Learning Robot
I have never had any difficulty in learning. I am blessed with a very good memory and have always had a passion for helping others to understand. When I was fifteen I used to go to a place called Silver City. It was a home for the intellectually handicapped on the outskirts of town.
I was a pretty good sportsman and I loved to share what I knew. I was asked to teach some of the ‘boys’ (they ranged from teenagers to middle aged men) table tennis. I had been playing A grade in the local competition since I was thirteen.
I particularly remember this one little fellow. I would show him how to grip and swing the bat. We would go through the actions about fifty times without the ball. When I thought he had some grasp of it I would go to the other end of the table and bounce a ball to him.
His hand eye co-ordination was so poor he would miss it. Then he would smash the bat across the end of the table and then blame me for his failure. I learnt some important lessons during this extremely frustrating time.
I became grateful for my capacity to learn. I learnt to be patient with those things in life I could do nothing about and, I began to develop the first faint traces of compassion. I am grateful to that young handicapped person for showing me so much of life.
Learning
Learning is not chance of fate
but arranged by the great
educators of the West
Who state their way must be the best.
The best for who, you may well plead,
for many children cannot read
and as for knowledge, music, art,
they are completely in the dark.
Do we worship science so
that we let our language go
to slang, or even worse, to jargon
the sum of which is no bargain
for those of us who only seek
a language all of us can speak
and when spoken we all can
be understood by any man.
