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 'Loose Talk'
By Benjamin Benedict
Turn, Turn, Turn
On the eave of the New Year, I heard someone say ‘Oh if you do that, you never know what you might turn into.’ And I thought, ‘Well, you never do know, but you are always turning into something, like it or not.’
As I speak, I am the kind of person who believes in personal change, but tomorrow of course that might cease to be true. We inevitably change, and indeed there are occasions where this takes the form of an epiphany. More normally, we slowly change as we go through life.
I am reminded of the expression, ‘a leopard doesn’t change his spots’, and there does seem to be a core to our personality that always remains, but to talk about a person as a rock, solid entity seems to be a sure way of getting them wrong. Ironically, it is often those who are closest, who are guilty of this. They have a detailed picture of who it is that they know and love, and sometimes the image is there for life. Often the object of their affection ends up playing the part handed to them, although they are no longer anything like that.
Such are the misunderstandings that playwrights feast on. Their stories can end up with the revelation of a new world, but are just as likely to find a person unable to grasp what is now around them.
As we journey into 2008, perhaps the greatest thing we could wish for is to see ourselves as others see us and for them to see how in fact we are. It would take the gift of telepathy to make such a thing come true, and we would have to hope that if such a wish was granted, it would be selective as there are many things about us which are simply not fit for the consumption of others; well not as we presently are at any rate.
But ‘never say never’. I am sure that our tolerance of each other can grow if we can at least think of ourselves as people who over the course of time are inclined to change. The mobility of our character and beliefs is what has kept us moving forward on this great adventure. Without it, we have no chance.
This last Spring, I watched a pair of swans nesting. Yesterday, the cygnet, now some nine months old landed on that same pond by itself. Even two months ago the parents wouldn’t let it out of their sight, now they are who knows where. Nature knows how to move on and we must to.
Here’s to ‘Them Changes’. Let’s make the most of them and not think that we know anyone so well that there is not more to be discovered.
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