French Lessons
Occasionally the river floods these places. “Floods” is the word they use, but in fact it is not flooding; it is remembering. Remembering where it used to be. All water has a perfect memory and is forever trying to get back to where it was. Writers are like that: remembering where we were, that valley we ran through, what the banks were like, the light that was there and the route back to our original place. It is emotional memory — what the nerves and the skin remember as well as how it appeared. And a rush of imagination is our “flooding.”
–Toni Morrison
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If we consider the overly simplified current argument between opening up to save the economy, or continuing to distance in order to save lives, wisdom stories can help reveal how what we really need is not a false courage or lies that obscure what the true dangers are. What we need is more wisdom about how to do both things, keeping ourselves healthy and safe, while also finding wise and honest ways to return to the work and activity of society. Unfortunately, the most common way to deal with a persistent dilemma tends to be to dissociate from the issue by turning away or turning to the outer world of daily activity.
Many methods for opening intelligently and possibly wisely have already appeared in various places around the world. On a deeper level, the real issue involves whether we…
