“If I had influence with the good angel who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children, I should ask that her gift to each child in the world would be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life as an unfailing antidote against boredom and disenchantments of later…Continue reading The Scarcity of Wonder in our Black-and-White, Know-it-All World
Category: Anthropology
Want to Learn about Community? … Listen to the Trees!
“Trees also understand that slowness is the key to a good life. For humans, at the moment, it feels like life is going faster and faster. This way of living uses up so much energy that the quality of our lives doesn’t get better. We should slow down.” – Peter Wohlleben – My father…Continue reading Want to Learn about Community? … Listen to the Trees!
Reflection on Rites of Passage
“Few of us go through life without taking part in some kind of rite of passage.” – Hank Nuwer – It was the French ethnographer and folklorist, Arnold van Gennep, who first coined the phrase “rites of passage”. It is the ceremonial event that exists in all known historical societies that marks a person’s passage…Continue reading Reflection on Rites of Passage
Confessions of a Bibliophile
“There is no friend as loyal as a book” Ernest Hemingway I am an only child. From time to time people ask whether I missed having brothers or sisters. This is rather a peculiar question. It’s like asking someone who has never tasted eggs whether they miss quiche. In short, no. I did not miss…Continue reading Confessions of a Bibliophile