I can tell it’s January because I catch myself peeking into the seed collection in my cabinet. It’s becoming something of a ritual, since some of those seeds have been waiting for me for three years. (In my defense, I did plant lettuce, spinach, kale, peas and green beans last year, but that’s just a sample of the seeds I’ve amassed.)
Fortunately, seeds are apparently everlasting. 2000-year-old date palm seeds found in the Judean desert and planted in the early 2000s have since germinated and reproduced. And according to Smithsonian Magazine, Russian scientists found a cache of seeds in a prehistoric squirrel burrow covered in ice back in 2012. Those seeds were estimated to be 32,000-years-old. They sprouted, too, so I think my broccoli rabe seeds are probably still viable.
Ideas are a lot like seeds: readily available, easy to carry, filled with promise. Some seeds, like those from invasive species, should never be planted, while others should be planted with caution because even though they might be pretty, they tend to spread beyond their confines. Some seeds won’t survive because they’re planted at the wrong time, in the wrong location, or by someone who can’t or won’t see them through the process. These things are also true of ideas.
As I watched portions of C-Span’s coverage of the Congressional circus surrounding the election of a new Speaker of the House, several thoughts emerged: 1. When did C-Span start having actual entertainment value, almost as good as hockey? And 2. We have a lot of ideologues in elected office and positions of power in both political parties, and that’s not good.
What’s an ideologue? I like this definition from Merriam-Webster: “an impractical idealist.” An ideologue clings blindly to a particular ideology, no matter the outcome or the impact that idea may have on actual people.
Nathan Meeker, for example, was an ideologue. His plan to create his own version of a utopia probably looked great on paper (most ideas do), but his ideology was wildly impractical when applied to the people he was supposed to be helping, and his insistence on “my way or the highway” when it came to implementing his ideology did not end well for anyone.
Now we have political and social “tribes” clinging to their little packets of idea-seeds, convinced their particular ideologies are perfect that will suit everyone they represent. Even at the state level we know that isn’t true. What applies nicely to the Front Range doesn’t always work well on this side of the state, and vice versa. It gets worse the farther you go on the political ladder.
The opposite of an ideologue is a pragmatist, “a person who is guided more by practical considerations than by ideals.” In other words, a pragmatic person wants to know if the idea actually works in reality, not just in theory. We need some more of those, but they seem to be a rare breed. Too many idea-seed collectors (like me) and not enough gardeners doing the actual work? Maybe so.
By NIKI TURNER – editor@editorht1885.com
