On The Gold Coast: Writing Class
In her latest column Judith Wallis speculates on the meaning of truth. Does she find an answer? Read on..;.
Have you watched a dog whose master stands before him holding a favourite ball? The dog’s whole body is alert, his ears are pricked, and his eyes never leave the ball.
When the ball is thrown smart confident dogs will leap up catching the ball in full flight. They know how to do it. Some dogs enjoy the chase, the retrieving and the return of the ball. Others race off full of enthusiasm only to lose the ball in bushes. They search in endless circles retracing their steps over and over finding nothing.
This month’s topic in our writing group, An’ Ain’t That The Truth, left me feeling like the dog that lost the ball.
I did try a prissy little tale of girls proving to a doubting grandfather that girls really can do anything. (An’ ain’t that the truth?) Such a story seemed too easy.
I decided the topic required deeper insight. ‘What is truth anyway?’ I asked myself. To me the sky is blue yet scientists tell us that blue sky is an illusion.
After days of rumination my only conclusion was that it seems easier to disprove than to prove a possible truth. I asked a friend, ‘What is truth, how do you see truth?’
He stirred his tea slowly, nodded his head wisely and said, ‘Truth is forever fleeting, held in place by a belief of what is in the moment?’
Oh Yeah?
As a young mother I took my sixteen-month-old daughter to lunch at a milkbar. You remember milkbars, the high-backed wooden seats and formica tables each with a mini juke box?
My daughter requested a jam doughnut and managed, in the way toddlers do, to spread the jam over most of her face and hands. Clutching a glass of milk, she turned her attention to the people passing our booth on their way to the shop counter.
A stern faced businessman paused in the queue alongside my daughter. ‘Daddy,’ she squealed, and, spilling the milk across the table, latched herself onto the man’s trouser leg.
Smearing blobs of strawberry jam onto his immaculate suit, she wound her small arms and legs about the stranger. The more he tried to release her limpet-like grip, the tighter she clung to him. ‘I love Daddy,’ she declared to the smiling faces around her.
In that moment my daughter truly believed she was hugging her Daddy and howled her protest as I finally prised her off the man. Ignoring my apologies he glowered at us both and pushed his way out of the shop.
Was I embarrassed? Yes.
Am I any clearer in my mind about what constitutes truth? No.
I know believing something does not make it true, that a great many ‘facts’ are assumptions and. . .
Oh, help. I am still like the dog hunting in the bushes for the lost ball.
Am I disappointed in my month’s effort to search out what is truth? Yes. An’ ain’t that the truth!
