Tag Archives: Students

Mice and Elephants

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An old Indian Guru once told me, when words and their meanings were not important to me, to remember a particular statement he had made, even if I remembered nothing from all of his flowing words of the afternoon.  It is easy to remember, as I can still repeat verbatim in all accuracy, even now, twenty years later.

“Speak like mice and learn like elephants.”  The meaning is also obvious enough.  The advantage of mice is their ability to be quick and quite piercingly loud, while elephants have their bulk in muscle which keeps them from falling over.  Lucky for us, elephants tend not to be violent, otherwise, we’d all be mashed potatoes.

At the time this was said to me, I was only concentrating on school and trying to get high enough marks to be allowed into the next grade.  And, I can tell you, unfortunately, I did not get into the next grade.  But that actually is a different story than this one.  I saw the meaning to be meant for those who were failing (or not making the grade), since it was instructional.  I am always in habit, because I have always made the grade, in one way or the other.  So, I saw all the others sitting around me in the auditorium to be the intended recipients of the free advice on making the grade.

The Indian Guru, actually explained in great detail.  It is known that elephants eat a tonne of food and water every week.  They are social and travel and live in packs.  They rear their young in families, within the larger pack that they live and travel with.  They pass their wisdom down to their young through experience and living.  Elephants are never on the endangered species list, and are not in danger of being extinct.

Well, what of mice?  They are rodents.  Very dirty rodents who live in filth and dirt and eat scraps of food that have dropped from mouths and plates.  They carry disease that is easily passed from mouse to mouse to other rodents, and if they are in your house, they will pass life endangering diseases like the Hanta Virus on to the human beings in the house.  They have their offspring in litters of up to six at once.  Only the quickness of a cat can catch the speedy mice, as they are able to hunt them out of their holes.

So, why should we try to speak like mice?  What redeeming quality would we be displaying if and when we speak like mice?  They live and act like they are in wartime situations, fighting for scarce food and only doing, eating, and squeaking for self-perseverance.  They know how to stay alive.  By using the sparse food supply and their ability to find life like lawyers are able to find life in a death sentence, they stay alive… and for us, we win the argument.  We are able to defend those values, and those things, that are important to us.  We will have our pack of elephants to travel with, thanks to our ability to be there.

So, what did I think and do with this Indian Guru’s words of wisdom that I did not consider or care about more than twenty years ago?  I thought his wisdom was out of date, from too long ago.  None of the situations that he spoke about actually applied to me at any of the times that I thought of myself in.  And, thus, my evaluation of his talk:  Only those who were not making the grade to get into the next class needed it.

Now, I am a little more circumspect.  Words have more meaning than just the meaning listed in the dictionary.  I surprised myself just the other day.  I did a college students’ favorite get-drunk-pastime:  I listed all the similar words I knew existed for “Molestation.”  Then, I looked up the dictionary definition.  None of the words were synonyms and none of the words were actually accurate of my understanding of the situation of “Molestation.”  How different this world is from that world I was in when I had access to great talks given by experts and Gurus of all kinds!  I am in wonder how I was actually able to learn anything at all!

There was a time when I considered the Oxford Dictionary of the English Language my bible.  It was the only way through which I could understand the world, and any of the articles and books that I was reading.  Now, if I were to rely on this staid and steadfast bible, I would become very lost as to what people are talking about.  I remember wisdom and I remember blessings, and I remember stories.  None of these things relies on the dictionary.  they all rely on life.  So, as the weather gets warmer, and you are looking for something to do…  Go wild one day this summer… Sit by the dock and get drunk for the afternoon and see how many words you can think of that have the same meaning!

Secret World of Educational Societies

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“I want to see you pull yourself out of that bag!”  When my friend said this, I wanted to punch him as hard as I could in his upper right arm.  We had started the evening, close to dinner, and we had got off transit and were now walking towards Hart House.  It was an exciting evening for me, and I was imagining what it was going to be, being impressed by what it all was.

I had been carrying a big bag…  Big enough for my friends to continually call it “Elissa‘s Suitcase,” …for close to a year at that time.  I was also always digging in it to find all the little things that get lost in big bags–keys, lipstick, hand creme, mirrors, day timers, and the odd Novel that I happened to be studying.  There were also essentials that came and went, like umbrellas, extra totes, phone, transit tokens, and concert tickets.

On this particular night, we were going to “hang out” at the Hart House Graduate’s Lounge. A Jazz Band affiliated with the University’s Music Program were performing.  Friends of friends, and our friends, heard of the concert and we were all invited to go and sample the quality of the music.  Anything that is good and new, and that would make a student look smarter or richer always got my attention.  And, often, my financial support as well. So, with this mood and atmosphere, we were walking through the late spring evening chill, the night sky reaching into twilight.

When we get to the stone steps leading into the Victorian era stone building, kept warm by radiators and fireplaces, when the windows that swing open are shut, and we get into the line-up that has formed from the inside and is beginning to spill onto the stone steps.  Everyone in the line-up are our age….  Young adults….  Who have a certain type of sophistication.  That, that says, French beret on head of long hair, in leather and pants, and dark glasses (only glasses, if we don’t own those shades), even if, in North America, it is closer to being in a long shirt over leggings with hobo bag matching that cute leather jacket.  So, we fit in.  And we were excited.

The tickets to the concert were considered cheap….  Any concert any student could get into could cost over a hundred dollars…  buying not only an evening with the band, but an evening with proper acoustics, access to alcohol, and the chance to be milling with large groups of people who think like you.  So, we were thinking that having everything we could want, and paying less than fifty dollars for it was a true, “Score!”  We loved it, even before it had started!

We were excited!  We were not in line for very long.  We stood and move by inches for about five or ten minutes.  And, having our tickets checked by the ushers, we followed the sound and scent of people towards the lounge.  Once inside, there were bar stools, regular tables, and room for standers.  The lounge felt different than a regular bar because we were surrounded by wood, a heightened ceiling, and stone at intervals as well as at the fireplace. There were painted portraits of past deans and presidents.  And, I would’ve swore, the scent, alternating, of weed and vanilla cigarillos!

We preferred to sit on the bar stools, at tall, round bar tables.  It was difficult to spot, but the bar was against the wall  where we came in through the door.  My friend suggested he get us both each a beer, and I agreed.  I started rummaging in my big bag, and my friend, yet again, said in his sarcastic, derogatory tone…  “I want to see you get yourself out of that bag!”

“Oh…  You be quiet…!  And go and do your job!  It’s one beer for you and one beer for me!”  as I told him loudly, my bag fell, upside down, spilling everything of mine inside the bag on the sticky wooden slat floor.  It was my world with its secrets revealed  My things of importance, my things of worth, and all of it was getting dirty and getting dirty stares in a public drinking house.

I felt as if some random stranger had reached up my skirt and felt me up.  I felt dirty, and the situation disgusted me.  But my friend was nice.  He immediately came to his knees and began to help me pick up everything and put it back inside the bag.  As he stood up with the filled bag in hand, he said to me, “You have the best bag!  Love it!”

I wanted to say something derogatory to him…  But I didn’t.  He should know how to treat a girl who is his friend.  Betrayal is not a way to treat someone.

The rest of the evening was not bad at all.  We stayed the night and my friend was nice.  We still liked each other, and that was important….  I did not regret anything that happened.  The warmth and safety of where we were and who we were is what has kept this memory for me.  I think we will forever always be friends!  Whether or not I still have my big bag!