Black Soles

I spent last night craning my neck to get a glimpse of a documentary being projected onto a worn piece of cloth.  The small auditorium was packed and I couldn’t resist responding ‘when the fire starts’ to the person ahead of me who asked when they would stop letting people in.  Thankfully, the only fires that started last night were those of hopeful aspiration, kindled by the passion of the subject of the film.

We were all gathered to watch one of our own: a woman who adopted Tanzania, and later the world as her home – Jane Goodall.  

Jane’s Journey traces the life story of Jane Goodall and how she transformed from a famous field biologist to an infamous conservationist, with a mission to take her message around the globe.  If you can imagine, at 77 she travels 300 days a year to relay the urgency of protecting the natural world and inspire hope that the youth of the world can and will meet the challenge.  I recommend you find and watch this film.

After the documentary, Ms. Goodall took the stage and for a moment the small room was filled with snapping shutters and flashes of light as everyone raced to capture the moment.  Some impassioned remarks, fervent applause and a few more pictures later, the floor opened to questions. 

There were a number of young students from the international school in the audience.  Immediately the room filled with the laughter and self-assured voices of twelve year olds who were not going to miss their opportunity to talk to Jane.  Among my favourite questions: ‘do chimps like vegetables?’

The concrete floor was hard (the perils of running late) and as I shifted I caught a glimpse of the feet of the eight year old perched in front of me.  They were black.  I stole a glimpse at the soles of my own – grey.  Those of the man next to me? Slightly less so.  All of us had dirty feet.

A digression from paying attention to one of the most famous scientists of our time? Maybe.  But since then I’ve been trying to work out what was so striking about this to me.  There’s a saying about not being afraid to get your hands dirty. But you can get your hands dirty making a cake or with ink from your pen.  In contrast, when your feet are dirty, it’s almost guaranteed to be because you have made contact with the earth.  Our feet root us to the world and when they are dirty, they scream ‘I’ve been there!’  It’s a beautiful thing.  As Theoreau said: “Think of our life in nature, — daily to be shown matter, to come in contact with it, — rocks, trees, wind on our cheeks! The solid earth! the actual world! ...Contact! Contact!’  Sure, the blackened soles of Dar es Salaam aren’t likely to be from a day of hiking in the wild but they are a daily testimony that nature is inescapable.

In my opinion, this is the essence of what Jane is trying to preserve for the next generation: a chance for contact with the natural world – in our own back yards as much as in the opportunity to explore the pristine jungles and star filled skies of her youth.  The truth - that you don’t have to live in a jungle (urban or otherwise) to make efforts to be at peace in the world and work to sustain it – is inspiring.