Bird Droppings November 13, 2025
Imagination is a key to unlocking a higher level of thought.

Over the years, I have visited many places and met numerous people. In 1973, I was living in Macon, Georgia, and had the great privilege to meet Bill and Gerald Harjo. Gerald was in school at Mercer University finishing his degree, and Bill worked at the time at the Ocmulgee Indian Mounds. Bill and Gerald are members of the Muscogee Creek Nation. When I found this quote, I recalled Bill telling me about his grandfather, who was then in his nineties. He was the medicine man for the Muskogee Creek. As I researched, I found that Bill and Gerald’s great-grandfather was Chitto (Bill) Harjo, a very famous name in Oklahoma state history and in Muskogee stories. Chitto was a medicine man and chief of the Muskogee until he died in exile in the mountains from a bullet wound in 1912. He fought for the rights of Native Americans and their land ownership. Bill and Gerald’s grandfather, though he was taught English as a child, refused to speak it. I heard portions of his telling of the Trail of Tears in Old Creek. So, I am sitting here using a quote from the last trained medicine man. I think he may have known John Dewey.  

“You can take a course in child development and think you’re prepared for parenthood, but until you have a child of your own, what you’ve been taught doesn’t mean a thing to you. So it comes to our old teaching: Never claim to know anything until you have experienced it yourself.” Bear Heart, the last trained medicine man of the Muscogee Creek Nation

This morning had me thinking back when I left the house to take sunrise pictures, Bill and Gerald Harjo were on my mind. I recalled many memories from a long while back. I recall being asked, or rather, invited to participate in the Green Corn dance and medicine of the Muscogee in 1972 or so. I was very skeptical in those days, and as I drove the five miles or so to school, my thoughts shifted to my own evolution of thought and imagination that had taken place over the years. I wondered for a second, what if I could just have gone in a straight line to where I am instead of all the crooked lines and scribbles that have occurred? What if I could imagine myself there, and I was there? I’m slipping in the deep end here today, but it is interesting to see what elicits imagination.

“You have read a lot of books. However, it is someone else’s thoughts and experiences that are presented in those books. To you, it is hearsay because you haven’t experienced it. You don’t know it; you only know something about it.” Bear Heart, the last trained medicine man of the Muscogee Creek Nation

“I like to let my thoughts come to me each morning before I get up. I meditate for a few hours, and that is like recharging.” Dalai Lama

I was asked more than once about writing Bird Droppings at 2:30 in the morning, and my response was similar: it is a time to reflect, rethink, ponder, and recharge for the day. As I look out at where I am going that day, I can, in my own way, write, meditate, stabilize, and go forth. Even today, as I am a bit lazier getting back into a summer routine of staying up later and getting up later, I am still up and moving in the dark of the morning.

”Add magic to ordinary moments, because our society works to educate the wonder out of children.” Mimi Doe

“Creative minds have always been known to survive any kind of bad training.” Anna Freud

“Most people die before they are fully born. Creativeness means to be born before one dies.” Erich Fromm

In elementary school a few years ago, my youngest son was tested for creativity. The test was administered and scored, and he scored off the charts. I might contest that score with his escapade from high school. Out of the blue, he decided to walk from our house to meet me at school. He chose a back route with no stores or stops of any sort. The record for heat was broken for our county about the time he was walking at over 103 degrees. He called for a ride from a cousin about halfway along, wringing wet from sweat.

I have always watched for sparks of imagination in people, not because it intrigues me, but because then you can truly tell a person is alive. Within a high school, the term “posers” is used extensively to describe certain individuals. They want to be like a particular group, yet they are not, so they pretend to be. I am always drawn to individuals who are original and creative, using their imagination rather than letting others do it for them.

I recall an incident several years ago with a wagon. It was a red child’s wagon and two high school girls who were taking turns pulling each other around from class to class. Something about one or the other was hurt; anyhow, the administration, after laughing heartily, said no more wagons. But the sight of two high school girls pulling each other in a wagon was hilarious and creative. A few weeks later, one of the girls colored her hair normal and cut off extensions and whatever else was involved, and she didn’t like being normal. It only lasted a few days. I quickly took a picture, knowing it wouldn’t last, and I had it on my wall of fame in my room, nearly ten years later.

“Because of their courage, their lack of fear, they (creative people) are willing to make silly mistakes. The truly creative person can think wildly; such a person knows full well that many of his great ideas will prove to be worthless. The creative person is flexible — they are able to adapt as the situation changes, break habits, and face indecision and changing conditions without undue stress. He is not threatened by the unexpected as rigid, inflexible people are.” Frank Goble

“The things we fear most in organizations — fluctuations, disturbances, imbalances — are the primary sources of creativity.” Margaret J. Wheatley

Going against the flow, rising above the waves, that is where creative people float along. Sometimes, an idea will change the flow of a stream of thought or stem the tide. Sometimes it will simply wash away with so many other imaginative thoughts. Thomas Edison spent a lifetime being creative. It has been said that over 10,000 light bulbs lay in a pile in his lab that did not work. Most men would have quit at 99 or a much smaller number.

“The person who can combine frames of reference and draw connections between ostensibly unrelated points of view is likely to be the one who makes the creative breakthrough.” Denise Shekerjam

I sit here thinking back to the second quote and how, in education, we often strive for standardization to facilitate ease of testing and measurement, ultimately for the greater good. We tend to eliminate and subjugate creativity in children, placing it aside for the consistency needed to teach a room full of children. My youngest son was working on a poetry paper many nights ago, interpreting poems by a poet. Many times, he seemed close as he dug into the poem. We often view creativity as an exercise in creation. It can take form in art or writing, as seen in the wagon and the girls’ dress, and even in ideas and humor.

“An original is a creation motivated by desire. Any reproduction of an original is motivated by necessity. It is marvelous that we are the only species that creates gratuitous forms. To create is divine, to reproduce is human.” Man Ray

Humanity creates gratuitously; I like that thought. The difference between man and animals is creativity. Simply copying another act is not enough; it is the unique act that embodies creativity, and in it, as well, spontaneity. Interestingly enough, animals do exhibit some creativity; it is documented in recorded history, and on a specific date, the snow monkeys in Japan began swimming in the heated pools around their mountain home. Monkeys are traditionally afraid of water. One day, a young monkey took a spill into the heated water and found it to be significantly warmer than the freezing air around it, and it stayed in. Very soon, Momma Monkey came in after, and generations later, all the snow monkeys now swim in the heated pools. Creativity is both unique and commonplace, yet it was once special.

“Creativity represents a miraculous coming together of the uninhibited energy of the child with its apparent opposite and enemy, the sense of order imposed on the disciplined adult intelligence.” Norman Podhoretz

Watch a child play with Lego, and their imagination will run wild, creating several blocks that become nearly anything, but when many adults pick up a Lego block, it is simply a block. We need to be careful not to stifle creativity, but to nurture it, embrace it, and let it flourish. Each moment we suppress creative thought, we deprive ourselves of ideas. Share ideas, seek inspiration, and be creative as you go out today. I used to share herbs with friends, including sweet basil, Purple ruffled basil, English thyme, Common Sage, St. John’s wort, and purple coneflowers, all plants I started from seeds or cuttings along the way. It is a great feeling to pass along to others. My grandkids are coming this afternoon, so I need to recharge and get fired up to face this weekend ahead. Please, however, keep all in harm’s way on your mind and in your hearts, Namaste.

My family and friends, I do not say this lightly,
Mitakuye Oyasin
(We are all related)
docbird