Say Hello To My Little Friend....
Albert Einstein once said that “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.” I think today I witnessed insanity firsthand.
Blake called me down to the basement this afternoon saying, “Hey mom, I think you’re gonna like this.” I’m sure he saw it as fodder for my blog 🙂 I went down, and there in the window well (thankfully, on the outside) was a small toad. About six inches above him on the window was a little cricket. So, as you would imagine, the toad was trying with all his might to jump up and eat the cricket. But it just wasn’t happening. He even had a perfect little frown on his face to show his dismay. Now, those of you who know me, know that normally I would not be amused by frogs of any kind. I am, in fact, repulsed and pretty much terrified of them. But since there was a double pane of glass between us, I found myself intrigued.
When he noticed me there, the toad began inching toward me, away from his potential dinner, as if to say, “Watch this!” and then he would head back toward the cricket and again jump with all his might, smack into the glass. When he would again fail, he would come back towards me, maybe wishing for my help, then head back toward the insect feast and jump again. This went on and on. And honestly, I felt a little bad for the toad. But the cricket hadn’t moved an inch. He didn’t need to. He knew that he was in no danger at all. History had proven that he had nothing to be worried about. And I swear I saw a little cricket smirk on his face…
Insanity…how many times are we that little toad with a frown on our face because things aren’t changing? We try and try and try, but the result is always the same – failure because we are doing the same old thing again and again. Hmmmmm….maybe we need to try something new. Maybe we need to seek the help of Someone a little bigger and smarter than us to get us out of the rut. (I guess that in the case of the toad, I was the bigger someone, but he didn’t ask for help so… :-))
The sad thing is, not only was he not going to get his dinner, but he is never going to get out of the window well either. But he will keep trying with his sad little leaps. This was evidenced in the next window well that I then checked out and where I found a skeleton of another unfortunate toad.
Do I like amphibians a little more than I did yesterday? Sorry, no. But I did learn a little something from a toad today. Who knew????
