|
The human eye is the only organ which is full size at birth, which is why a baby's eyes seem so large. They follow you with curiosity and interest, sometimes with amusement but never with fear. A baby learns to fear and is at birth, guileless. A baby's eyes are like dog eyes, trusting and hopeful. A dog's eyes will follow his master across the room without anger or prejudice, without a notion of future or worry, without judgment. A dog's love is unconditional and complete. To a dog, you are heaven and Earth, and all of the universe he or she knows. You are the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end. As the saying goes, Be the person your dog thinks you are. Babies are like dogs in that way. They love, they trust, they don't know enough of the world to judge or fear or hate. Every day is a new experience, a new adventure. The world is new. Babies are always curious, reaching, tasting, touching. Each experience builds in the aggregate to form the person. But as tabula rasas, so much of what they become is formed in those early, fearless, trusting days. We grow, we learn, we change. The world is not the place we thought it was and worse, we find we are not the people we hoped to be. But babies don't know that yet. "Such a little guy," the doorman said to me so many years ago as we hauled the baby carrier, the blankets, the bottles and toys into the hotel lobby. "Don't even know what the world is all about yet." I looked down at the bundled mass of formless person and still remember those eyes; The eyes of a child. Reflected in them is a pure, unashamed hope, a belief that life is fair and men are good. A hope that their life will contribute the reservoir of human experience, if only in a small way. In those eyes are the endless possibilities, the boundless and wholly unrealistic dreams; and above all else, the joy of life and discovery. It is only later that the eyes reflect fear, anxiety and comprehension that the world can at once be a wonderful and horrible place. But not now. For now the eyes search and scour, and peer deeply into the world into which they have been thrust. Large eyes don't last. The river of time sweeps us past those precious moments too fast. The large eyes become a memory and like so many, blurs and fades to the soft gray past. Like so much of life that is not appreciated during the experience and cherished in recollection, those large soft eyes stare unfocused into an indeterminate future now revealed but then unknowable. And I now know but didn't then that in those eyes lie all the treasures of heaven. |
