I wonder what became of them, when they grew up. As children, both of these girls were saddled with a lot of responsibility. And their circumstances were extremely similar. Even their outward appearance was uncanny, if not of doppelganger proportions. Yet, the outcomes. Oh, the outcomes.
I mean, Mary had a little lamb. Bright, bright white. That thing followed her everywhere. It didn’t matter. Like a shadow, it was. Everywhere she went.
And then, there was Little Bo Peep. Not so adept, this one. I’m not sure just how many sheep she had. Number unknown. Regardless, she lost them. It sounds like many, from the story. Someone, off-camera, tells her to leave them alone and they’ll come home. But truly? There’s no guarantee. I’ve known sheep to go missing from flocks completely. Either by choice or by demand. Never to be seen again, either way. We never truly know the outcome of this one.
In the job world, I suppose Mary would have the better resume. I mean, for just having the one lamb, at least she was able to keep an eye on it.
Mary Had a Little Lamb was written by Sarah Josepha Hale, back in 1830 or so. It appeared in a book with other such poems, called Poems for Our Children, all by Hale.
Of course, Mother Goose wrote Little Bo Peep. And god only knows who Mother Goose was. It was published in 1805. As we come to find out in the nursery rhyme, the sheep’s tails were all hanging on some tree. Not so good for the sheep, I’m afraid. But again, we never know who, or what, accosted the sheep? Or perhaps they cut off their own tails, in some sort of rebellious gesture.
Regardless. Here we have two similar individuals with two completely different stories.
While their initial “meanings” were intended to yield two thoroughly distinct messages, when you put them side-by-side, we are reminded of one truth about life.
We never know what someone else is going through.
From the outside, someone may look the same as everyone else. But inside, there is a completely different story. A set of experiences that are unknown to us. There could be pain, or sorrow, or broken pieces. There might be a life of continuous joy. We just don’t know.
There could be a past that was constructed on fairytales or on fear. The story is hidden from our view.
Each one of us, have our own lives, filled with joys and sorrows. Things we wake up thinking, or perhaps, those things that come to us in our sleep. We don’t just walk up to everyone we meet, and bleat these things out. We don’t wear our wounds on the outside. We do our best to move through each day, with some level of semblance, of getting on. On being whole.
But as we look around, we should remember that everyone has their thing. And that’s where kindness and compassion come in. If we can remember this, we can treat people a little softer. Because on the inside, things might be very hard.
They may have lost all their sheep.
=============
“Little Alice fell
d
o
w
n
the hOle,
bumped her head
and bruised her soul”
― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
==============
“The nail that sticks out farthest gets hammered the hardest.”
― Patrick Jones, Nailed
==============
“The outside doesn’t always match the inside.”
― Rebekah Crane
==============
