He does have a book on ants. It doesn’t have the rich color illustrations of a glossy $15 book or the gee-whiz facts that are supposed to catch the attention of kids raised on a high-energy diet of “Sesame Street.” But to him it is just as good. In his eve. it has perfect illustrations and contains the essential information that a 6-year-old naturalist needs to understand ants.
On the book’s cover is an accurate drawing of an ant. The ant’s head has elbowed antennae; the body has three segments, with the legs attached to the thorax as they should be in any insect. My son has learned what ants look like. The first page says, “Ants live in holes.” with a picture of branching tunnels leading tinder the ground. More drawings and explanations continue on the following pages: “You can look at ants in line”; “You can lift up rocks then you will see ants”; “You can collect ants.” A giant ant is pictured within a circle: “You can look at ants with a magnifying glass.” “If the ant’s home gets all messed up they can make another one,” reads a page. It’s followed by “The queen ant can fly” on a page graced by a drawing of an ant with wings. The book closes with the acute observation “Ants from other colonies attack them.”
Jaroh’s work, based on personal knowledge, is in the grand tradition of Western science. Like a child’s version of Darwin’s “Voyage of the Beagle,” it brings his small years of experience with ants into a nice little treatise, proportionally as important as any tome written by naturalists of the past or today. His insights did not come from television or from books. He learned by sitting on the ground and watching. Going beyond what he’s been told he has connected with other living creatures–allowing him to write an entire book. It’s more than I’ve ever done.
Now it’s not necessary to observe the ants in our neighborhood. We can watch the ants of Borneo, Costa Rica or Africa on cable TV, with narration by experts who provide everything we need to know. Exotic ants scuttle across the screen exhibiting a fascinating array of behaviors–much more glamorous than our own ordinary sidewalk critters. We can see close-ups of these erotica doing intriguing things inside their nests. There’s the excitement in instant-replay mode, the ant equivalent of hitting home runs. Someone else has done all the ant watching for us, editing out the hours of boring “inaction,” so we can enjoy the ants entertaining us on schedule. We have the narrator’s assurance that the segment is eye-catching and basic to understanding ants. Nature is digested and regurgitated in a way that’s suited to our fast-paced life. Gone is any sense of scale: space and time are adjusted to fit the screen.
I’m not faulting the documentaries. They are fascinating, but the shows move faster than nature does. Jaron has reminded me it takes time and patience to observe an animal’s stride and cadence. Dian Fossey watched the gorillas of Rwanda for years. Jane Goodall has long observed Africa’s Gombe chimpanzees. They are a part of her. She speaks of them with passion and consummate understanding forged by years of vigilance, letting them teach her at their pace and rhythms. We can read about the apes from Goodall’s book. We glimpse their social organization and feeding behavior, their parenting skills and the daily factors in their existence. But we don’t know them, as Jane Goodall does.
Once, while working in the desert, I was stuck waiting for nearly six hours for a friend to pick me up. It was one of the most delightful waits I’ve had because my entire time was spent looking at a lizard that shared a rock near mine. I got to know that lizard in a way that is hard to describe. It warmed itself through the cool morning, shifting its position with the changing angle of the sun. I saw it scurry, up and down, looking for food or hiding from dangers I could not see. Mostly it sat there for something to come along. The strong memory remains of how familiar and important that lizard became. I formed a relationship with an untamed creature (and I’m not keen on lizards) that I valued long after my ride came.
Nintendo teaches my children to hurry to the next level. Videos and cartoons are set up with intense crisis situations that are often completely resolved in two hours. I worry about what my sons are learning of life–the connections they’re making, or rather the ones they are not. My children’s favorite food is immediate and instant. The knowledge that a cow has something to do with their fast-food burger is forgotten. The connection between the land and the meat on the table is not there. When I mention the burger’s beginnings, they give me that “get real, Dad” look. It’s not that they don’t believe it came from a cow. It’s just not relevant.
When I was growing up, I watched my grandfather raise rabbits and vegetables on a patch of land in rural Utah. He sold them to supplement his income from working for a grocery store. He kept bees that supplied honey, showing us both the connection between the time elapsed and the sweetness that the bees offered. Comparing my four kids’ childhood with my own, I get seared for them.
Jaron’s book has let me see that all’s not lost. He’s busy assessing things, forming links that I’m missing because I don’t have the time. I hope he continues to get to know ants even better, and that he’ll be an ant watcher all his life, whatever his occupation.
Next time a colony of these wondrous animals invades your kitchen, don’t reach for the Raid. Take a few minutes, turn off the TV and watch. You might be the better for it.
