Plague City Is Delightful: Everything Is Possible

A recent bedtime conversation with our older son, age 9:

"They say the universe is endless. Do you think it is? Because if it goes on forever, then all things are possible. They actually exist somewhere out there. A world of dragons. A Minecraft world. Everything we imagine. If the universe goes on forever, then all the things we imagine exist out there somewhere because that's what it means to be infinite. Infinity means that everything we can imagine is not only possible, but real. Somewhere out there."

"Or already existed or will exist. Because if time is infinite too then those worlds could have already happened and ended, or are yet to come."

"So do you think the universe goes on forever?"

"I think there's no way to know. We can't travel fast enough to find out before we'd die of old age. So we just have to accept it's a mystery and we'll never know. Though it is fun to wonder about and feed our imaginations."

"But there might be better technology in the future so we could find out."

"Not during our lifetimes. Someone might learn eventually, but you and I won't have a chance."

"I might. They could invent a way for us to live forever during my lifetime, then I could try to find out. I don't think you have a very good chance, but I might."

He blows me away. He thinks big thoughts like this regularly. He doesn't think the same way most of his peers do, doesn't see things in the same ways as them. It makes it hard for him to connect with peers and make friends. His mom and I were similar, so we understand. It often makes his life a lonely one, which we try to help him with. And, frankly, he has the makings of an evil genius, so we're always doing our best to instill him with kindness and compassion.

Our family recently listened to the audiobook of Charlotte's Web while driving. I've read it before, of course, and have seen the movie somewhat recently, but it was the first time for our two boys (ages 9 & 7). One of the things that struck me this listen was the mechanics of Charlotte's plan to save Wilbur. She says before beginning work that humans are easy to fool, so that's what she's going to do, fool them. When Wilbur is in danger of being slaughtered by the farmer, Charlotte writes messages praising Wilbur such as "Some Pig" and "Terrific" and "Humble" in her web in order to persuade the farmer to let him live.

To use a different parlance, what she really enacts is a successful marketing campaign. She makes big, bold claims about the pig, and the humans believe them. They adopt her language, the very words she writes in her web, and continuously repeat them in their descriptions of Wilbur ever after. She changes their perception of him simply by saying it is so. The story illustrates how our perceptions determine our realities. Once we decide something is so, as far as we are concerned, it is so.

That seems to be a theme of so much I've read lately. We can make the world a better place by changing our perceptions of it. Most importantly, by changing our views of ourselves and each other, of humans. We'll discover our mutual kindness by deciding we are mutual and kind. It seems silly when put in such simple terms, but it keeps coming up in both stories and science. I'm most explicitly thinking of three recent adult nonfiction books:

From last post, The Acme of Evolution, of This View of Life: Completing the Darwinian Revolution by David Sloan Wilson:

In this book, Wilson advocates an “evolutionary worldview,” applying principles from biology to all areas of knowledge. He is intentionally wide-ranging and multidisciplinary, finding examples from not only biology, but also psychology, sociology, education, economics, business, and more—examples of evolution in action—and synthesizes them into one overarching perspective. To paraphrase, evolution is groups working together to improve and grow through trial-and-error learning. From the level of genes and cells, bacteria and simple organisms, scaling up through plants and animals to humans and cultures, the lesson of evolution is “that the primary way to survive and reproduce [is] through teamwork.” . . . 

We need to change our perspective, the lenses through which we see and understand ourselves, to an “evolutionary worldview” that defines humans not as individuals, but, first and foremost, as small group members, shaped by evolution as social organisms who are successful for our cooperation and teamwork more than any other traits.

From You Are a Group Project of Humankind: A Hopeful History by Rutger Bregman:

Bregman believes the main thing wrong with the world is our collective view of human nature. The narrative that controls our government, economic, education, and social institutions is that humans are, at base, selfish and self-centered. So we have created a world based on that expectation. Rules, consequences, incentives and punishments, all meant to control those base instincts, and they've become a self-fulfilling prophecy. We think people are bad so we treat them as they are and they react accordingly.

And Bregman thinks we have it all backwards. His research has led him to conclude that people are instinctively cooperative and social, well-intentioned and compassionate, and most interested in the general well-being of everyone. So he believes that if we could change our outlook and expectations and the way we structure our cooperative ventures in line with that framework, we would act and experience each other much differently.

And, from Telling a Different Story of Work, an earlier book by Bregman, Utopia for Realists: How We Can Build the Ideal World:

Bregman tells this story and many others in the hopes of changing our controlling narratives about work and the role of government. He makes a convincing case that the world now has more aggregate wealth than ever before in history and living conditions are better than they have ever been, and provides plenty of evidence that if we simply found better ways to share--to redistribute--that wealth we would all be better off.

So. Perhaps the best thing we can do is work to build more webs proclaiming each other terrific, as Charlotte does for Wilbur, and we might start to believe it of ourselves and begin to act accordingly.

I think the idea to call Charlotte's plan a "marketing campaign " might have come from another book I read recently: Once Upon a Tim by Stuart Gibbs. A quick description:

Humor based on satirizing medieval fairy tale social structures and the power of expectations and perceptions are at the heart of this fractured quest to save a princess from a dragon(ish beast). The fact that this type of tale has been fractured before doesn't diminish the amusement of this version. It's knowing and witty and fun. I enjoyed it highly.

I noted the first half of this excerpt from the book for sharing because it reminds me of my children; in much of their imaginative play, something is always named the ______ of Doom. I do it too. Gibbs is clever to point out the humor of it. The second half, though, is not only the best instance of a recurring joke that runs through the book, it relies on a bit of insight into human brains:

We were happy too, because we had survived the Forest of Doom.

Now all we had to do was make it over the River of Doom, the Chasm of Doom, and the Mountains of Doom.

"Rats," I said.

"What's wrong?" Belinda asked.

"I was hoping that we'd at least have a brief break before encountering something doom-y," I told her. "Like maybe, the Fields of Joy. Or the Path of Pleasantness. I'd even be all right with a Swamp of Mediocrity."

 . . . 

"Wait, Your Excellency! There's something suspicious about all of this."

"Suspicious?" Ruprecht repeated mockingly. "Nerlim, stop being such a scaredy-cat. Everything here looks perfectly fine!"

"That's what I'm afraid of," Nerlim said. "This is called the River of Doom. Why would it be called the River of Doom if there wasn't any doom?"

"Maybe it was a marketing thing," Ruprecht said. "Like when the Vikings discovered Iceland and Greenland, and Iceland was nice, while Greenland sucked eggs, but the Vikings didn't want anyone else to know that, so they called the icy island Greenland to trick people into going there and called the green island Iceland so that everyone would avoid it. My uncle, King Snodgrass, did the exact same thing. He discovered a beautiful place to build a kingdom, but he didn't want anyone invading him, so he named it Plague City, and now everyone avoids it like, well, the plague."

"Plague City is actually nice?" Nerlim asked, surprised. "I'd heard that place was a cesspit."

"Exactly!" Ruprecht said. "It's all marketing!"

Marketing sways perceptions, and perceptions determine the realities that we experience.

Julie Fogliano is one of my favorite picture book authors. Her latest, I Don't Care, is no disappointment. I love how it demonstrates which human characteristics are worth paying attention to and which don't really matter.

i don't care

by julie fogliano

i really don't care what you think of my hair

or my eyes or my toes or my nose

i really don't care what you think of my boots

or if you don't like my clothes

i don't care if you think that my singing is funny

or whether my frog drawing looks like a bunny

i don't care if you think that

my house is too small

or my feet are too big

or my brother's too tall

i don't care if you think that my lunches smell weird

or if you don't like my dad's giant black beard

i really don't care

what you think about that

i really don't care at all

and i really don't care

what you do with YOUR hair

or your eyes

or your nose

or your toes

i really don't care about what shoes you wear

and i don't care a bit about clothes

i really don't care if your dancing is funny

or if your cow painting looks just like a bunny

i don't care at all if

your house is too tall

or your ears are too big

or your brother's too small

i really don't care if your lunches smell weird

or if you dad has a gigantic black beard

i really don't care

about any of that

i really don't care at all

but i really do care

that you always play fair

and don't change the rules

when i'm winning

and i really do care

that mostly you share

and want to hold hands

when we're spinning

and i care if you wish

and i care if you sing

and i care if you like to lean back when you swing

and i care if you smile

and i care if you're sad

and i care if you're worried

and i care if you're mad

and i care that you like to have picnics with cake

under a tree and down by the lake

and i care that you're careful when you're catching frogs

and i care that you like to pretend that we're dogs

but mostly i care that you're you

and i'm me

and i care that we're us

and i care that we're we

and i care that we're always

and i care that we're two

and i care that we're friends

and i care that we're true

i really do care about all of that stuff

i really do care a lot.

What you focus on--what you care about--impacts what you perceive. And what you perceive . . . 

The art by Molly Idle and Juana Martinez-Neal is excellent as well.

I shared my thoughts about what I focus on about religion in The Details Don't Matter, and just recently ran across a meme on my feed that summarizes those thoughts as well as anything else I can imagine.

In my post, I wrote:

The biggest thing I took away from my seminary experience is that we spend far too much time and energy arguing about details that ultimately distract us from what's important. I studied two thousand years of church history, and what I saw was pointless division and strife that should have been avoided, division caused by people fighting over their personal preferences instead of the underlying message. What should be a teaching of uplift and unity and love becomes one of judgment and labels about who is right and who is wrong. I found I couldn't see myself leading within the confines of any specific church because, ultimately, I don't fully believe in any of the official dogma enough to teach it. (And going outside the confines to start something new is just another divided effort.) I understand why the dogma exists, but I don't believe in it. Even such basic, foundational ideas like Jesus was divine, rose again in the flesh, and saved everyone through his sacrifice; it doesn't really matter to me whether those are literal or merely symbolic ideas. Those are just details we shouldn't get hung up on.

And yet I attend and profess belief. I take my kids and want them to learn. That's because I do believe in the underlying idea of humans and creation being united by a Divinity. And I believe people need community. Churches bring people together, build love and unity, impart morality, and fulfill an essential human need. At the same time, I believe finite, limited humans are only able to grasp such big, mysterious ideas in a filtered way, so they will always, by necessity, be experienced and expressed in grounded, human terms. Read the metaphor at the top of this page, but swap in the word "God."

After passing through the prism, each refraction contains some pure essence of God, but only an incomplete part. We will always experience some aspect of divinity, of the Truth of God, but only from our perspectives as they are colored by who and where we are. Others will know a different color and none will see the whole, complete God. These are my musings from my particular refraction.

That is how I see religion. There is a tension, a paradox, at the heart of each religion that seems to understand this. The story of religion is a repeated cycle of embracing and sharing the light for good, then gradually losing the idea that all light is good and getting stuck fighting about whether blue is better or red or green. Then someone else comes along and says stop nitpicking and get back to trying to understand that it all starts the same before it refracts, embracing and sharing the light for good, then sliding back into the details.

When we split over our differences, we're caring about hair, eyes, toes, noses, and clothes and all the wrong things, the things that don't matter. To those things we must say, "I don't care." Then we can instead care about sharing and caring and finding our things in common. About seeing our value and making us we, we really should care a lot.

I always feel a bit Liberal Arts touchy-feely librarian when I advocate kindness and compassion, knowing some will see me as "out of touch" with "gritty reality," so I love it when something from the business world supports what I advocate. From Farnam Street:

The Stormtrooper Problem: Why Thought Diversity Makes Us Better

Diversity of thought makes us stronger, not weaker. Without diversity, we die off as a species. We can no longer adapt to changes in the environment. We need each other to survive.

Diversity is how we survive as a species. This is a quantifiable fact easily observed in the biological world. From niches to natural selection, diversity is the common theme of success for both the individual and the group. . . . 

We often seem to struggle with diversity of thought. This type of diversity shouldn’t threaten us. It should energize us. It means we have a wider variety of resources to deal with the inevitable challenges we face as a species. . . . 

Diversity is necessary in the workplace to generate creativity and innovation. It’s also necessary to get the job done. . . . 

Any difference can raise this reaction: gender, race, ethnic background, sexual orientation. Often, we hang out with others like us because, let’s face it, communicating is easier with people who are having a similar life experience. And most of us like to feel that we belong. But a sense of belonging should not come at the cost of diversity. . . . 

Success in life, survival on the large scale, has a lot to do with the potential benefits created by the diversity inherent in the reproductive process.

Diversity is what makes us stronger, not weaker. Biologically, without diversity we die off as a species. We can no longer adapt to changes in the environment. This is true of social diversity as well. Without diversity, we have no resources to face the inevitable challenges, no potential for beneficial mutations or breakthroughs that may save us. Yet we continue to have such a hard time with that. We’re still trying to figure out how to live with each other. We’re nowhere near ready for that meteor.

It's good to be different and still get along. It's what makes David Sloan Wilson's "evolutionary worldview" work. We don't need to split into different branches of religion, we just have to perceive everyone as part of the same circle that contains all our diversity and differences, united regardless.

A bit more about our eldest, both his compassion and his evil genius. Anecdotes as first shared on Facebook:

[Older] had the opening lines at his school holiday music concert last night. He decided he wanted to say his welcome in Spanish as well as English, so he found a friend's mom to translate it for him and memorized it too. He made his welcome extra welcoming.

-----

We were trying to get the kids to focus on brushing their teeth this morning so we could leave the house on time. [Older] heard [Younger] coming down the hall and, tooth brush in hand, jumped out and scared him. [Spouse] and I both berated him for the delay.

"But," he defended himself, "you have to admit it was pretty funny."

"Oh, yes," [Spouse] said dryly, somewhat muffled by the toothbrush in her mouth. "My kids are super funny."

"What did you say?" said [Older].

"She said her kids are super funny," I clarified.

"Oh. I thought she said her kids are horrifying."

Hmm. Guilty conscience much?

-----

[Spouse] and I took [Older] shopping today to buy a Christmas gift for [Younger]. On our way to the car, she started briefing him on our approach to keeping it secret.

"It's only okay to lie if you're lying about a gift. If [Younger] asks, we'll all agree to lie and say we didn't get anything today."

We started fine-tuning a bit to get our details straight. Today was just research, etc.

[Older] jumped in, "Can I be the one to lie? I'm really good at lying."

"You are?"

"Yeah. I lie to you all the time and you never figure it out."

-

[Spouse] added as a comment: The irony is that this kiddo can't lie. If he says something questionable, you just look him straight in the face and slightly arch one eyebrow. The truth just comes pouring out of his mouth like a broken dishwasher.

Yeah; we always know, we just don't always openly confront him about it.

Some poetry:

My Dad Is Stupid

by [Older]

My dad is stupid

My dad is stupid

He is dumb.

-

On Saturday, [Older] was wound up, causing trouble, and not listening, so we put him in safe seat to calm down. He refused to calm and kept trying to get up, so we started asking him to mentally solve math problems. He loves solving math problems, and it gave him something to focus on instead of his anger. Soon he calmed down.

His class is working on their first poetry unit at school right now, so when the same thing happened on Sunday I gave him pen and paper and said he couldn't get up until he wrote me a poem. The above is what he produced.

I only wish he hadn't later destroyed it out of guilt, because I love it. It has a great sense of rhythm and structure, even though he told me he was going to write it in free verse when I gave him some suggested forms. He made sure it had a title and said "It's called 'My Dad Is Stupid'" before he read it to me. I was going to keep it folded in my wallet as a keepsake.

-----

[Older] has a wonderful grasp of the complexity and contradictory nature of things. Some selections from his third grade poetry unit.

[Older]

mean, kind, easily angered

brother of [Younger]

lover of cats, jungles, and dragons

who feels mad, sad, and loved

who needs family, love, and a pet

who fears blood, sharks, and death

who believes that people are

hurting the earth,

should build in trees,

and eat healthier

who wants a dog, a sister, and a friend

who says, "hey"

[Surname]

water

powerful, helpful

shaping, providing, destroying

It is very useful

liquid

I love that immediate, seemingly paradoxical description of "providing" next to "destroying." That he sees both are equally true together is the start of wisdom.

Shifting the focus a bit . . . 

So I reported last month (see: Obscure & Inscrutable) that one of the others has created name tags for the three [Degolars] at my workplace (Good, Evil, and Pirate). This morning I ran into Evil [Degolar].

"Hello, Evil One. . . . I have to admit, that feels strange to me. I'm used to my house, where my children treat ME like the evil one."

"As it should be."

"Except it's more in terms of a fantasy story, where I am the Dark Lord to be defeated."

"As long as they believe it."

"Yes, but in children's stories the heroes always win and evil always loses."

-

I added the next day as a comment: Like this morning, for instance. I'm innocently trying to get caught up on dishes. They're playing "ninja school." That apparently involves lots of practice missions sneaking into the kitchen to attack me with their improvised weapons. I've already been killed multiple times today.

-

And:

All good children's stories are the same: young creature breaks rules, has incredible adventure, then returns home with the knowledge that aforementioned rules are there for a reason.

Of course, the actual message to the careful reader is: break rules as often as you can, because who the hell doesn't want to have an adventure?

― Brian K. Vaughan, Saga, Volume 3

-----

We were just driving in the car, the four of us. Out of the blue, [Younger] said, "I spy with my little eye something . . . white."

We guessed for a while, no one getting it. Eventually, we started asking for clues. They included Mom and [Older] can see it, but not Dad. We had to give up in the end, and asked him to tell us.

"Dad's hair."

It wasn't white nine years ago. :-)

I am fond of this quote by George Carlin:

Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

I even owned a t-shirt with it at one time. Of course, the point of this post is that the inverse is true as well. Caring people in large groups have remarkable power, too. The key is to create such groups by learning to perceive each other as so, as kind and caring, cooperative and compassionate.

At the top of this post I shared some nonfiction books that promote the science behind that thought. At this bottom I want to share a fiction story that does a remarkable job of demonstrating those principles in action.

Of The Ogress and the Orphans by Kelly Barnhill:

Social contagion. That's what lies at the heart of this book; that's what this book is about. How thoughts, feelings, attitudes, beliefs, and actions spread from one person to another to another and so on. Trust is contagious; when one person behaves trustingly, others respond in kind and the dynamic spreads. Suspicion is contagious; when one person acts from suspicion, others respond in kind and the dynamic spreads. Everything is contagious, spreading socially through networks of people.

This book is about a town full of people. Like people everywhere, each person is somewhat good and somewhat bad. Which they choose to project and act on, the good or the bad, changes with circumstances. This book tells the story of how the people in this town influence each other to do good and bad things together, to be kind and unkind people in turn. At times, the town is a wonderful community; at others, it is quite horrible.

This book is lovely. And, at times, heartbreaking, sad, frustrating, and suspenseful. Barnhill weaves a magical tale with a timeless, fairy tale quality. Visiting it, even during the difficult periods, is always enchanting. It takes readers away to a special place and returns them, in the end, better equipped to be good neighbors and citizens capable of spreading more goodness through their social connections.

This is a book about an Ogress. An Ogress with no community, who wants to be part of one, who must always avoid the sun, who settles on the outskirts of a human town. It's about a group of orphans who live in a wonderful, loving, sheltered orphan house, surrounded by a town that has fallen on hard times, afraid to trust anyone outside their home's walls. It is about a town that has lost its library, its school, its park, and its sense of trust, friendliness, community, and cohesiveness. It is about the desire to blame. It is about a mayor. A dragon. Groups of crows, sheep, cats, and a dog. A stone that tells stories. Trees that tell stories. It is about stories. And hoarded wealth.

It is about what makes people--and the world--good and bad.

It's a new favorite.

A few excerpts:

He explained that a man in town had been deceiving people. For years, probably. Taking what he should not take and telling people to live with less and less, so as a result the townspeople had begun looking for someone to blame.

-----

We have been told since we were small that the bad people outnumber the good. But I do no believe that is true. We have seen in the Orphan House recently that it only takes some people doing good to encourage many other people to do good. One good person can inspire other people to do good things. Good is not a number. Good is more than that. With good, the more you give, the more you have. It is the best sort of magic.

-----

They came. The cobbler's wife made cookies. She handed one to everyone, whether they wanted it or not. People shared the books they had received. They listened to others share their own books. And they found themselves remembering the Library. Even the people who were too young to remember the Library found themselves remembering. They remembered that a story, in the mind of the reader, is like music. And discussing stories among other minds and other hearts feels like a symphony. They remembered how ideas make their own light, and how words have their own mass and weight and being.

-----

A neighbor exists without condition--if I were to declare that this person is my neighbor and that person is not, then it is I, and not they, who have failed at neighborliness. It is only by claiming all as your neighbors, and behaving as though all are your neighbors, that we become good neighbors ourselves. The act of being a good neighbor must always begin with us.

That's what I selected to include in my review. I noted more than that as I read, though. More follows.

From the short opening chapter:

They were good children, these orphans: studious and hardworking and kind. And they loved one another dearly, ever so much more than they loved themselves.

The Ogress, too, was hardworking and kind and generous. She also loved others more than she loved herself.

This can be a problem, of course. Sometimes.

But it can also be a solution. Let me show you how.

At first I was puzzled by that "let me show you how." It stands out from the rest of the narrative a bit. But, by the end, I realized Barnhill really is trying to demonstrate how these dynamics work. One character tries to convince everyone with logic and facts, and that doesn't work. Other approaches fail as well.

Only the doing of good things for others, with the series of reactions and consequences that follow, causes true change. Reciprocity and passing on of doing good things, which leads to seeing goodness in each other, which leads to sharing stories and learning about each other, which leads to seeing each other as neighbors, as community. It's that combination of kindness and perception, working in tandem, shaping each other in a positive spiral.

I also noted how she mentions that kindness and generosity can be both problems and solutions. In This View of Life, David Sloan Wilson sums up evolution as:

Selfishness beats altruism within groups. Altruistic groups beat selfish groups. Everything else is commentary.

Altruism can allow you to be taken advantage of by the selfish on small scales, but the groups that can manage to achieve altruism together will outlast the groups that decay from the strife of competing selfishness.

That's what happens in this story. A town's members have come to see each other as competition, behave selfishly toward each other, and the town is in the process of dying. Two small enclaves of altruism exist (the ogress and the orphans). They fear their altruism will fall to the selfishness, and they do, in fact, suffer quite a bit of injury and damage before experiencing success. It's only after many failures that they gradually, haltingly figure out how to tap into the town's collective need to survive by helping it's members discover their altruism.

More:

As for dragons in particular, they are as diverse in their dispositions as any other creature. I, myself, have encountered dragons of every personality type--shy, gregarious, lazy, fastidious, self-centered, bighearted, enthusiastic, and brave.

-----

Bartleby's eyes were two starkly different colors. One was hazel with flecks of green and gold, while the other was pale--like the color of skimmed milk spilled across the sky. The hazel eye was able to see tiny details at great distances, but the other eye was only able to see light and shadows. He often said this allowed him to practice seeing things in two separate ways, and to be of at least two minds on most subjects.

"I can see it both ways," he said to Anthea now.

Anthea was instantly annoyed. "This isn't a both ways situation, Bartleby," she said.

"Everything is a both ways situation, Bartleby countered. "All situations contain multitudes."

-----

Curiosity is a powerful state of being--full of possibility. Curiosity doesn't sit still. It moves. It's awfully close to magic.

-----

Even knowledge can be used for wicked purposes. Even understanding can be twisted by those who wish to twist it. Even empathy can be transformed into a weapon.

-----

Bartleby picked up the book, opened it, and started reading aloud.

"What does it mean, then, to call a person Good?" the Philosopher asked the Ill-Tempered Grouse. "How do we know if a person is Good, or Wicked, or simply Indifferent?"

The Grouse scowled at the question. "I question your assumption that one might ask that question at all. A person is Good if they do not steal the eggs of an unsuspecting grouse! A person is Good if they would never consider doing so--and if they lack the capability of doing so. All foxes are capable of stealing my eggs. Therefore, no fox can be Good. If no fox can be Good, if follows that this fox cannot be Good."

"I disagree," the Fox said. "You forget the fallacy of expectations. You expect me to be Wicked, and therefore, in your estimation, I will only ever be Wicked. But if I spend my life doing Good, would it not then mean that I, too, and Good? If not, and if you insist on declaring me Wicked, then you must also accept that the Wicked are capable of Good Deeds, and, conversely, that Wickedness can be committed by the Good. In which case, declaring a person either Wicked or Good is arbitrary. Goodness and Wickedness have no meaning if they are not defined by choices and actions. My friend, you must choose: either your definitions are incorrect, or your expectations are based on an error."

"Meow," the tabby said. Bartleby stared at the cat. The cat had said "meow," but it sounded strangely like "You should take that message to heart and stop worrying whether or not you are a good person. If you wish to be good, do good." Which would be a strange thing for a cat to say.

-----

There was no doubt that the cobbler's wife was doing good, despite her poor listening skills, and expanding on that good. It was remarkable, Anthea thoughts, how it took only one person deciding to do good things, and then convincing others to join in, to create a cascade of good deeds, each one sparking the next. Just think if everyone decided to do good. Just think if everyone decided to do so every day. Or, if not everyone, what if some did, and it still expanded? This was a whole new kind of arithmetic. How long would it take for those good deeds to compound? And what would the town look like then?

I was about halfway through when I realized that Barnhill had a very specific model in mind for the corrupt, selfish, dragon-in-disguise mayor. There were some very explicit moments that seemed pulled from political events in our country of the past six years. The charismatic demagogue hoards all the money, takes advantage of constituents' generosity, and unites them in hatred against outsiders. In this case, against the Ogress--based entirely on stereotypes and propaganda with no bearing on anyone's actual experiences or the truth. The mayor covers the town in signs saying things like "We don't have room for ogres" and "Protect our children, keep ogres out." One even says:

Make our town lovely again

which is a clear reference to president 45's red-hat slogan. Another says the mayor wants to build a wall to keep ogres out. I'm pretty sure in Barnhill's mind this isn't just a philosophical fairy tale, but her attempt at an actual roadmap to help us be better neighbors and more of a community as a country.

To further echo reality, at one point two of the adults are attempting conciliation despite their wildly divergent beliefs. A conspiracy-minded, ogre-hating citizen is decrying the fact that the Ogress has stolen a child from the orphanage. The other adult, the orphanage "dad," tells him that no child has been stolen and that, in fact, the very child he's talking about is standing right next to him in front of the man's eyes. The man insists the dad is lying, that the Ogress did, in fact, steal a child.

"What is the use of truth when people refuse to believe verifiable facts?" asks one of the other children.

And, near the end, when stories are helping the citizens see each other more clearly, the mayor adds signs that say "Books are dangerous" and "Don't believe everything you read" and tries to ban the books.

More quotes:

He explained that a man in town . . . had been deceiving people. For years, probably. Taking what he should not take and telling people to life with less and less, so as a result the townspeople had begun looking for someone to blame.

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We have been told since we were small that the bad people outnumber the good. But I do no believe that is true. We have seen in the Orphan House recently that it only takes some people doing good to encourage many other people to do good. One good person can inspire other people to do good things. Good is not a number. Good is more than that. With good, the more you give, the more you have. It is the best sort of magic.

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I keep thinking about the Library. Everything went wrong when the Library burned. The Library was what held the whole town together. Maybe people have to remember what that felt like.

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They came. The cobbler's wife made cookies. She handed one to everyone, whether they wanted it or not. People shared the books they had received. They listened to others share their own books. And they found themselves remembering the Library. Even the people who were too young to remember the Library found themselves remembering. They remembered that a story, in the mind of the reader, is like music. And discussing stories among other minds and other hearts feels like a symphony. They remembered how ideas make their own light, and how words have their own mass and weight and being.

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A neighbor exists without condition--if I were to declare that this person is my neighbor and that person is not, then it is I, and not they, who have failed at neighborliness. It is only by claiming all as your neighbors, and behaving as though all are your neighbors, that we become good neighbors ourselves. The act of being a good neighbor must always begin with us.

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Public good means that the public is good.

That last is a slogan on a sign that the new mayor, at the end of the book, puts up. But it's also, I think, a helpful truism. You can't muster interest in the public good without believing that the public is good.

One more tie back to last post, The Acme of Evolution. The idea of social circles:

Groups of groups of groups. Small groups are a fundamental unit of human social organization. And circles. In the final excerpt, Wilson talks of "how we define our moral circles," advocating that we ultimately "start regarding the whole earth as the appropriate moral circle."

Just last week, someone gave me--and everyone in our workgroup at the library--a picture book. Here is a bit:

The Circles All Around Us

by Brad Montague

So let us create bigger circles

all around us for the rest of our days.

Let our caring ripple out

in a million little ways.

That simple book advocates making our in-group circle larger and larger until there is no out-group. The Orphans in this book have a strong, loving in-group: their orphanage. That's how they know what a healthy community should feel like. They have a small circle that is very effective as a group. This book tells the story, in part, of how they learn to draw a larger circle to take their in-group to a larger level. At first they don't trust anyone outside of their small circle, but they want to. And by helping the town members find the good in themselves, they make it possible.

One final quote:

Some people are gifted not only in seeing the best in people, but in convincing those people to see the best in themselves.

I don't believe I have that gift, but I do have that intent. It doesn't always come naturally or easily to me, but helping others see the best in themselves is the main thing I try to do as a leader at work, as a parent, as a spouse, and as a friend. It's what I see as the essence of love. It's the most effective way to make the world a better place.