Allow me to take inventory now that we have traveled so far. We have observed that childhood and adulthood are opposed when viewed as temporal phenomena. A person of thirty is no longer a child in the sense that he has become too much, had too many opportunities to be considered a child. Yet, if we reflect upon ourselves we noted that childhood and adulthood are less definitively related. Neither memories nor dreams entail compatibility or opposition between being a child and being an adult. In this light, childhood and adulthood behave like qualitative states of being. Qualities are always more elusive than quantities and their definitions tend to be suspect. Much thought needs to be exerted to distinguish qualities. One never knows them for certain, but rather gets a taste for them.
Being obligated to meditate further on aging as a quality, let us try to differentiate further. What are some of the commonplace understandings of our subject? A child is ignorant, prone to self-gratification, and free from responsibility. An adult is rational, prone to self-sacrifice, and burdened by duties. Children are dreamers. Adults are realists. A child will cry when he does not get his way. An adult has learned to control his emotions in disagreeable circumstances. Children are clumsy. Adults are careful. A child is helpless. An adult is autonomous. A child needs help even to go to sleep. An adult can go to sleep on her own.
Is there no common ground amongst the prejudices? Why is it that when we looked at a given man's life we saw subtle transitions but when we consider conventional wisdom all we see are contrasts once more? Could it be that conventional wisdom is propounded by adults, a party interested in its own image?
From our list, it appears that childhood is inferior to adulthood. What could a child have that is superior to her older counterpart? I must interject and suggest that the child has a great gift in innocence. The pride in adults thinks it is better to be credited than to be blameless. They (and I with them) need to admit that it is always better to be blameless than to be blamed and often better to be blameless than to be credited.
To be innocent, one must not have done something. Children are innocent for at least two reasons: (1) they do not do the same sort of things adults do and (2) they do not know as much as adults do. With increased autonomy comes greater trust--trust in personal and professional relationships. Children, being largely dependent, are saved from the opportunity to do wrong. With increased autonomy comes greater awareness--awareness of morals and mortals (i.e., one's contemporaries). Children, being largely dependent, are saved from the knowledge of doing wrong. It is the childishness of children, so frequently used to disparage adults, that allows them to be so innocent. It is the maturity of adults, so frequently used to commend children, that allows them to be so often guilty.
Childhood has its weaknesses and dangers. Conventional wisdom speaks to those. It is a different sort of dangerous to get older though, and yet we must get older.
These hands that type were once too small and confusedly operated to communicate through words. God willing, they will someday be too contorted and perhaps confusedly operated to communicate through words again. I pass through this process. We all do. Yet, the hands remain our own and the same. How are they the same? In a distant way, like the first prototypes of technologies relate to today's state of the art? Or intimately like an old pine floor with a new coat of wax on it?
When a baby is displeased, is crying and unsettled, a loving parent takes her up into her arms. She walks with her child, dips her shoulders, and rhythmically rocks her. The baby is lulled by the expectations of the movement and their certain fulfillment. Now the move to the left; now the move to the right. If need be, she whispers sweet shushes and reaffirms serenity with words. The baby knows both only by their calming affect. Now the baby sleeps and the parent is pleased. Finally, the struggling child rests. But--what if the child wanted food? What if the child had soiled herself? What if she was pained by the onset of a fever? The benign, dreamy face masks the original problem.
Can an adult be lulled to sleep? I concede that he or she is often unsettled and would be well-pleased by a lullaby, but it is impossible. An adult is too sophisticated, too self-conscious, to be tricked by the gentle whispers of nonsense. A man or woman cannot easily be taken up into the arms of a loving parent. The cause of distress if far more complex, weighty, and intransigent--in a word, far more adult.
What about alternatives? Is there no way to rock an adult to sleep in a metaphorical way? Have they absolutely outgrown being coddled, or could there be a more sophisticated form? Is there now a different sort of rocking device--a surrogate parent?
A common experience among people transitioning from dependence to independence is persistent doubt. A person develops, matures, grows, physically and mentally, but not without restriction. Diet, gravity, and self-awareness all hinder the process of growth. A young man or women is frequently riddled by self-doubt. An undercurrent surges beneath the placid surface. Is this a good way to make a living? Is this what I was meant to do? Where am I going? An adult is bound to tear up and kick if they reflect much longer on this uncertain state. Somewhere they know there are needs going unmet, but it would be so difficult to meet them. It would be much easier to be distracted. Now our young man or woman wants to be put to sleep, in the disarmed reality of unconsciousness.
Give a person a routine, and he will be calmed. He has his definition; he knows the floor he is at. He thinks of himself as a worker. There is a position on his identification badge that fixes him in place. The rhythm of adulthood mollifies him. A morning cup of coffee is his new pacifier. The bumps along the commute provide the rocking motion. Now the acceleration to gain access to the needed lane; now the deceleration to abide by the traffic light's command. Discomfort slinks back. What is now and pressing upon him is the cold but tight embrace of worldly responsibility. Those questions, which still lack answers, are displaced. The goals are immediate: pack a lunch, check the messages, file the papers, write the letter, clean the area. They are easily completed. Oh grace of grace--how they replenish! The world marches on and the inbox fills and refills. There is no time to consider discomfort--there is work to be done. All the while, the potential elevator drops.
Is there anything more dangerous for an adult than to be lulled when he needs to be awake? It is a state that precipitates a crash.
If a gentle woman were to come upon the worker who is at rest while being so active, addressed him by name, and asked whether he was awake--what would the man answer? "What a silly question--if I could answer, I must be awake. I am surely awake for I can tell you as much." She would then ask the follow up question: who is it that answers thus--the worker or the man? Now she has cornered him. He would pause and furrow his brow. "It has been so long since I recognized the difference, but you ask an apt question. For long ago, when I began this routine--I told myself, "This is what a person must do in an age like ours. I will take up this routine and take up the designation of worker, but it will not be me. No, I will keep myself neatly tucked away. I am tired and distressed. I will let my self rest and the worker in me will take over. I will return upon retirement and be full of energy and ready to address what ails me. Now here I am, frail and tucked in my sheets, and you have awoken me though I thought I was already awake. I was rocked to sleep and lost consciousness of my self in the process. Where is the worker now? Oh dreadful thought--that I was him this whole time!"
The gentle woman would pat him on the head, smooth over his disheveled curls, and explain to him that a person can never really be free from his self. Integrity describes a person's life even if he tries to disintegrate because a person is always the same book even when the chapter changes. The hand grows, but it remains at bottom the same hand.
Now those unanswered questions are free to return. Now he feels anxious. Now the tears begin to well. Woe to him whose elevator of actuality door opens at such a moment!
It would be so easy, so secure, if we could simply be content in being adults. Surely membership in such a group demands respect, both from self and others. Alas, it is not so easy. It is a dangerous group to be a part of.
--
Our analysis is far from complete. Books could be written on the subject and still the qualitative difference would remain as vague. Qualities are indiscrete, making the study of them at once frustrating and rewarding.
We have made many observations that the audience is free to remember or forget. From within thought, we may peer into growth's essence. We see a process of becoming. Growth is at once an automatic and perilous process. It is automatic like the progression of time; it is perilous like the firing of clay. From within life, we see growth in its existence. We reflect on our selves changing and remaining the same. We recall the centrality of ideals concerning a person's development.
Childhood is not devoid of value nor is adulthood abundant in it. How the two stages are related is neither inscrutable nor obvious. If given time, a child will become an adult. Attention is required along the way lest the child become something less laudable than the ideal of maturity suggests.
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