LOTUS EATING

Evening Star, Issue 21636, 3 February 1934, Page 2

LOTUS EATING

[Written by Mary Scott, for the ‘ Evening Star.’] A poor life this if, full of care, We have no time to stand and stare. I have always agreed with Mr Davies; have always thought that that was what a holiday was lor—to stand and stare. When one leads a reluctantly busy life in an inland town, the call of the sea becomes maddeningly insistent at times. Every year 1 become listless and discontented until I get within sight and smell of it. Once there, I am like the old woman in ‘ Punch ’: “ Sometimes I sits and thinks, and sometimes I just sits.” At last I have time to stand and stare. But this year I have improved upon Mr Davies’s advice. I have lain and stared. To a tired body and. a contemplative mind it is even more soothing; in fact, I spent long hours wondering why cows ever chow the cud in an upright position. To lie upon a hilltop and gaze down upon a still blue sea, or up at a kind blue sky, is sheer heaven after a year’s hard work. One’s appreciation is sharpened by months of hurried glancing at garden trees, of furtive upward looks at a small patch of very distant sky seen through an opening in roofs, endless roofs. Here there is nothing between me and the sea —save, of course, my own laziness; nothing between mo and the sky. save the limitations of the flesh. Every year I mean to do great things —to think out that problem that has been worrying me, to write those letters that have been haunting me, to patch those garments that have been gaping at me. Every year Ido none of these things. I know myself well enough by now to smile as I pack my work box and ray fountain pen. I wouldn’t leave them behind for worlds. One’s enjoyment is immensely sharpened by the ' knowledge that they are there, hopefully waiting. Moreover, if I didn’t take them, who knows but I might really want to write letters or sew? Inconceivable, my family says—but it is better to be upon the safe side.

Lying lazily and staring, now upwards, now downwards, with equal joy, I have given many contemplative hours to wondering why mankind must toil so hard when, after all, the sum of its spinning is so pitifully small. There is, for example, the matter of house pride —a subject upon which my family contends that I cannot possibly write, because I know nothing of it. As 1 climb into my sleeping bag at night 1 reflect with immense satisfaction that I have around me all the necessities of life, and that no precious moment of the day lias been wasted upon house work. Of course, we have had to eat, but what food more fit for the gods than fresh-caught fish baked in a campoven, and potatoes roasted in the fire? What tea has half the fragrance of that made in a billy, of water freshdrawn from a hillside spring and touched ever so lightly with the sweet sharpness of wood smoke? With such meat and drink man may surely live contentedly—particularly if he has no knowledge of vitamins. And yet three-quarters of mankind spends itself daily to provide food and comfort for the other quarter. And the end of it all? A life of luxury gives no bliss greater than mine upon my hilltop by the sea; the epicure’s table holds no dainties more choice than my fresh-caught fish and billy tea, for he brings to it an oppetite that has long been jaded; the millionaire sleeps no better in his carved and priceless bedstead than I in my sleeping bag upon the sand. And afterwards? A nameless grave upon the hillside, or a marble slab in a crowded city cemetery—will Heaven prove any brighter for the difference? But these are holiday thoughts. With the end of this thrice blessed month work begins relentlessly. We have been told often enough in our school days that we shall return all the more eagerly to our books at the end of a good holiday. What a dreary old lie it was, one of those false and idiotic sentiments upon which youth is supposed to batten. In middle years we know that it is not so. We are allowed to admit it then, to speak of “collarpride ” and wear a sad face for the first week in harness. Common sense assures us that the holiday has done us good, that we shall work all the better for it the rest of the year, that we return fresh-armoured for the battle. But we don’t pretend to enjoy the return, and who wants commonsense when they are young? Nevertheless, life could not be all holiday and lotus eating. So at least we have been trained through many generations to believe. We accept work and struggle as poor human destiny, inexorably ours ever since Adam’s ignominious expulsion from Eden. Having been thus bred to toil, it is natural that we should not remain indefinitely happy without it, for idleness breeds discontent in hearts long inured to struggle. Wo hear with wonder and scorn of an occasional falling-out from the battle; a man of brilliant promise has unaccountably failed to fulfil that promise. More, he has deliberately turned from the burden and heat of the day, from the strife and the crown that might so easily have been his, and has chosen to lead his own life in poverty, obscurity, and freedom. Moreover, the wretch has enjoyed it. He has not even deteriorated in the process. He may have lost the glitter of life, the joy of success, the charm of the world!s praise; but he leaves us with an un-

comfortable feeling that he has won something more valuable. We speak with a sneer of the simple life, but we know so little of it that we may be jeering at that_ simplicity that approaches the sublime. Primitive people still go their easy, lotus-eating way. I have watched the Maoris in the neighbouring pa with interest and a little envy during this holiday. They are not ashamed to be idle. It has not been bred in them for many centuries that inertia is a shame and a sin. It is simply natural to them, although a few generations of pakeha influence have taught them to hide their idleness at times. They have learnt to tolerate their white friends’ curious preference for aimless work and foolish cleanliness. But the influence of all this strenuousness is very skindeep ; in his heart the Maori knows it to be a “ dam’-fool ” business. If you have enough to eat and a blanket to cover you, what more is necessary I- 1 True, it is well sometimes to look ahead as far as the next winter and plant potatoes to provide against the hleack months when fish is scarce and cold breeds a mighty hunger. But why trouble further than that? Man is but mortal, and who can tell what next vear may bring forth? It is a happy if a fatalistic creed, but it is not necessarily a mad one. Let ns examine our own achievements, our world progress, our infinite wisdom ; has all our striving brought only this? Such were my lazy and subversive thoughts as I lay upon the beach. They wore but holiday thoughts and a holiday creed, for use only for one month in the strenuous twelve. They do no harm ; why not withdraw ourselves once a year from a world of work and of struggle and dream? It gives a better sense of proportion occasionally to weigh in the balance our striving and our attainment. And when the month is over? Why, then we become earnest again, struggle once more upon the dusty, up-hill road. But Iho month’s creed will help ns not to worry so much about the high exchange or next winter’s fashions.