A matter of perspective

Seems I am using this blog to talk a lot about the old folks. Well, that is what is happening in my life. Lots of old lady and lots of old man. Other things are going on but they are private.

On Saturday I brought the old folks to the movies to see Earth. I know they didn't particularly want to see it but I did. I told them that they agreed to see it after seeing the previews when I told them I was looking forward to it. The old man usually says things like "Nature? You've seen one tree, you've seen them all." But he was engaged during the film. He loved the baby polar bears. He loved the dance of mating birds. The old lady liked it too.

It is so important to see the wider world. It gets even more important as their lives get so circumscribed by physical limits. Everyone needs perspective. Otherwise the little dramas that take place within our walls become too big and our of proportion. The old lady has some pretty barrettes that she has misplaced. They have become a big issue in her life, as well as running low on vitamins. But watching elephants cross the Kalahari to find water, to see lions drink at the same place, to see birds by the hundred thousand migrate takes one out of ones self. The old lady was especially touched by the cranes that had to make it over the Himalayas. They would work so hard and sometimes have to turn back, only to try another day.

For myself, I did not truly understand the plight of the polar bears. I did not understand about the melting ice sheet and how polar bears starve when they cannot hunt seals on the ice sheet. I figured that there was plenty of snow, plenty of glaciers, what was the big problem? Well the problem is that the ocean is warming and melting their hunting platform. It still takes many months in the den to raise the cubs and weeks to get to the ocean, but if the ice is already melting, the seals are gone. Oh my.

This film, Earth, is an edited version of the twelve hour set we gave Betty for Christmas. They don't really show the true brutality of life for the hunted and the hunter. It was cleaned up for the G rating. I am glad we went the first week because Disney donated a tree for every ticket sold. I know they are still just tiny saplings only a few inches high, but if the rabbits don't eat them, maybe there will be some new forests in a few years. The old man was quite concerned when he saw all the little children in the audience, but they, like everyone else were quiet and enjoyed the majesty, and sometimes humor, of all that was shown.