Power of Creation.

One day, as a little boy at about the age of eight, I thought I was able to perpetuate new life. It was with my father that I embarked upon this most exciting venture.

At eight years old, how did I create life? This interesting phenomenon can be easily repeated simply by taking a few rudimentary actions. The first steps of creating life started in my kitchen when my father took an empty glass jam jar and instructed me to collect handfuls of dry grass, banana skin and orange peel. Fair enough, as an ingredient list it was not going to win me any culinary competitions but in the scientific lab of a kitchen, it was an epic set of basic requirements.

Once I had collated all of the ingredients I was told to stuff it into the jam jar. My father then filled the jam jar with fairly warm water and instructed me when the water had cooled to take the jam jar and place it in a shaded spot in the garden. It would take several days in the summer time to inspect the jam jar. Finally on one inspection the contents had turned a dark brown and after more highly anticipated days, it smelled awful but it had happened.

The jam jar was home for countless tiny creatures that were swimming in the water, moving about in staccato jerks. At that time, I knew the creatures were called daphnia but it was not until much later, I discovered another name for them was water fleas. They are in fact tiny transparent crustaceans.

As a little boy I had thought the discovery of such a process was huge. I was an absolute scientific genius and I knew how to fuel the power of creation. A short while after my somewhat short experience of marvellousness, it was with disappointment that I realised what was happening. I was simply creating a suitable environment for the fleas to squat in and they must already have existed somewhere else in the surrounding area.

Then the thought came to me. Why should Earth have life? Is it because there is a suitable environment for it to flourish?

I had deliberately created a home for daphnia but what I had done occurs naturally everywhere in the countryside, in springs and ponds.

The next thought I had was why is there not life on every planet? Obviously life needs a suitable environment to begin and sustain it. However on Earth life is fragile and over a long time has suffered drastic reduction and change of form and direction.

So I had not discovered the secret of creating new life but had glimpsed the wonders of nature. A brief introduction that included a fascination for multiple varieties of natural life and the splendour of all its many forms.