Growth of the Soil

Knut Hamsun

Walking up along the river one evening, Sivert suddenly stops: down on the water sit two wild ducks, male and female. They have spotted him, they have seen a human being and become apprehensive; one of them says something, a brief sound, a melody of three notes, which the other answers correspondingly. The same moment they take off, spin like two little wheels a stone’s throw upriver and settle once more. Then one of them says something again and the other answers; it is the same language as the first time, but with a touch of blissfulness for being saved: it is pitched two octaves higher! Sivert stands there watching the bids, seeing past them far into a dream. A sound had sailed through him, a sweetness, leaving him with a fine, thin remembrance of something wild and beautiful, something previously experienced but effaced. He walks home in silence, doesn’t talk about it, doesn’t chatter about it; it was nothing like mundane speech. It was Sivert Sellanra, young and ordinary who experienced this when he walked out one evening.

It worked out—everything worked out. But Isak began to feel tired in the evenings, whatever the reason might be. It was not as if he simply had to build a sawmill and that was the end of it, all the other things had to be done as well. The hay was in, but the grain was ripening and must soon be cut and the sheaves put on stakes, and the potatoes would also have to be dug up before long. But Isak had an excellent help in the boys. He didn’t thank them, that wasn’t done among folks of their sort, but he was mightily pleased with them. Once in a while they would sit down for a moment in the middle of the work period and talk together; then the father might, almost in dead earnest, consult with his boys about what they should tackle next and what later. These were proud moments for the boys, and they learned to consider carefully before speaking, lest they should be in the wrong. “It would be too bad if we didn’t manage to roof the sawmill before the fall rain sets in,” their father said.

There are big people in this world and they do big and serious things. There are people who are going to achieve greatness in this lifetime. There are people who will become rich, there are people who will become famous, there are even people who will have their names recorded in history. There are people who have done everything they should do, people who invest in the right stocks, land the right jobs, achieve the correct positions and their lives have meaning. They don't worry at night, when the nightbirds are singing (though the big people aren't listening) that their lives have been wastes; that their lives have lacked consequence. Big people have big lives, both are important.

It was Sivert Sellanra, young and ordinary who experienced this when he walked out one evening.

Is Sivert a big man or is he little? He is recorded, his name is written down for us to mark the occasion that he experienced this thing. While walking he heard two birds. Isn't it astounding? But yes, it is.
Bigness is not always to be sought after. Sometimes the big things are so big that they are boring and simple and not at all interesting. There is rarely anything about the big that feels like a cluttered desk or a dirty room--in other words big is not cozy.
Now it seems to me that it's a dangerous thing to say that one would like to live a cozy life. The man who says this risks incurring the anger of the crowds who would respond to him that he doesn't have aims, ambition, goals, purpose--he might even be called a coward. Because when we come down to the hardness of the bones in our thought, anything less than great achievement is failure.
But I am not yet convinced. I spend my time on the fence. Sometimes I worry that I, too, must ascend the great ladder which the majority of people fall off, feel bad about falling off, and fall further. I worry that if I wake up when I'm seventy and haven't done anything of consequence, I will have this terrible sinking feeling that I am a waste--that I am the man who buried his talents in the ground, that I made nothing where so many others have made something.
But there is also this thought: how many amazing events would the eyes of a man of seventy unblinded by the bigness of big lights see? If I can manage to withhold from writing the next great American novel, solving some vital issue of poverty, winning the acclaim of my fellow countrymen, establishing a new corporate dynasty, thinking thoughts that are generally acknowledged as brilliant, if I can avoid all these big pitfalls, there is the chance that I might actually witness a few moments where God steps out from behind his hiding veil, like the Garden Queen. Surely a few glimpses of God on this Earth are worth more than most big things. And knowing God, even little as I do, the glimpses would come as bountifully as the fruit on a tree.
The sentence "It was Sivert Sellanra, young and ordinary who experienced this when he walked out one evening" captures my heart. I want a life that is worthy to be recorded for this instance. I want to be written down because I happened to be the man, that lucky man, who awake one night in his bed, heard a barn owl hooting on his roof, and, though it be asking too much, heard its mate hooting back.