In the time it’s taken me to write this book, its inspiration—Josephine—has grown from a chubby arrangement of dimples and curiosity into a slender girl with adamant opinions, a distinct sense of fashion, and an overriding conviction that she is right about everything. As she developed her earliest interests, it seemed that she was not cut out to obsess over weeds and squirrels like her father. I could live with that. After all, my definition of the natural world leaves out a lot. For example, I’ve neglected the microscopic in this book; what about gut bacteria, and houseplant mycelium, and the mites that live on our faces? And why stop at biology? What about the geological formations beneath our feet, the movements of water and weather all around us? What about the properties of starlight? And aren’t our bodies part of the natural world? What about the chemistry of wonder, the inspiration and exhalation of breath? And is there any reason to exclude the art, music, and religious traditions humans have created to make sense of all this? It’s hard to prove that anything, no matter how lowbrow or arcane, is not the study of nature.
So when Josephine entered a girly phase I wasn’t too disappointed. But I was a little disappointed. Every once in a while she’d see me examining something and ask me what I was looking at. She was interested; it’s just that she was a lot more interested in dancing like a ballerina and dressing like a princess. When I suggested that she might want to be a scientist instead, she would tell me that that was not for girls.
Then one morning as we set out on our walk to daycare, Josephine spotted a line of ants crawling across our driveway. They stood out in the low-angle light, casting shadows that moved with them. Josephine was pleased with herself for discovering the ants. Then she asked me if they sleep at night. I had no clue.
“I don’t know,” I said. “But I can ask my friend. She’s a bug scientist.” I was talking about ant scientist Eleanor Spicer Rice.
The word “she” paired with “bug scientist” seemed to strike Josephine.
“Your friend the bug scientist is a girl?” She pondered silently. A few minutes later she twisted around in her stroller and announced: “I changed my idea, Papa. I don’t want to be a ballerina. Can I be a bug scientist?”
“You can be anything you want,” I told her as evenly as I could manage. My heart did a secret victory dance.
This is probably just another phase, but it’s one with some staying power. She borrows my hand lens to peer at spiders, stops every day on the way out the back door to check on the paper wasps’ nest under the railing, and eagerly calls me over to identify insects she’s found. The other day she pointed out a big snail making its way over a slender bridge of grass stems. She swept a hand over it and crowed with delight as it retracted its horns.
“This is a good adventure for a bug scientist,” she exclaimed.
I’ll admit to feeling immoderately pleased. I fear I will always be a poor and bumbling naturalist, forever in the awkward early stages of a relationship with nature. But perhaps there’s hope for the next generation.