Tent Basket Philosophy

Nothing worth doing is completed in our lifetime;

therefore, we are saved by hope...

Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone;

therefore, we are saved by love.

Reinhold Niebuhr

The tent caterpillars have arrived. Each year, towards the end of April, their gauzy baskets fill the crotches of their favorite trees. By May, they will have dissolved as the masses of caterpillars creep out to devour the leaves of the host tree. As I child, we loved this time of year. To us, the hundreds of striped furry caterpillars were so much fun to catch and put in jars and let crawl over our arms. Come on, I know some of you did that.

While those hungry caterpillars are the bane of gardeners if the host tree is near something they like to eat, it is still a miraculous thing to watch. In our world, there aren't many times we get to see masses of any kind of bug or bird or animal anymore. This little microcosm of abundance has an awe all it's own, for there are gillions of those little creepers when they emerge.

The miracle of metamorphosis has always been revered. Early peoples recognized it as a powerful example in nature of explaining the mysteries of God. The symbolism of a butterfly, emerging from a cocoon after a sluggish prior life as a fat caterpillar is not lost on any of us. Often in our lives, it seems we have our heads down and are totally and completely absorbed as the caterpillar is, by our lives, never pausing to consider that one day we won't be nearly so hungry...

But these lines from Niebuhr are not really concerned about metamorphosis. He is talking about the mystery of human connectedness which nature mirrors for us. In that world things are born to provide for those to come after. It's the same with us. Often we forget that what we do is a result of others prior work, recognized or not; good or bad. Our very existence here is because of our parents before us. What we do or accomplish is not only because of our efforts. It is so easy to believe that our brief time here is close ended; that what we do now is all our legacy will be, when in truth, it is only a short time in a much longer season. That is the miracle of hope. We are only weaving our lives into a much larger life. Everything we do is only a part, not all there is. Our lives spin out in all directions after we are gone, no matter how we lived them. And each strand that touches someone else is taken in turn to be done with as they choose. For me that means all the hurtful things get a chance to become compassion and tenderness; all the anger can become forgiveness, all the fear become comfort and solace. We are all some version of those hungry little crawlers, working, eating, loving, making our lives in anticipation of some great event to come and each and every one of us is needed to make that day arrive. What makes that possible it seems to me, is that great gauzy basket of love from which we come.