with such haste that I generally need to pour the food over his ears and down into the bowl. In fact, outstretched arms and a “want a pet?” is generally enough to lure him into a trot (as long as you don’t mind cat drool… he gets a bit carried away when he’s purring).
That said, of course, I wouldn’t want to be a cat herder, as no two have the same idea about ANYTHING except, perhaps, the virtues of a laser pointer. My larger point is that the minds that make us human also make us infernally hard to control. Stanley is concerned with having his head scratched, avoiding the mean Siamese mix next door, whether his cat-house blanket is dry and doubling his body weight in preparation for winter. Your average kindergartener, on the other hand, wants to know why. Why are we doing things this way? Why can’t we go over there? Why do we need to wait for this? Why does that person, pumpkin or hay pyramid look like that?
The whys are what make us human—and they also make us far more difficult to herd than an animal of any species. As we commemorate the 494th anniversary of the start of the Reformation, I find myself reflecting upon—and celebrating—the God who created us with our senses of reason and the very ability to ask why. Lutherans tend to be comfortable in paradox, comfortable with the need to question and even, at our best, comfortable with doubt. The best impulses of our faith tradition tell us that it is in the questioning and the searching that we encounter God’s Word and promise. We are at our best when we are behaving like those kindergarteners (although I would appreciate indoor voices and a little less hay-throwing, please).
In his infinite and unsearchable wisdom, the God who created us gave us free will. Fortunately, God also gives us tools— the Word made manifest though Scripture, prayer, our own reason and others—so we can spend a lifetime on our journey of whys, secure in the knowledge that where we seek, God will provide. Perplexing? Yes. Challenging? Certainly. Reflective of God’s total understanding of the creatures he’s created? Absolutely.
Why? Oh, look, it’s time to go have our snacks… ask your Father.
1) Elementary school teachers are saints.
2) Kindergarteners are cute, curious and completely exhausting.
3) Noise may well be a property inversely proportional to size.
4) I had a headache.
Sharing these revelations with my mother over the weekend, she commented with the deserving smugness born of years in the trenches, I mean elementary schools, “I’ve always said it’s like herding cats.”
My first reaction was to agree entirely, but the more I think about it, the more I have concluded that Stanley the Outdoor Cat is significantly more tractable. After all, the only measure required to secure Stanley’s total compliance is a hearty shake of the kibble sack, at which point he comes galloping along the Stanley Thru-Way he has carved through our grass with such haste that I generally need to pour the food over his ears and down into the bowl. In fact, outstretched arms and a “want a pet?” is generally enough to lure him into a trot (as long as you don’t mind cat drool… he gets a bit carried away when he’s purring).
That said, of course, I wouldn’t want to be a cat herder, as no two have the same idea about ANYTHING except, perhaps, the virtues of a laser pointer. My larger point is that the minds that make us human also make us infernally hard to control. Stanley is concerned with having his head scratched, avoiding the mean Siamese mix next door, whether his cat-house blanket is dry and doubling his body weight in preparation for winter. Your average kindergartener, on the other hand, wants to know why. Why are we doing things this way? Why can’t we go over there? Why do we need to wait for this? Why does that person, pumpkin or hay pyramid look like that?
The whys are what make us human—and they also make us far more difficult to herd than an animal of any species. As we commemorate the 494th anniversary of the start of the Reformation, I find myself reflecting upon—and celebrating—the God who created us with our senses of reason and the very ability to ask why. Lutherans tend to be comfortable in paradox, comfortable with the need to question and even, at our best, comfortable with doubt. The best impulses of our faith tradition tell us that it is in the questioning and the searching that we encounter God’s Word and promise. We are at our best when we are behaving like those kindergarteners (although I would appreciate indoor voices and a little less hay-throwing, please).
In his infinite and unsearchable wisdom, the God who created us gave us free will. Fortunately, God also gives us tools— the Word made manifest though Scripture, prayer, our own reason and others—so we can spend a lifetime on our journey of whys, secure in the knowledge that where we seek, God will provide. Perplexing? Yes. Challenging? Certainly. Reflective of God’s total understanding of the creatures he’s created? Absolutely.
Why? Oh, look, it’s time to go have our snacks… ask your Father.
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