Dear Nestlings,
Last week, while most of you had pink eye, and the rest of you had to tend everyone who had pink eye, I went to a museum. To be honest, it wasn’t my “favorite museum ever,” but there’s one particular piece I want to tell you about. This piece was in the back-most corner of the museum, and at first glance looked to be a miniature of a gothic cathedral. Once I’d moved closer, it became clear the metal sculpture was made entirely out of bullet and gun fragments.
As I thought about the piece—as one does at a museum—I concocted my own reasoning behind the work. I found it significant that the bones of a spine had been placed inside the cathedral. I found it significant that crucifixes adorned the spires. I thought perhaps the piece spoke about the spinelessness our nation seems to have, when it comes to dealing with guns. I found comfort in Christ, and his eventual ability to heal our weaknesses both individually and collectively. Then, I decided to listen to the audio tour available for the piece and learned that the artist felt entirely different about the work’s meaning. (I wish I could link the audio tour here, but that is beyond my current abilities.)
This difference in meaning between myself and the artist should not have been surprising. After all, this is what people do in life. We create meaning from experience and we all do it very differently from each other. Then we wonder why everything is so confusing. I am currently reading, along with 87 other books—a la Bonni Mergenthaler—the nonfiction work An Immense World, by Ed Yong.
I’ve only got through the introduction of this book so far, and to sum it up in one terrible sentence: it tells the story of how each organism on the planet sees the world differently than the others. It makes the point that since perception depends so much on our senses, we each actually live in our own distinct world that others (both creatures and people) can only begin to imagine. It also makes the point that each perceived world is valid and real to the organism experiencing it. (Okay, I’ll sum it up in three sentences.) All of this to say that Ed Yong might back me up when I tell him my perceived meaning of the “Gun Cathedral”—even if it does turn out to be significantly different from the meaning intended by the artist.
Let me share another “difference in meaning,” this one my favorite, and this one the point of this essay entirely. (Did you think I’d got to my point yet, with all this endless babbling? You were obviously wrong!)
Years ago, I ran across a piece of art taken from a larger stained glass exhibit called the Roots of Humanity, created by Holdman Studios. The particular panel I became enamored with was fittingly titled “Love” and stood at the center of the exhibit:
To me, this window holds several meanings. In it, I see my Heavenly Mother, nurturing the children she’s created and looking down over us with love and interest. In it, I see my Heavenly Father, kneeling in the dirt and teaching His children how to tend and care over our own worlds. In it, I see my Savior, lifting each of us from our infirmities through the work of His atonement. In it, I see Mother Eve, partaking of the fruit, and giving us all an opportunity for our own experience on Earth. One of my greatest attachments to this piece of art is its complete encapsulation of all the wonderful beings who made this mortal world of learning and growth a possibility for the rest of us. I love that I can look at this single panel, and see everything I believe in one, unblinking glance.
Not surprisingly, when I went online to learn more about the piece, I discovered that the artists did not have the same analysis for the art as I’d created. While the central figure was identified as Mother Earth, the other “characters” were not associated with the backstories I’d assigned them and were even engaged in different tasks than I had thought. Initially, I felt somewhat disappointed. I’d thought someone had finally understood my perception of the world (and eternity!) and then made it clear. And now it turned out they’d been thinking something entirely different…
Alas!
But here’s the good part: while I had been fairly certain I understood why Heavenly Mother was pictured the way she was, along with Heavenly Father and the Savior, I had been slightly more puzzled about Eve. I could see clearly (ha!) that she was reaching to a tree and plucking fruit, but I wanted to know more about her. In the explanation given online, the artists explained this figure in the following way:
To the right of Mother Earth, a young girl holds out an origami crane that she has made. This hearkens to the Japanese legend embraced by Sadako Sasaki that if one took the time and energy to fold 1,000 paper cranes, they were entitled to a “wish” or to special healing. This young woman is offering her efforts for the healing of the planet itself.
What I had been so certain was fruit, plucked from a tree, was in fact a folded paper crane, meant for healing…
So, what was the meaning of this?
And the meaning of this, OBVIOUSLY, was both!
After all, as illustrated in my earlier essay, I am a BOTH kind of girl. I find it illuminating and strengthening when something can mean two (or three) things, all of them wildly different, and all at the same time. So, yes, to me the figure represented Eve, reaching out for the fruit, bringing us our experience on this planet. But now, after listening to another person’s meaning, it also represented Eve, holding aloft her paper cranes and joining her efforts with those of the Savior when it comes to making this world right again. My understanding of Eve—less Pandora opening a box, and more Japanese cranes of healing—was suddenly manifest. My opportunity to see the perception of another allowed me to find more meaning and understanding in a piece I loved.
So, I guess I’m saying the same thing here, again, as I said last time I wrote. I guess that’s what Moms do: say the same things over and over again. But while I really wanted to share my understanding of that window with you all, so you would know why it’s the home screen on my phone, instead of a photograph of our family, I also wanted to give you this:
I will tell you in these essays what I think, what I feel, what I perceive. You may not always agree with me. You may point to the fruit and inform me—with good reason—that it’s actually a crane. But I hope you’ll also fold my meaning into yours, and let me fold your meaning into mine. We’ll be better at the end of it.
Of that I’m certain.
Love,
Mom
Beautiful.