‘Little soldier’ I am now going to tell you a story to give you encouragement – and, more importantly, courage – to face the humiliation of experiencing the rejection, and pain, of loneliness and discouragement. There once was a little soldier, who found his way into the Big Playroom. Now, when he first came into the Playroom, there was a little voice which said behind him: ‘you are a soldier, no less, and you must never forget that, no matter what the other little toys say you are’. On his first day in the Big Playroom, the soldier found that there were many kinds of toys – some big, some tiny, they were all made of wood and wire but not all of them strong. Now the little soldier was quite small, but not as small as some of the other toys who lived in this Big Playroom. While there were taller toys than he, he could still look in their eyes and he saw there much to dislike. The tallest toys wanted to hurt the little ones, and this the soldier could not bear to see. He could step over the littlest toys with his feet, but still he liked to talk with these little ones the most, because they did not behave around him as if they were much different from each other. And the little toys did not make him apologise for talking the way he did, or for humming happily to himself in the way that he liked to do. On the end of that first day, some of the larger toys from the Playroom came up behind him and covered his eyes. Then they picked him up by the scruff of his neck and hung him up next to one of the windowsills which faced outside. They murmured in low voices, trying to make sure that none of the smaller toys would wake up and hear what any of them were saying, ‘You think you are a soldier, you think you are really a soldier, but you are just a jack-in-the-box’. When they were finished taunting him, they took their hands off his eyes and let him go free. The soldier was very brave, so he shrugged his shoulders and said to their faces, ‘Well you say that I am a jack-in-the-box, but I can see that I am a soldier. So please don’t try your tricks on me again, I know that I am a soldier and you are not going to convince me otherwise’. Besides, the soldier remembered what the voice behind him had said, that he must always remember how he came into the Big Playroom, his wood and his wire made him a soldier – he must never believe anyone who tried to tell him otherwise. The next evening, and the evening after that, some toys that were around his size pounced at his back again. Yet, once more, the little soldier told them that they were only being silly, everyone could see that he was a soldier – if there were any of them who were really convinced he was a jack-in-the-box... Well, he doubted that any of them were sincere about it anyway (and he was right, these other toys enjoyed their power too much, and that is why they found it so easy to bully him, that is why they never stopped to think twice about their own harmfulness and cruelty). Now the soldier began to suspect that one or two of these cruel toys had heard the voice behind him on that first day, and they knew that he was never supposed to forget what the voice had told him about who he was. Remember, the little soldier was very brave (he was also becoming a little angry), so, on that third night, he told all the bullying toys, even to their faces, exactly what he thought: that there could be no greater shame than to call him a jack-in-the-box when they all knew in themselves, he would never be a jack-in-the box, he was made to be a soldier, and no less. The fourth day was different for the little soldier. He grew lonelier and lonelier through the day. He did not want to frighten any of the smaller toys with any kind of story about how truly bad most of the larger toys were, on the inside, beneath the wood and the wire they were made of. So, on this fourth day, there was a kind of sadness which began to run through the wood and the wire which made up his own little body. Don’t worry, the little soldier still knew he was just that, a soldier, and no less, but there was a part of him which began to think it would be easier if he were not a soldier, after all – maybe then those toys who told him he was a jack-in-the-box would no longer feel like they needed to invest so much of their energy, night after night, in trying to make him think he were otherwise than himself. Lonely, and sorely disappointed about how life was turning out for him in the Big Playroom, the little soldier was trying to remember what that voice behind him had sounded like, when he saw walking into the Playroom a little dancer. Now here was a toy, he thought immediately, who knew how to light up this cruel, dark Playroom! But when he called out to her, she would not hear – she did not even respond when he tried to ask after her name. And all he could hear in that silence was the sound of those awful toys from the night before: ‘you are only a jack-in-the-box, did you think you were a soldier? You must not think you were ever a soldier, when we can all see you are a jack-in-the-box’. Yes, when the little dancer turned away from him, these are the words he heard in his memory, and he even began to think that the little dancer would not have turned away from him if he really had been a jack-in-the-box, and not a soldier, as he knew he was. Oh, you and I both know that the little soldier was just tired of feeling so alone, with no one to tell about how much courage he had lost since first he entered into that Big Playroom. He had not thought it would be so difficult to be a soldier! He had never asked to be made of wood and wire, or to be made in the form of a soldier, or even to come to this place! I think, in that moment, he may well have considered blaming that voice which had spoken behind him – but then I think he would also have felt guilty for thinking that. He knew the voice was a lot kinder than all those toys who liked to provoke him, night after night, with all their silly lies. Even though he was tired, even though he was feeling more discouraged than he could ever remember feeling in his life, he knew there must have been other soldiers, in some other time and place, who had felt exactly the same way as he in this moment. This gave him a little comfort, for the time being, and he fell asleep that night in peace – his thoughts grew slower, his eyes finally closed, and his body of wood and wire was finally able to rest, undisturbed, in the relative quiet of his own little corner in the Playroom. The toys that would taunt him did not come that night, for whatever reason we will never know... Now we are coming to the morning of the fifth day. One of the little soldier’s eyes peaks open, he remembers where he has come to live, and he hopes this day might be the last of this unhappy, uncertain, and unfulfilling career as one little soldier in this most awful of all Big Playrooms. But look, little soldier, there on the outside of the windowsill, a little birdy tapping on the glass, telling you to come outside. And all you hear is the voice behind you, telling you never to believe those who would make you think you are anything otherwise than a soldier. You are a soldier, no less. Maybe you ask yourself, because you are tired and lonely, and because for the time being you think you would rather forget that you already know, what does that even mean, that I am a soldier. And then you hear the little birdy tapping on the glass, from outside of the windowsill, she says be glad you are a soldier. Be glad you are able to fight those who would make you ashamed of the wood and the wire they too are made of. And then, she tells you, from outside of the windowsill, tapping on the glass, rest now, and sleep – find the words you will tell them when they come for you tonight.
Posted on: Fri, 29 Aug 2014 02:24:08 +0000
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