Felling Trees

[Guest guest]

>From "All I Really Need To Know I Learned In Kindergarten, by Robert

Fulghum. " This cute anecdote reminds me how important words are .

 

I remember the wisdom of the three gates every word needs to pass

through " Is it true ? Is it necessary ? Is it kind ? " - JAI MAA

 

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In the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific some villagers practice

a unique form of logging. If a tree is too large to be felled with

an ax, the natives cut it down by yelling at it. (Can't lay my hands

on the article, but I swear I read it.) Woodsmen with special powers

creep up on a tree just at dawn and suddenly scream at it at the top

of their lungs. They continue this for thirty days. The tree dies

and falls over. The theory is that the hollering kills the spirit of

the tree. According to the villagers, it always works.

 

Ah, those poor nave innocents. Such quaintly charming habits of the

jungle. Screaming at trees, indeed. How primitive. Too bad thay

don't have the advantages of modern technology and the scientific

mind.

 

Me? I yell at my wife. And yell at the telephone and the lawn mower.

And yell at the TV and the newspaper and my children. I've been

known to shake my fist and yell at the sky at times.

 

Man next door yells at his car a lot. And this summer I heard him

yell at a stepladder for most of an afternoon. We modern, urban,

educated folks yell at traffic and umpires and bills and banks and

machines--especially machines. Machines and relatives get most of

the yelling.

 

Don't know what good it does. Machines and things just sit there.

Even kicking doesn't always help. As for people, well, the Solomon

Islanders may have a point. Yelling at living things does tend to

kill the spirit in them. Sticks and stones may break our bones, but

words will break our hearts....

 

 

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