Labels are like a Fire

“I've been searching for you in the whole school campus. I thought you were just playing in the school grounds again with your friends. You are just here in the waiting shed. “

“I'm too tired to play. And it is labelled waiting shed to wait here. “

“Fine, Mr. Obvious. We’ll just walk and drop by the ice cream parlour. “

“Yay! I want some coffee crumble and mocha ice cream. “

“ Okay, we’ll buy that later. While we are walking, tell me about your day in school, son. “

“I got a 100% score in our quiz in English class today and the only one among us. “

“Woah! What a smart kid, just like your mom. And of course, just like me.”

“Because it was too easy. Then my mind got tired on the following classes. There are classifications, types and kinds of something. Labels here and there. “

“Tell me about it. “

“ In Biology, we are taught about classifications of organisms from Domain down to specie. Then there are types on each categories. My head hurts just thinking about it. And tomorrow, we have a test about it. I need to study tonight. “

“Just keep it easy. Don't pressure yourself. Let's have a quick review based on my knowledge in my memory about taxonomy. What are the five kingdoms? “

“There's Kingdom Animalia, another is Plantae.... Uhm... Sorry, I forgot the other kingdoms.”

“It’s okay. Don't stress yourself out. I’ll teach you later and give tips to memorise the lesson easily. But whatever score you will get, I'm still proud of you. What about others? “

“Okay dad, thank you. Then in Literature, we learned about different kinds of poems.”

“Oh, interesting. So what's the three-line poem with a typical 5-7-5 meter or something with a total of 17 syllables?”

“It’s haiku.”

“Give me your example now. I’ll give you a moment.”

“Wait. Let me think.”

“Sure. ........”

“I’m done!

I miss my ice cream

It’s coffee crumble flavour

We’ll buy it later.”

“You're still thinking about your ice cream? Anyway, I love that. Nice one“

“As you should be. “

“Next. How about poems that don’t follow certain meters, and rhyme scheme? “

"Free verse."

“Okay, last one. What do you call the 14-line poem and William Shakespeare written popular poems in this form? “

“Sonnet. Easy. “

“I see, you're good at Literature, too.”

“You know that I love writing,a thing I inherited from you. Be sure to help me on my school project due next week. We need to make a scrap book containing different types of poems I should have written. “

“Sure. You'll get the highest mark. What else? “

“We are taught about different types of four sided polygons or quadrilaterals in Geometry class. There are types according to sides and angles. It was easy because I don't need to solve for something. I guess, easy for now. “

“Let's just leave that here. I hate mathematics.”

“Hey, dad? “

“What is it?”

“Why do we need to classify things? Why need to label them? I’ve learn about different types of matter, sentences, angles, and others in school.”

“We label things to organise and put things in order. We also do this to classify things and find connections among them, specify things and communicate better. Let's talk about your ice cream. For example, how would I know that you would like to eat coffee crumble ice cream when you said ‘I want food’. There are a lot of food in the world and ice cream is one of them. And there are countless types and flavours of ice cream around. By just telling you want coffee crumble ice cream, we can communicate better and faster.”

“So, is labelling for the best?”

“Yes. Our world is complex and comprised of countless things from objects we can see to thing beyond our senses to things that just products of our minds such as concepts and emotions. We need to put these things in order and organisations through labels. “

“Okay. But labels also put a gap between us, humans, and cause chaos not order.Just like people fighting over different political or spiritual views.”

“You’re talking beyond your age, son. We’re just talking about school and ice cream a few moments ago.”

“Just curious.”

“You are talking about the other face of the flipped coin. I can say labels are like fire. We use fire for cooking, heat and others so it is useful and helpful to us. Fire was discovered to make things easier. But it can bring danger and disaster when used to hurt others with intention and when not properly handled. Labels are like fire.”

“I understand that other face of the flipped coin, dad. That's why mom was burned to death because we are Asians in this foreign country.”

“.......”

I've been thinking about this analogy for so long. This is my story for @JonicaBradley 's prompt which is Labels. If you want to write about this prompt, I'll drop the rules below.

Another prompt is from @meitanteikudo . I saved this one in my notes, looking forward to write about it before. I enjoy writing about it because I'm not good with dialogues with narrations. #promptfactory