The Glass Elephant

When Randall Nathan was a little boy, growing up in the glums of Capitol City, he fell in love with a little elephant. Two of them. The first was in a book. The second was in a store window.

[If a glum drops down one more step, it's a slum.]

Randall loved books, and the branch library where he read them. The books were an escape from his chaotic home and the bullies who chased him up and down the sidewalks and alleys. The library was an oasis in the glum and in the terror.

He can't remember the name of the book about the little elephant. He just remembers that the little elephant was brave, so brave that he saved his whole herd from some now forgotten diaster. Randall wanted to be brave like that little elephant, brave enough to stand up to the bullies instead of fleeing from them, brave enough to save his herd, his family, from its chaos.

Then he saw that elephant in a store window on Federal Street. It was just a little glass statue, but it represented all that bravery that he wanted so much. So he longed to possess that statue. If he could just have that little elephant as his companion, he could be brave.

He saved his money. His family was poor, though, and each time he got close to enough, his money was needed for something else, something practical, certainly not a little glass elephant.

His family moved from the city when he was ten, the age now of his grandson, Johnny, to a hard scrabble farm in Arkansas. Instead of running from bullies, he began to run from pecking chickens and curly-horned cows and grunting pigs and wild-eyed horses. He forgot about the little elephant.

He told that story last fall to his grandchildren. Their life is much different from what his was like, but he thinks it's important for them to know that if they are chased by bullies or pigs or expectations, he understands. He understands that it is important to be brave, that they want to be brave, and that it is hard to be brave.

On his birthday, 8th grader Betsy gave him a little glass elephant. She had saved her money and searched the internet. She found just the right one. It has its trunk up in a rampant show of courage. He sits each morning on his couch and looks at that little glass elephant. It gets him ready to face the day. He can face the day bravely, because he knows that the grandaughter who hears his stories understands.