Back to the Homepage10-17-97I'm sure that all of you have noticed that babies are the greatest creatures to ever walk the planet. Whether they are baby people, zebras, sharks, or birds, they have a certain quality about them that makes them so darn lovable. That quality is innocence.
Babies are born without knowledge of death, destruction, plague, emotional hurt, lonliness, and a million other things which are an accepted part of everyone's everyday life. The only things they know are the love and natural bond between it and it's mother. They know the love and care expressed by the mother during pregnancy and miracle of conception. But this, unfortunately, all comes to a crashing end at the precise moment that child enters the known world.
As soon as the baby is exposed to the doctor who is keeping it alive and the tests and measures taken to ensure the well-being of the child, that unquestioned innocence is being violently chipped away at by our "advanced culture and civilization". We allow the child to take it's first breaths in a contaminated environment.
This analogy can be roughly compared to a newly constructed office building. During the construction of the building, it grows taller, larger and better looking as it approaches completion. Upon completion, or birth, it must endure structural integrity testing, natural disaster proofing and a variety of other methods to prove it's ability. This is just a minor chiseling job, but still we chip away. Once the first tenants move in, the real hacking and chiseling begins. They place heavy desks on the flooring, walk back and forth, wearing down the carpet and bowing the floor, cigarette smoke to dye the walls yellow and cause the entire building to reek, spilled coffee and other beverages to ruin the carpet. People do the most damage to things which are not indestructable. It is taken for granted that if one building collapses, build a new one until that one collapses.
But humanity can not be blamed for all of the damage. Mother Nature is one hell of a teacher. It constantly reminds us that there is a balance of good and evil in her domain. Floods that wash away homes and property, earthquakes which level multi-million populus metropolis', volcanoes that bury entire cities, etc... Once a child is exposed to this unalterable lesson for the first time, the imprint which it leaves is one of pain and loss.
If only we could all keep the innocence of the child. If we could hold on to that gift in life that kept us content. If it were possible to hold on to it, the world would truly be a much more beautiful place than it already is. As I already said, nature shows us a balance. For every act of good, there is an act of evil. This is also shown in the laws of physics. Perhaps that is why it is impossible to be innocent forever...