The Point Of View

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Title:     The Point Of View
Author: Francis B. Pearson [More Titles by Pearson]

Just why a boy is averse to washing his neck and ears is one of the deep problems of social psychology, and yet the psychologists have veered away from the subject. There must be a reason, and these mind experts ought to be able and willing to find it, so as to relieve the anxiety of the rest of us. It is easy for me to say, with a full-arm gesture, that a boy is of the earth earthy, but that only begs the question, as full-arm gestures are wont to do. Many a boy has shed copious tears as he sat on a bench outside the kitchen door removing, under compulsion, the day's accumulations from his feet as a prerequisite for retiring. He would much prefer to sleep on the floor to escape the foot-washing ordeal. Why, pray, should he wash his feet when he knows full well that tomorrow night will find them in the same condition? Why all the bother and trouble about a little thing like that? Why can't folks let a fellow alone, anyhow? And, besides, he went in swimming this afternoon, and that surely ought to meet all the exactions of capricious parents. He exhibits his feet as an evidence of the virtue of going swimming, for he is arranging the preliminaries for another swimming expedition to-morrow.

I recall very distinctly how strange it seemed that my father could sit there and calmly talk about being a Democrat, or a Republican, or a Baptist, or a Methodist, or about some one's discovering the north pole, or about the President's message when the dog had a rat cornered under the corn-crib and was barking like mad. But, then, parents can't see things in their right relations and proportions. And there sat mother, too, darning stockings, and the dog just stark crazy about that rat. 'Tis enough to make a boy lose faith in parents forevermore. A dog, a rat, and a boy--there's a combination that recks not of the fall of empires or the tottering of thrones. Even chicken-noodles must take second place in such a scheme of world activities. And yet a mother would hold a boy back from the forefront of such an enterprise to wash his neck. Oh, these mothers!

I have read "Adam's Diary," by Mark Twain, in which he tells what events were forward in Eden on Monday, what on Tuesday, and so on throughout the week till he came to Sunday, and his only comment on that day was "Pulled through." In the New England Primer we gather the solemn information that "In Adam's fall, we sinned all." I admit the fact freely, but beg to be permitted to plead extenuating circumstances. Adam could go to church just as he was, but I had to be renovated and, at times, almost parboiled and, in addition to these indignities, had to wear shoes and stockings; and the stockings scratched my legs, and the shoes were too tight. If Adam could barely manage to pull through, just think of me. Besides, Adam didn't have to wear a paper collar that disintegrated and smeared his neck. The more I think of Adam's situation, the more sorry I feel for myself. Why, he could just reach out and pluck some fruit to help him through the services, but I had to walk a mile after church, in those tight shoes, and then wait an hour for dinner. And I was supposed to feel and act religious while I was waiting, but I didn't.

If I could only have gone to church barefoot, with my shirt open at the throat, and with a pocket full of cookies to munch ad lib throughout the services, I am sure that the spiritual uplift would have been greater. The soul of a boy doesn't expand violently when encased in a starched shirt and a paper collar, and these surmounted by a thick coat, with the mercury at ninety-seven in the shade. I think I can trace my religious retardation back to those hungry Sundays, those tight shoes, that warm coat, and those frequent jabs in my ribs when I fain would have slept.

In my childhood there was such a host of people who were pushing and pulling me about in an effort to make me good that, even yet, I shy away from their style of goodness. The wonder is that I have any standing at all in polite and upright society. So many folks said I was bad and naughty, and applied so many other no less approbrious epithets to me that, in time, I came to believe them, and tried somewhat diligently to live up to the reputation they gave me. I recall that one of my aunts came in one day and, seeing me out in the yard most ingloriously tousled, asked my good mother: "Is that your child?" Poor mother! I have often wondered how much travail of spirit it must have cost her to acknowledge me as her very own. One thumb, one great toe, and an ankle were decorated with greasy rags, and I was far from being ornamental. I had been hulling walnuts, too, and my stained hands served to accentuate the human scenery.

This same aunt had three boys of her own, later on, and a more disreputable-looking crew it would be hard to find. I confess that I took a deal of grim satisfaction in their dilapidated ensemble, just for my aunt's benefit, of course. They were fine, wholesome, natural boys in spite of their parentage, and I liked them even while I gloried in their cuts, bruises, and dirt. At that time I was wearing a necktie and had my shoes polished but, even so, I yearned to join with them in their debauch of sand, mud, and general indifference to convention. They are fine, upstanding young chaps now, and of course their mother thinks that her scolding, nagging, and baiting made them so. They know better, but are too kind and considerate to reveal the truth to their mother.

Even yet I have something like admiration for the ingenuity of my elders in conjuring up spooks, hob-goblins, and bugaboos with which to scare me into submission. I conformed, of course, but I never gave them a high grade in veracity. I yielded simply to gain time, for I knew where there was a chipmunk in a hole, and was eager to get to digging him out just as soon as my apparent submission for a brief time had proved my complete regeneration. They used to tell me that children should be seen but not heard, and I knew they wanted to do the talking. I often wonder whether their notion of a good child would have been satisfactorily met if I had suddenly become paralyzed, or ossified, or petrified. In either of these cases I could have been seen but not heard. One day, not long ago, when I felt at peace with all the world and was comfortably free from care, a small, thumb-sucking seven-year-old asked: "How long since the world was born?" After I told him that it was about four thousand years he worked vigorously at his thumb for a time, and then said: "That isn't very long." Then I wished I had said four millions, so as to reduce him to silence, for one doesn't enjoy being routed and put to confusion by a seven-year-old.

After quite a silence he asked again: "What was there before the world was born?" That was an easy one; so I said in a tone of finality: "There wasn't anything." Then I went on with my meditations, thinking I had used the soft pedal effectively. Silence reigned supreme for some minutes, and then was rudely shattered. His thumb flew from his mouth, and he laughed so lustily that he could be heard throughout the house. When his laughter had spent itself somewhat, I asked meekly: "What are you laughing at?" His answer came on the instant, but still punctuated with laughter: "I was laughing to see how funny it was when there wasn't anything." No wonder that folks want children to be seen but not heard. And some folks are scandalized because a chap like that doesn't like to wash his neck and ears.

[The end]
Francis B. Pearson's essay: Point Of View

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