It’s a Small World
It’s small.
– No, it’s big.
– It’s SMALL, not good enough for us, surely.
– Why?
– We can’t get anything out of it! All our efforts will be a waste of time and energy.
– Come on, Earth has some things worth trying.
– Like what?
– Like water! It’s got much more water than our planet has, we could use that.
– Are you serious? Their water is so polluted that we would all die at an instant if we drank it. Anything else?
– Well...it does have natural minerals and fossils...
– You’ve got to be kidding me! They’ll run out in no time!
– What makes you think so?
– Look at the way they use it all.
– So wha...well...yeah, I guess, you’re right. Um...but what about Earth’s nature?
– Are you talking about that pile of junk over there?
– No, I am NOT. Take their parks, their lakes, mountains, forests...
– ...which will be gone in nearly 50 years.
– No, they will not!
– OK, then 100 years, but that’s the limit. I’m definite, I’ve calculated it all already.
– All right, smart head, about counting. They’ve got fantastically perspective minds! Destroying Earth would mean commiting suicide!
– Perspective..what?
– Minds! I know, they haven’t yet reached our level of development, but, if we trained them...you know, experimentally...
– Wait. Just...just stop. You are saying outrageous things.
– No, I’m not! I’m sure they can do better than they are now!
– Er...why? The only thing I see, through which their, as you had said, “perspective minds” are shown, is weaponry.
– But...
– Oh! And earning that...what do you call them, ah, money! What a thick-head invention that...it only brings quarrels and wars...
–You are hopeless. You only look at the negative side of things.
– But there is nothing else to look at here!
– Yes, there is! Some of them are capable of making huge progress! They are scientists, inventors, artists...
– ARTISTS? Who needs artists?
– But...what they do is...
– Is...what?
– What they create is...is...
– Is? Come on, say it! Say that awful, pointless, human-created word we ought never to use!
– Beautiful.
– You are mad. Oh, how I am going to report on you to the commander...
– All right, I might be mad. But what they do with those pieces of paper and paint, making unbelievably vivid images, and with those wooden and metal instruments, that produce music, and those rocks and other materials, when they make breathtakingly delightful buildings...
– Ours are much more technically advanced.
– But they are just soulless bits of metal! And those...
– You are surely mad. No mistake. I really should report on you.
– You can. But...well...don’t YOU see what I mean, when I say that the Earth is huge?
– Nope. It’s two hundred thousand times smaller than our planet.
– You don’t understand...judging by the way it is filled with works of art...don’t frown! Art is not a swear word. Our commanders want us to think it is, but it’s not. What have you seen of it?
– Erm...
– Music, graphics, architecture, what?
– I...well...
– You...you just can’t be serious, you...haven’t seen anything?
– Er...no.
– Heard anything?
– N-no.
– You are killing me.
– But I...what do I need to see it or to listen to it for? I won’t be needing it, we are going to destroy this planet anyway, it doesn’t fit into the range of usefulness! Besides, like I said, even its size is not appropriate for it to join the Universal Union!
– I said this already, but I’ll repeat. How can you judge it by its size, if you don’t know the contents?
– OK, here is your chance! Show me anything from Earth that can impress me as much as to agree with you, and I will sign the report, along with you, confirming that this planet is worth entering U.U. If you don’t, I, as the higher in rank, will include it into the list of Cosmical Objects Liable to Destruction. You agree?
– Yes.
– You have fifteen minutes to find something. Do it.
The Controller two didn’t really need so much time. For the last few weeks he was being driven by one melody, which was only one of the many created on the Earth, but not the best. Still, it had something in it, that made his heart gleam with such indescribable feelings that he was almost afraid of its power. This is why he presented it to the Controller before his time elapsed.
They sat there, on board their space ship, listening to music for eight minutes, five seconds, number one trying to understand and number two trying to read the thoughts on his face. After it had ended, number one closed his eyes. Thus he sat for ten more minutes. As he opened them, his partner thought he saw something sparkle under his eyelids. Then, he took a laser pen which lay in front of him, and slowly signed the hologram with the mark U.U.
Z. Kudashova
It’s a Small World
The exact meaning of the idiom “It’s a small world” you can easily find at Pocket English Idioms site Go English.com. In this story I dare follow the stages and motives of my own small world’s ongoing reshaping.
Some 17 years ago a tiny bud came to life in a soft warm cradle deep inside my mum’s belly. It was me! I believe I was happy in that tiny, safe, and cozy spot. Nine months later a sense of inquiring curiosity and search for something new pushed me forward into the unknown world. It was as if I heard some call, a fairy ding-a-ling of a silver bell that encouraged me to enlarge my personal area making it more spacious.
By this time my first palace became unbearably small and too closed for me! I craved to see all seven colors of the rainbow with my own eyes, smell the fragrance of meadow flowers, taste bananas, feel the touch of the sun’s rays, and watch snowflakes slowly melting on my hand. Did I miss my comfortable shell? I feel I did. But a new, really big, amazing, and promising world was opening its entrance for me.
Packed in lace, calico and pink ribbons I crossed its threshold. I was awaited! A fantastic bouquet was presented to my mum, a bottle of Champagne and a box of chocolates to a man in a white coat, piles of bright toys and snow white diapers to me! However, after seven years of being a big fish in a carefree angel infancy pond, watched toddling, bedtime lullabies and fairy tales, a familiar sense of tightness and smallness began to haunt me again. The silver bell made a second tinkling. It ticked the time of losing baby teeth and further mental and emotional changes and challenges of my small world. Towering in naive seven-year-old confidence I fancied that very soon I would learn all secrets of the Universe: why spring is green and autumn is yellow, why birds fly and fish swim, where the Sun goes to sleep to, how the clouds know their way in the sky, etc. To carry out this idea I had to change my homely family nest for a six-days-a-week study at school, adapt to strict discipline, timetable, and not always smooth relations with peers and teachers. Honestly, I can’t be praised for being the best at school, but I’ve made out one important thing: success in life requires more common sense and the ability to adjust than all human knowledge crammed in store.
I’m 17 now. I hear and recognize a familiar chiming. It gives boost to a new reshaping of my space for the third time. R. Braithwaite once wrote that “time and tide stayeth for no man”, no one can stop “ever wheeling wheels of time.” In a little while, the tidal waves of my grown-up life will seize and drag me off the shores of Childhood far into the ocean of adult sorrows and joys. I hope mast and sails of my vessel are well prepared for this voyage and I will be able to make mature decisions and turn all problems into challenges. I dream to match the facts I’ve learnt in my lessons of History, English, and Geography with a real life, greet millions of people, gain knowledge of their cultures, languages, and help them if necessary. Maybe some blissful day this crazy idea will come true: my small world will expand to a global size. It will prove a great law of human evolution: everything small should turn, in its time into the big, the big into the bigger, and bigger world.
If it so happens that in the far off corner of the Earth, where a seven-colored rainbow drinks the salty water of the ocean, I accidentally bump into my green days fellows, I’ll remember the phrase “it’s a small world” and realize that the process of my expanding small world is continuing. What will be next? A Universe?