OPINION | MIKE MASTERSON: A lot of nothing


Editor's note: Mike Masterson is taking the day off. The original version of this column was published July 8, 2008.

The more suns that rise and set in my life, the deeper my resignation that I know virtually nothing.

It's strange how as teenagers we brim with our perceived specialness, so arrogantly certain of everything. Yet, as the ol' clock keeps on ticking, the more most of us realize in maturity that we never really knew much of anything after all--and still don't.

This revelation was driven home yet again while rocking side-by-side at dusk with my sister Gaye on a cabin patio overlooking the White River at Gaston's Resort. There is no better escape I've found than this tranquil place below Bull Shoals Dam just as the sun is setting and the fog is rising across the icy, clear stream.

Our conversation ranged from childhood with our now-deceased parents to our grown children and grandchildren. For a while we just rocked, watched and listened in silence as herons squawked into their rookery across the river. Then we began disclosing everything we don't know that is constantly unfolding all around us.

The freshly mowed green field between us and the river suddenly had come alive with the magic of 1,000 blinking fireflies floating on the breeze chilled by all that frigid water.

"So where the heck do they all go in the daytime?" I asked. She shrugged. "I don't know. I've never thought about that."

We guessed they must hide beneath leaves or in the bark of trees. Then we finally agreed to our ignorance.

"Do you suppose all their blinks mean anything?" she asked. "Just look at the way they constantly go off and on."

I sat--creak, creak, creak--rocking and pondering for a few seconds.

"You know, I think it must have something to do with lightning bug romance," I guessed. "They must be signaling each other, because it's sure not meant for our enchantment, despite what Disney would have us believe."

She nodded in agreement. On we rocked as darkness fell.

Then it was her turn.

"Look at all those insects already swarming around that light down by the water. Why do bugs go to a light at night? I mean, what is it about a light that makes them seek it out? Why aren't they satisfied just being in the dark when night comes?"

I started to say because they could see better in the light, but decided to forgo that frail attempt at humor in favor of maintaining the inquiring moment of ignorance we were creating.

"Must be something chemical. I also don't know how so many dead bugs wind up inside closed light fixtures."

A large black-and-blue butterfly had spent a long while visiting flowers in a nearby bush as the sun had been setting. I wanted to know what a butterfly found in a flower that a honeybee and hummingbird and bumblebee didn't.

"You suppose, sister, that they are all after the same whatever it is that exists in those flowers, or is each after a different something for each of them?"

The rockers continued to sway as she thought. "I dunno, beats me," she finally responded. "Maybe they're all just made to be pollinators."

"Funny how much we don't know after living over a century between us," I said. "I mean, we each have spent a lot of years living and working outside and it's pretty clear we still don't know beans about what we are looking at out here, do we?"

"OK, here's one for you," she said. "Why does that fog rising from the river right now lie out there in those neat nearly separated layers rather than forming into just one big gray mass?"

She was right. The fog was hovering in layers separated by several inches.

"Wow, why haven't I ever noticed that in all this time? It's probably not the breezes, because they would blow it all together. It must have something to do with the temperature variations above that icy water. But, hey, I don't know."

By now, it was all but dark. We had earlier watched a chipmunk scurry eight feet up a tree trunk to a feeder attached to a massive hardwood, then back down again after a cheek full of dinner.

"I never knew chipmunks could climb trees, did you?" I asked.

"Nope, that's the first time I've seen that, too," she said. "I thought they lived on the ground and stayed there, like under fallen logs and inside them. That little booger went up and down that tree like it was all his. But I never see chipmunks playing in trees."

As we finally rose to head inside, I glanced down and spied an enormous black ant illuminated by the porch light. He was scurrying alone along the patio. Before I could open my mouth, Gaye said, "With no brain or GPS, how does that little guy know where he is or how to get back home? How does he even know where he is right now?"

I stared at that busy ant for what seemed like a long while. He sure did act like he had some kind of intentions or a plan. Then I looked up and said I was tired of feeling dumber than an ant and wanted to go inside where I could slacken my jaw and drool a while watching some mindless TV.

One family can own up to only so much ignorance in a single evening.


Mike Masterson is a longtime Arkansas journalist, was editor of three Arkansas dailies and headed the master's journalism program at Ohio State University. Email him at [email protected].


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