December 7, 2003
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An Admirable Life
Yesterday I took my grandchildren (12 and 7) to see the Wild Champanzees film at the local Omnimax (and by the way, if you’ve never been to a Imax film, you gotta try it – it’s like being inside a three-dimensional movie). My 7-year-old granddaughter has been talking for some time now about growing up to work with animals, particularly saving them from abuse. The film was old footage of a young graceful Jane Goodall tramping around alone in the jungle, reaching out to touch the finger of a baby chimp (FiFi), discovering that these particular chimps could use a tool to get food, and having to leave this paradise to fundraise in order to preserve it, and then current film of a woman in her upper 60′s making a return visit, seeing that same baby chimp now 42 years later the eldest inhabitant of the tiny preserve, talking with the present staff who are still studying, walking alone again in the jungle. What struck me most, as I watched my granddaughter’s eyes widen and her smile react, was how seldom one sees such a single-minded life journey – from the young woman sent to study a species she had never even seen before to a world-famous researcher, looking just like the young girl except for some very fine wrinkles all over the same sweet face. Most of us blunder around, banging into roadblocks, surmounting others, changing course, crashing, recovering, sometimes seemingly ending up behind where we started. It’s nice to know there are a few who find their purpose early on and stick it out straight through to the end. What gifts they give us.
Deep Thought:Too bad you can’t just grab a tree by the very tiptop and bend it clear over the ground and then let her fly, because I bet you’d be amazed at all the stuff that comes flying out.Today I am grateful for: Libraries
Comments (2)
I really love Jane Goodall and I admire her too. I think it’s rare though for most people to know what they want to do with their lives and still be doing it years later.
My husband said there was an IMAX somewhere about the rainforest. I want to go, but the closest one is an hour and a half away.
Jane Goodall is a wonderful woman. I know her life quest is single and simple from the outside, but I’ll bet it’s much more complicated and “normal” from her perspective. maybe I prefer not to get enough perspective on my own wasted life. it’s likely that i’d be just too overwhelmed to deal with it. It’s my hope, however, that somehow, even in meandering, we make differences, large and small. Think of the gift you gave your beautiful grand daughter, sharing Jane’s life with her!