We Are All Philosophers

painting by Neville Herbert-Reynolds

By Norris Frederick

“I love my life, Dad.

“I love your life too, Dad.

“I’m just curious about life, not death, I just like thinking about life.”

It’s a late May morning, grey and raining, and my son Neville and I are feeling cozy in the car, as I drive him to his art studio.  He’s very talkative this morning, and in a philosophical mood.

“You love your life too, don’t you Dad?”

I reply, “I do, buddy, I do love my life. I’m very grateful.”

Neville continues, “I’m just curious about life, the circle of life. It’s like in the Lion King movie when Mufasa is talking to his son Simba.  He talks about the antelopes and the grass.  When the antelopes eat the grass, they get life.  I like thinking about life.

“And the circle of life. Then when the lions eat the antelopes, the lions get life too.  And then when the lions die, then the grass comes, and then the antelopes get life. That is the circle of life.

I am curious about life, Dad. I love my life.”

A sense of wonder

Our son Neville just turned 40 years old.  He is a person with Down Syndrome.  He’s very social and has been called “the mayor” by some teachers, as Neville loves to go up and shake hands with people.  Especially with pretty women.

He’s “strong as an ox,” as he likes to say, which comes in very handy for his older-than-we-used-to-be parents, who appreciate the many chores he does around the house.   He plays Special Olympics tennis, and basketball, where his specialty is the 3-point shot.

In several areas, he is high functioning.  He has an amazing memory for names, and for details about events, family, and sports.   He’s very social, and keenly attuned to the moods of people around him.  Neville can be hilarious, as in a recent family game of Uno, when he put down a “Draw Four” card, and the recipient said “Neville!”  Nev quickly replied, “That’s my name, don’t wear it out!”

He reads in a book every day, for an hour or more.   On days when we get the printed version of The Charlotte Observer, he reads every word of it.  All that is a blessing, except when I’m looking for a section of the paper, and I shout down the hall, “Neville!!  Where are the sports pages??!!”

“Oh, sorry, Dad, it’s right here.”

Neville is an outstanding artist, as you can see from his works at the top of this post and below.

painting by Neville Herbert-Reynolds

He does not do math well.  At all.  Neither do some of us.

He could never follow Plato’s arguments about Truth, Goodness, and Eros.

But he still philosophizes.  Plato wrote, “All wisdom begins in wonder.”[1]  As you can see from our conversation above, Neville wonders.

Neville is a living testament to Aristotle’s comment, “All people by nature desire to know.”  Aristotle viewed human beings as very malleable, and thus the person we turn out to be is influenced greatly by our family and friends, our health, and by luck.  Neville’s having Down Syndrome was bad luck.  His having Kimberley for his mother was very good luck.

I didn’t know Kimberley or Neville when he was born in 1982.  Shortly after his birth, she ignored the advice of a physician who said Neville would be better off in an institution, advice that was common at the time.  Instead, she read everything she could get her hands on, and connected with a network of people who were parents of children with Downs.  Since people with Down Syndrome often have weak muscles as well as slow mental development, she organized a group of friends and the friends’ friends — 40 volunteers in all — to come to her house on a schedule to “pattern” Neville, moving his legs and arms rhythmically in order to strengthen the muscles and to form neural pathways. 

And she talked to and with him, and read to him and with him, and taught him how to read, along with the help of a bevy of devoted and talented teachers.  Even now, she and Neville walk together 30 – 60 minutes almost every day.

So the encouragement and support was there for Neville, that he might grow to wonder.  Some of what he wonders is very specific, such as which animals predators eat, and what in turn can eat those predators.  But he also wonders about the big questions, such as life.  And the circle of life, and how a death fits into that circle of life.

He loves watching the Star Trek television series and movies.  A favorite is “The Final Frontier,” in which the crew appear to be getting messages from God, leading the starship Enterprise and its crew on a search for the source of these messages.  There’s an powerful scene near the end of the movie when (spoiler alert) the face and voice of God appears to the crew.  But later we learn the source of this appearance, which Neville calls the “fake God.”

Although he would never put this in these words, he makes a “philosophical distinction,” between “fake” and “real.”  That distinction between “appearance” and “reality” is central to philosophical wonder and thinking.

Be in the Present Moment

 Neville excels in the practice that many of us  try to achieve through meditation, journal writing, self-talk, and deep breathing.  He lives in the present moment.  And he lives with joy.

Friday is a movie night.  Around 4 p.m. he goes to his room to get a shower.  The lead-up to the actual shower can last for an hour, as he listens to the music du jour, which ranges from The Four Seasons to Mary Chapin Carpenter to Kiss.  Whatever the music, he sings along confidently and with gusto, even if a bit off key sometimes. He’s in the present; he’s happy.

He’s happy every morning when he wakes up, ready to go.  His older brother Chris shakes his head and laughs, remembering when he was in high school and trying to get that last bit of sleep before getting up for school, as Neville blasted out the “Four Seasons” at high volume on his tape player.  Every morning.

For the past twenty years, I’ve learned much from reading and listening to the Zen Buddhist Thích Nhất Hạnh (1926-2022).  Nhat Hanh, who in 1967 was nominated by Martin Luther King, Jr., for the Nobel Peace Prize for his work during the Vietnam war, had an amazing presence of calm and understanding.  (You can read a biography here, or watch a video biography here.)

In an audio recording of Nhat Hanh’s teaching about mindful breathing, he says, “when you are not there, not clearly there, you cannot see things clearly…. Therefore, to make ourselves available to our beloved ones, we should be there.  And that is done by [mindfully] breathing in and breathing out.  That is the practice of mindfulness, mindfulness means to be aware, to be aware of what is going on.  Your child is coming, and she wants some attention, some affection, and the basic condition is that you are there….  Life can be found only in the present moment.”

I’m happy that this morning I was present when Neville was talking about his love for and curiosity about life, and about the circle of life.

We can all learn a lot from Neville and people like him.

Neville Herbert-Reynolds

[1] This is a loose translation, but it keeps the essential meaning of Plato’s thought, as found in the dialogue Theaetetus, section 155d.  Socrates says to Theaetetus, “For this feeling of wonder shows that you are a philosopher, since wonder is the only beginning of philosophy.” http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0172%3Atext%3DTheaet.%3Asection%3D155d