Yesterday I saw a bee land on a Chrysanthemum, and on the other side of the bunch was a fly doing the same. I don’t think either knew the other was there but they buzzed and investigated a stigma the size of their whole body. I thought to myself that would be like people climbing and crawling through a field of 8-foot flowers petals. In just this concrete pot - a fantasy land for eyes the size of peppercorns. (No, I wasn’t on acid or mushrooms, I don’t take any drugs except for 3-4 cups of coffee a day) People fantasize about paradise islands or these beautiful and exotic places that either exist very far away or only in imagination - and if only we were significantly smaller there would be hundreds of these places in our immediate surroundings.
There is a small ivory statue of a woman in my front yard, she stands on a square base that to a mouse or a spider would probably be the equivalent to the Parthenon or Eiffel Tower. She holds a small bowl that fills with water when it rains - a floating shiny white marble swimming pool, overlooking the same Mums where the bee and fly were earlier. Between an endless green canyon where the blades of grass would be like redwoods to the crickets. Someone dumped a bunch of sand at the street corner, maybe the squirrels go to the beach there or the ants refer to it as the Sahara Desert. Our neighbor covered their house in these 4 foot spiders for halloween - and from this perspective, it’s funny we get scared of them when this is how they appear all the time to smaller creatures who have no concept of halloween.
So ultimately, the problem is we are too large. If we were way smaller everywhere would be paradise, this is built-to-scale ugly just for humans by humans. Concrete and metal and plastic and rectangles and chipping paint and neglect and shards of tires and trash line the highways. Cars are all ugly and look the same now, the price for aerodynamics to save 10 cents on gas and maximize on speed in your fucking Hyundai going to a variety of grocery stores all owned by the same parent company. Everywhere looks the same. The same stores, buildings, roads - everywhere. With either no sense of aesthetic or a fake aesthetic that helps you fantasize about somewhere else better while knowing it’s not the real thing. It’s just funny it’s all perspective, to a chipmunk that same cars tire could be a ferris wheel, or a waterpark or a sports complex. The filthy pipes and sewers could be like ancient caverns and catacombs. The trash pile could be a mountain where your family goes for a couple weeks each year to hike and see the hieroglyphics.
On the other side of paradise everywhere for the tiny, and proof of the balance of the universe, is a breeze becomes heavy wind, heavy wind becomes a hurricane, and a hurricane becomes end of the world. People become evil oblivious giants. (Not much different I suppose). An airplane flying overhead is probably like the Independence Day starring Will Smith. One car responsible for nearly daily genocide to beings of a certain stature. The noise is probably unbearable.
And so, the golden rule for keeping your paradise intact as a small being - avoid humans at all cost.
And for humans, to keep fantasizing and realize the majesty all around us, we’re just too large to appreciate it.
