My work, however, brings me to another aspect of elderhood. For the past few years I have been taking middle school classes of students into urban parks here in San Francisco, both to learn about nature and to engage in restoration of natural areas. Most of the students, whose ages range from pre- to early adolescence, seem to appreciate my being older. I have found that the African-American and Asian youth with whom I work predominantly still have a familial background that appreciates elders--aunts, uncles, grandfathers, and grandmothers often live at home with them. It is only rarely that I encounter being shouted at "Hey, you old coot!" as I walk past a group of anonymous students gathered in some schoolyard.
Preparation for this work with students also brings up another aspect of elderhood, that of the human study and observation of wild animals and plants. In my readings of the relationship of past cultures with the animal and plant world, especially in the works of Paul Shepard, it seems obvious that the development of human culture was dependent on mirroring the presence of flora and fauna. The undulating movement of cattails on the edge of a lake in a windstorm suggests human dance; the standing still of the great blue heron with poised beak is a lesson in spear fishing. Within the span of evolutionary life, the human species is a Johnny-come-lately, whose unique development of a sophisticated communication system known as spoken language carries with it definitive traits of stages of animal and plant life: "she blossomed into womanhood," or "he outfoxed those who were pursuing him." On any crowded street corner, amidst the bored adults waiting for buses, observe the small child studying the movement of pigeons, then perhaps his or her mimicking their awkward walk. Through the genealogy of species, humans learned much early on from their "elder" species.
In my experience of working with youth in order to familiarize (in the sense of making one part of family) them with the natural world, I have found the structure of ritual vital to introducing them to the teaching of animals and plants as elders. The ritual I most often turn to is the Council of All Beings, whereby boys and girls first observe and learn about the plants and animals in their neighborhood, then make masks of the life forms each chooses for herself or himself, and finally meets "in council," taking on the persona of the flora and fauna selected by each student. Instructions for what to say in this ritual are kept to a minimum, emphasis given to what each plant or animal present has to offer to the world as a unique gift. For example, a student representing an ant might speak of this creature's ability to carry an object many times heavier than the ant's body weight, thereby expressing a valued lesson to small children: how diminished size is no barrier to strength.
The format for the Council was created by Joanna Macy and John Seed, environmental activists working out of the deep ecology tradition. It also has implications for the bioregional movement, which focuses on enlarging the human sense of "community" by providing humans with a ritual context for knowing the various animal and plant species found in one's natural region. In my own work with students and teachers learning about the natural areas found in urban parks, I am constantly amazed how little they know about the flora and fauna that make urban parks their habitat. Often, this lack of familiarity on the part of young people takes the form of phobia, particularly when it comes to students encountering insect life. Much of this phobia, I suspect, comes from watching sensationalized movies and TV fare of the horror or science fiction genre, which reflects a long American- European-rooted cultural tradition of casting Nature as the "enemy" to be vanquished.
Our young people, particularly those living in highly industrialized urban centers, have lost contact with living nature, except what comes through to them on TV and in the movies, a celluloid replica of the real thing. For the Native American youth, living in nature meant being surrounded by teachers, by "Elders," whose form, whether cattail or coyote, told a story embellished by narrative. One of my favorite Native American stories, told often to my students in the park, is the one about coyote coming upon a bunch of cattails in a pond waving in the breeze. Not one to pass up the opportunity to dance, coyote begins to strut his stuff in unison with the movements of the cattails. As time passes, coyote's strength begins to flag, while that of the host of cattails remains unchanged. At last coyote collapses while the cattails dance on. The lesson is that in community there is a vast reservoir of strength, just as there is in the rhizomatous network of roots binding one cattail to another.
What nature has to teach humans, as elder to youth, given the evolutionary time span in which nature has created the human species, is that there is a much wider community of life than normally attributed to the word. The place of the elders in that community belongs to the myriad species of life that surrounds the human one. One etymological root of the word human is "humus," as of the earth, but also as of humility--knowing our place in the evolutionary birthing of life. As one coming to terms with my own elderhood in human life, I find myself more and more speaking on behalf of my fellow elders, the tall trees, the wavy grasses, and the birds in flight. It is their magic I want to impart to the city kids I teach in parks. A magic that is truly elder to any born of merely human kind.
David Graves lives in San Francisco where he runs a program called Kids in Parks. He also is an avid naturalist in his neighborhood. His comments on watching mockingbirds found a place in the Summer/Fall 1999 edition of Talking Leaves.
©2000 Talking Leaves
Spring/Summer 2000
Volume 10, Number 1
Listening to Elders and Children