In the muted half-light of the laboratory, the infant monkey clung to the twisted wire mother. Its small, clever fingers found no warmth, only the hard geometry of steel. Nearby, the cloth mother, soft as a cloud, stood silent and aloof, her embrace forbidden except in moments allotted by rules the monkey would never understand.
Days blurred into days. The hum of machines and the shuffle of white-coated figures became the rhythm of existence. Food came from the wire mother, a thin stream with a metallic taste, never enough to still the shiver beneath the monkey’s skin. Each hour, the longing for softness, for warmth, for something just out of reach, pressed in like the ache of cold.
Sometimes, the man with the rimless glasses—Harlow—appeared at the edge of the cage. He watched without speaking, taking notes in a steady, unreadable hand. His face remained unmoved, a pale moon above a world of small, trembling creatures. The monkey learned to shrink from his gaze; it brought memories of dreams where he was always falling.
Once, when the shadow passed near, the monkey reached through the bars in a pleading gesture. The man did not flinch. He only wrote something and walked on.
Night returned, cool and endless. The monkey pressed closer to the wire, looking for warmth it never found, and stared through the glass at the universe beyond, where perhaps there were mothers made of fur, arms that soothed, and gods who wept.
Association for Psychological Science. (2020, April 2). Harlow’s classic studies revealed the importance of maternal contact. Observer.
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