Fulghum - What On Earth Have I Done?

WHAT ON EARTH
HAVE I DONE?

Also by Robert Fulghum

All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten

It Was on Fire When I Lay Down on It

Maybe (Maybe Not)

Uh-Oh

From Beginning to End

Words I Wish I Wrote

True Love

Third Wish

Robert Fulghum

WHAT ON EARTH HAVE I DONE? Copyright 2007 by Robert Fulghum. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martins Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.stmartins.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Fulghum, Robert.

What on earth have I done? : stories, observations, and affirmations/Robert Fulghum.1st ed.

p. cm.

ISBN-13: 978-0-312-36549-3
ISBN-10: 0-312-36549-7

1. Life. 2. Fulghum, Robert. I. Title.

BD431.F875 2007
814'.54dc22

2007020487

First Edition: September 2007

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Questions asked of children by parents:

What on earth have you done?
What in the name of God are you doing?
What will you think of next?
Who do you think you are?

Questions I still ask myself:

What on earth have I done?
What in the name of God am I doing?
What will I think of next?
Who do I think I am?

WHAT ON EARTH
HAVE I DONE?

My house in Seattle is across the street from an elementary school. A high fence blocks my view, but Im close enough to overhear conversations. One morning I was out in my yard at the hour when children were being delivered to school. I heard a car door opened, then slammed shut: KABOOM! Another door was opened, and a womans voice came blasting over the fence:

BILLY... WHAT... ON... EARTH... HAVE... YOU... DONE?

Naaannggnnhhh..., wailed Billy-in-the-backseat.

What on earth had Billy done?

Maybe spilled a whole bottle of apple juice or opened his lunch bucket and spread the contents around looking for the cookies.

Or, worse, he had quietly vomited his breakfast all over himself and had taken off most of his clothes. Or picked a scab until blood flowed.

Or used a plastic picnic fork to tattoo his name into the back of his mothers seat. Or decorated the upholstery and himself with a red magic marker his mother didnt know he possessed.

Having played both starring roles in this small domestic comedy in my time, I can attest to the possibility that the kid had accomplished all of these moves during the short trip from home to school.

My own mother asked me the same question. Often. And I, in my turn, asked my own children, who, no doubt, have followed the same line of inquiry with their kids.

WHAT ON EARTH HAVE YOU DONE?

This is one of the great Mother Questions.

The second great question mothers ask is the theological one:

WHAT IN THE NAME OF GOD ARE YOU DOING?

Another Mother Question anticipates the future:

AND WHAT WILL YOU THINK OF NEXT?

(My father rolled all these questions into oneonly the tone changed:

WHAT THE HELL... ?)

Children know these questions have no reasonable answers. Any child who has half a brain will go mute or mumble, Nothing. Nothing. Or resort to pity-invoking sobs that plead innocence, ignorance, and helplessness:

I dont know (snork) I dont know (snork)...

And the child is telling the truth.

Most of the time a kid doesnt think about what hes doing, or why.

This is the privilege of childhood.

Now, at a distance from childhood and parenting, I begin to understand that these Great Mother Questions are, in fact, profound. They are the great Life Questions. Questions of accountability.

Muttering under my breath after yet another screw up, I echo both my mother and father: What on earth have I done... what the hell... ?

When asked of ones self in a calmer spirit, this line of inquiry makes sense, provokes thought, and even puts my feet back on the right path.

For example: Well, just what on earth have you done? After all these yearswhat? I think its useful to inquire of myself about the quality of my existence and my contribution to the commonweal. Never mind what I set out to do. What have I done? Whats my record as a citizen of Earth?

Likewise, What, in the name of God, am I doing? queries my actions on behalf of all that I say I believe and hold sacred.

And, finally, the question with ongoing relevance: What will I think of next? is a way of asking if my mind is a stagnant cesspool of worn-out notions or if I am mentally activestill replacing archaic information with fresh and better ideas? Am I still thinkingstill askingstill learning?

When my mother asked me her questions I hated her.

Her tone of contempt raised blisters on my soul.

Looking back now, what I really hated was knowing that there were no acceptable responses to her inquest. This was not an invitation to a friendly symposium. She wasnt really asking. She was obliquely declaring that I was a loser, an idiot, and a pain in the ass.

I suppose I was, at least some of the time.

But, then, so was she. Some of the time.

Now I think better of her. And me. And the questions.

So. Energized by my thinking, I hurried around the fence to enlighten the mother who had been whipsawing Billy-in-the-backseat. The kid was gone. The mother was sitting in the car weeping and beating both hands on the steering wheel while muttering to herself.

I remember those parental moments. And this was not the time for the Unknown Wise Man to appear and explain to this vexed lady the deeper meaning of the Mother Questions.

I didnt want to have to answer that other great Mother Question:

WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?

Thats the big one, isnt it?

A flourishing life depends on how you answer that.

Who do I think I am?

The incontestable truth is that we come and go in sealed solitude. You cannot ever know what other people really think of you. Even your mother did not tell you the truth all the time. And the world will tell you what it thinks you want to hear, not always what you need to know.

What you think of you is what finally matters. When you look in the bathroom mirror in the morning, the court is open for business. And you are the jury and the judge on the case.

Will the defendant please answer the Mother Questions:

What on earth have you done?

What in the name of God are you doing?

What will you think of next?

And if you know, you can say who you think you are.

Thoreaus line is often quoted:

The man who goes each day to the village to hear the latest news has not heard from himself in a long time.

As if solitude were a rare condition avoided by most people.

But the contrary is true: The man who hears only from himself most of the time, needs to get in touch with the village. Even Henry knew that. He didnt go very far and wasnt gone very long. And historians have proved that Thoreau walked the two miles into Concord almost every day, and he welcomed visitors at the pond.