Obviously there are instances where physical swords are currently and have been throughout history wielded unwisely, for reasons I do not write in this blog about, it does not contain a personal opinion about fighting, combat, or war.  Also, I do not deny the potential negative impact of war metaphor (with adults and especially with children) nor do I deny the positive (with children, especially with adults).  I do not intend to outline a debate on just war. With all political indignation, pacifism, and Freudian analysis aside, I wrote this here bit, inspired by my nephew.  Please read it.


I was catching up on some vids stored on my cellular telephone.  One in particular I watched several times over.  It was one I had shot weeks back somewhat nonchalantly, while checking the old missed call/text log on a Sunday afternoon.   Nephew (Brady) was running around while I was circulating with my feet planted in the grass, legs wrapped around a daisy (green plastic disk in shape of daisy petals) at the end of a rope hung from a ficus (benjamina) limb.   Nephew was running in circles trying to catch me with a sword in hand.  All thewhile, he was insisting on what I couldn’t gather until he tripped, became aggravated, and I finally stopped laughing, circling away from him, at last listening to what he had to say.

 “You need a sword,” he said

“Why?” I asked, somewhat befuddled, defiant.

“Because, you need to fight,” he stated, matter of fact'ly.

Tree’s leaves are green.  Green jello has pears in it (and a lil’ cottage cheese).  And, you need a sword [Uncle Alan] because you need to fight.  He didn’t actually state the former two Sunday afternoon truths, but as I watched the vid and pondered his logic, the one statement he made outright seemed to most obviously follow the two that I had fabricated.  What I mean is, the first reason why I was enraptured by the vid, and what I cherish about my nephew Brady or any/every child for that matter, is the simplicity behind their reasoning.  In other words, there were no secondary arguments to defend his primary insistence upon my needing a sword.  There was one reason, “because you need to fight.”  Period.   

The second reason I loved this vid was due to the direct connection in Brady's mind with a sword as an object, and fighting, an action.  He doesn’t necessarily yet understand the makeup of a traditional sword, how metal as a state of matter can be malleable, shapeable, hardening, temperature permitting, potentially with sharpened edges, for practical use when whittling, dicing vegetables (or fruits), or in hand-to-hand combat.  He doesn’t yet understand that in this world we don’t always get our way and if/when we absolutely must get our way for certain reasons, say defense of justice, protection of peace (purposefully vague, subject to interpretation), or to obtain certain items that we are in no way capable of obtaining without fighting it away from some other body…or does he understand these things?  Regardless of whether he does or not comprehend why we fight, and at that with a sword, he remains a child (capable of err and very soon capable of accountability but not yet as far as I’m a judge of such things (though he talks extremely well for a massive two year old bulldozer)).  And as a child, with tears he forced a sword into his Uncle’s hands, mine, and told me I needed it because I need to fight.  Agreed.  I do, I strongly believe that I do.  I need a sword because I need to fight.  Period.

Finally, in life there are those who go through it all for all the reasons they are told to go through it all and there are those who put a foot down, have a long thought on the potential good that can arise when minds' give sway to heart, when ideas are really thought out, and money gets put where the mouth is, and dear mosses when pages get torn out of “my mother’s hymn book” (feast in heaven, john r. cash) and voice boxes start tintabulating like all God-given gumption, “in his love abiding, and in him confiding, just like a tree that’s planted by the water, I shall not be moved.”  Period.

You need a sword because you need to fight.  Period.  Well said Brady.