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Sunday journal

Tall tales, life lessons

By TOM VALEO
Published April 3, 2005

One day, when my daughter was 7, she peered into my face and asked, "How did you get that hole in your head?"

She was pointing at my forehead, where I have a pore that's slightly larger than normal.

"I don't know," I said. "One day I looked in the mirror and there it was. I don't know what happened."

Out of the corner of my eye I could see my 4-year-old son listening intently. "That's not what you told me," he shouted with great indignation.

"What did I tell you?"

"You told me you were living in the jungle," he began, his words rushing in a torrent, "and Indians lived there, and they ate people, and they blew arrows out of sticks, and the arrows had poison on them, and - and one day you were walking in the jungle and they blew an arrow at you, and it stuck in your forehead, and you pulled it out real fast so the poison wouldn't kill you, and then you ran, and they chased you, and . . ."

Oh yeah, the Jivaro Indian story. How could I forget that one? I visited South America just after I got out of college and traveled by boat down the Amazon River, where a passenger told me about the Jivaro head hunters who lived in the jungle and hunted with blow guns containing poison-tipped arrows. I mentioned the Jivaro to my son one day, and when I saw that look of wide-eyed amazement on his face, I couldn't resist. I embellished the story a bit. Clearly, it made a lasting impression on him.

Yes, I used to lie to my kids. I would make up fantastic tales, and their obvious fascination inspired me to make up more. For example, while driving to visit their grandparents one day, we passed a power plant with two smokestacks belching great gobs of fluffy, white smoke. "What's that?" my oldest daughter asked.

"That's the cloud factory," I answered. "That's where all the clouds in the sky come from."

She was satisfied with my answer and said nothing more. I was tempted to confess that I was kidding, but then I imagined her, at the age of 12 or so, hanging out with some friends, or better yet, sitting in science class. The subject of clouds would come up, and my daughter would announce, with great authority, "Clouds come from a factory in Kenosha, Wisconsin." As soon as she heard the words come out of her mouth she would stop and think, "Wait a minute. . . ." Then, she would recognize that her old man had tricked her again.

I felt a little guilty about lying to her like that, but as I watch my kids grow into adults, I'm starting to think my tall tales actually taught them a valuable lesson. They learned that even the most authoritative, trusted source of information they had ever known (that would be me) could be wildly, absurdly wrong. On top of that, they learned that if they ever let their skepticism relax, they can be easily fooled by a tall tale told with confidence, and a straight face.

In short, I think I succeeded in teaching them the perils of uncritical belief. My oldest daughter, who did indeed figure out all on her own that clouds don't come from a factory, has become fiercely political. She is outraged by how easily people are deceived by misleading politicians, and she is devoted to the principles of freedom of speech and freedom of choice.

My younger daughter, while in college, chose to study anthropology, which examines how people cling to belief systems that may seem utterly arbitrary and bizarre to others. Now she understands that reality is open to interpretation, and this insight seems to make her more willing to take a second look at her own cherished beliefs. My son, still in college, has been studying world religions. Although he doesn't adhere to any one of them, he's fascinated by the sheer diversity of belief. The only religion that holds any personal appeal for him is Buddhism, which maintains that we live in a state of illusion. Thanks to me, he had plenty of experience living in that state while he was growing up.

I like to believe my tall tales introduced him to the seductive power of illusion, which provides easy answers to tough questions. To underscore that point I recently sent him a card featuring a quote from Buddha: "Believe nothing, no matter where you read it or who has said it, not even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."

I would take Buddha's advice one step further. Sure, other people can have very strange notions about what's reasonable and sensible, but we should be skeptical of our own conclusions as well. Ultimately, the most dangerous misleader I will ever encounter is me.

So if my tall tales inspired my kids to doubt authority, that's great, but if I taught them to be doubt their own authority as well, that's even better.

-- Tom Valeo is a freelance writer who lives in St. Petersburg. Or so he says.

[Last modified March 31, 2005, 09:42:04]