ANT-HROPOLOGY
start at the end of the road
you’ll have no lessons to take
no comparisons to make
Two ants, whilst wandering through our house, upon a slender golden thread, with nothing better to do…
They followed the thread to a partly opened door. At first, they saw nothing in the total darkness of the room in front of them but, as they looked again, something amazing happened. The thread began to illuminate. Waves of golden lights began to emanate from the thread and a golden glow circled their heads. Their shock turned into fear as the sun coloured circle turned to sound, and spoke.
“I am the thread of all knowledge and truth. I am true wealth, power and love. That which is all, and all is within me. I am capable of restoring life to the dead and of taking life from you all. I am the possibility of all good, the holder of all bad. I am that which denies, defies and confuses. I tempt you with infinity minus one. I hide true infinity behind a grain of sand. I offer you gold or nothing and give you the choice. If you follow my path to the one true end you may drink from the Fountain of Truth and eat from the Tree of Knowledge, in the gardens of paradise.”
The two ants stepped closer, peeped through the circle of gold, and saw silver stars shining in the shadowed room ahead. Without consultation the insects stepped forward in search of the Promised Land. They climbed onto the thread and walked, orderly at first, into the mysterious room. The golden circle of sound disolved and, one by one, so as not to notice, the stars faded away. The ants were happy, confident and determined – they would find the gold. To walk on the thread and make progress seemed much easier than they had anticipated. They were able to drive themselves on with thoughts of wealth, power and respect. The stars continued to disappear.
Diamonds, rubies, castles and kingdoms were foremost in the minds of the ants. So many stars had now been extinguished that the room was almost totally dark. The ants had forgotten the golden voice, the promise and conditions, they thought only of personal gain. It was now pitch black, the thread was no longer a slender silk but a fluffy wool that clouded the ant’s vision and even deadened their taste. The wool was not flat on the ground like the thread but rolled into a confusing and complex ball. The ants were too involved in their quest to notice the complexity. Their hindered sight and taste was put down to tiredness and natural causes. They had long since forgotten the ring, the voice, the promise but, as they became wearier, more blinded and seemingly no nearer to the fulfillment of their quest, they began to wonder if there was a more meaningful purpose to their struggle.
They saw diamonds in the dew that fell on the wool but it would evaporate before they reached that place. One moment they would follow the rolled wool down and the next moment up. They had actually realised that they were in a ball because one or two other ants, moving in circles, had joined the search. They were unable to agree however, whether at any one point in time, they were the right way up or upside down. Some ants had realised that it was not necessary to walk single file on the one part of the cylindrical yarn. No-one seemed to know if they were the right way up. There was nothing to stop them using all 360° of the thread. Then they realised that they could step from one stretch of the wool to another, making huge short cuts. Of course, it did not occur to them that such shortcuts in the heart of a ball of wool is just as likely to take one several thousand ant steps backwards, as it is to be a shorter route. In any case there would be no guarantee that the chosen direction was the correct one.
There were now many more ants and because of their progress so far they were heading in all directions, at all angles to the level plain on which the golden thread was first trodden. They had a complete lack of understanding.
One or two extremely intelligent and sincere ants would occasionally stop and attract a wide audience to which it would preach ideals from long lost legends. For example one individual spoke of a Golden Man who built the thread and gave it magical powers so that if an ant seeks reclusion, and just waits patiently, he will be rewarded by everlasting life. Another story came from an ant who said that to love all ants and the wool itself would result in the dissolution of the tangle revealing heaven beneath.
Large groups of ants followed the two so-called prophets who, by this bestowment of respect and adoration, seemed to be receiving at least some of the forgotten promises. Other prophets rose to power, some genuine, others intriguers and rogues. The majority of all the ants in the ball followed one leader or another and because of the various directions and methods of short cutting to the gold, there came much strife and fighting between the various groups. As time rolled by even the original prophecies were forgotten or changed to suit the current feeling of the masses.
Ants are able to secrete an acid and this caustic substance was, amongst other things, responsible for the disintegration of the wool itself. It was no longer a single ball of wool but a crippled tangle of broken ends. Even if an ant was to remember that the thread was the target he would no longer be able to say if he had found the one true end.
The power afforded to the leaders, who were no longer just prophets but politicians, industrialists and criminals, and the promises given to the followers, subjects or proletarians were the only considerations in the minds of the ants and they were just happy if they were allowed to live in peace. In this oblivious state most of the ants found happiness. Some of them, however, posed certain questions…
“Why does the Golden Man allow war and crime?”
“What is the real purpose of existence?”
Some of them asked themselves, “Is there not something in this world of ours that we have overlooked?”
There were some bolder ants who said, “The answers are within yourselves.” Or, “The futility of our existence is held within our false concepts of time and space”, or “Our downfall is to trade friendship for love and to think that we have gained on the deal”.
The happy ants (those who never thought of questions) had mixed feelings towards such ants. It ranged from sympathy to hatred, from fear to fascination. Some of the questioners were made famous because of their literature, they became happy, rich and forgot all about their questions.
The tangled ball of broken wool is now rather overcrowded. There are still wars and problems. No questioner has found the right question and even so there would be no one to answer.
The majority of ants are happy and they believe that they will remain that way. They may be right, as long as the ball stays intact.
there is no question to seek
no climb to the peak
We are there as we were before
the truth was with the ants at the door
***
