A to Z: Everything's Quilted

Everything.  That's what I've always wanted to know.  Ever since I was a kid, I've dreamed of knowing everything.  How many licks does it really take to get to the middle of a Tootsie Roll lollipop?  I used to stay up late wondering about that stupid owl in the commercial, wondering if he was right.

I went to school because I want to know. I watch people because I want to know. I travel because I want to know. I am a voracious reader because I want to know. I surf the web because I want to know. I became a school psychologist because I want to know. There's an entire world out there filled with stuff that I don't know, and I'm in a bit of a rush.

What do I want to know?  Everything.  No detail is too little or too big.  All those lame trivia questions that pop up in life?  I love them.  If there's something that I find that I don't know, I must at least give it a cursory investigation.  Because it might be important at some point.  You never know when someone will ask a question!

I'm a packrat of miscellany.  I'm a hoarder of random bits of data; my brain is sometimes one of those ratty storage sheds that you hear about on the news, where they find treasures and various oddities. Little patterns make up the bigger patterns, my brain tells me. It's all connected.  My brain is convinced that those little bits of data must fit together somehow like a big quilt that covers everything. Like that toilet paper.  Once I finish that quilt, I will know everything.

Except that's not how it works, is it? The world is ever changing, after all, and even if you see a pattern one moment, all you have to do is blink and it is gone.
Even if I did manage to learn everything, I'm not going to be famous for it, unless I get really good with that buzzer on Jeopardy!.  I won't have photographers stalking my every move, throwing random questions at me.  Smart people don't get all that attention, just the pretty ones.  

Knowledge isn't wisdom, after all.  Knowledge can lead to wisdom, and maybe that's what I'm aiming for.  Somewhere in all the clutter that lives in my brain, there may be that single spark that coalesces into the wisdom of the ages. 


Maybe some day. 

Stupidity

I have a low tolerance for stupidity. Let me just say that right now. Stupid people stretch the very fragile boundaries of my patience. If you ever hear a news story about some middle-aged woman on a rampage of punching people in the face, that will be me and my patience finally running out.

Stupidity is not the same thing as ignorance, however. Ignorance means that you don't know better. Ignorance implies a lack of exposure. If you don't know multiplication, for example, that is ignorance. Ignorance can be cured, or at least accommodated; all that is needed is information and a willingness to learn. I have all the time in the world for people who want to learn.

Stupidity is a choice. In the above example, the person doesn't know multiplication, but decides that they don't want to know multiplication. They come up with excuses why multiplication is not worth knowing. Multiplication is the work of the devil. Multiplication kills puppies. Multiplication leads to people having sex(that one might be true; people don't really need a "reason" to have sex). This person chooses to remain ignorant rather than learn something new about the world and the people in it. That is stupidity.

My low tolerance for stupidity extends to myself. If I don't know about something, I make an effort to find out. It especially bothers me when someone tries to tell me what to think; I have to know why they want me to think that. I will not just blindly follow. I have to know where I am going and why. I just don't like the idea of "not knowing", so I choose to remedy that. This is not always fun, and it sometimes makes people angry, but it is necessary.

Knowledge is power. It's the power to decide for myself, to make my up my own mind. I don't always like what I find out; there is some pretty horrific stuff out there, like multiplication. What I learn sometimes completely changes my view of the world. That is okay. I would rather make up my own mind about the world, and my own decisions.

RemembeRED: Lesson Learned

Write a post that either starts or ends with the words "Lesson learned." Word limit: 400 words.

Some life lessons take a while to germinate. It can take years for the moral of the story to come to fruition. When I was in my twenties, for example, I knew everything. I was a college student. If someone had a question, I always knew the answer and I would tell them so. If someone needed advice, I always knew exactly what to do and I was always very sure of my answers. I was never, ever, without some kind of answer for anything and everything.

When I was in my thirties, I knew some things. I was a professional. If someone had a question, I sometimes knew the answer, and if I didn't, I would pretend that I did. If someone needed advice, I sometimes knew what to do and wasn't really sure of my answers. I occasionally had some kind of answer for most things.

Now I am in my forties, and I don't know anything. I am the parent of a three-year-old. If someone has a question, I have no idea what the answer is and I will tell them so. If someone needs advice, I stare at them blankly until they go away. I never have the answer to anything, and even have difficulty remembering the questions.

It turns out that when you don't know, you can enjoy the journey a whole lot more.

Lesson learned.

Snakes Are Not So Bad

I am not afraid of snakes.

You read that right.

I am a girl and I am not afraid of snakes.

I will not kill a snake, unless it is poisonous and in my yard. Maybe not even then. My policy--they go their way, and I go mine. Everyone is happy, and nobody dies.

Throw a snake into the mix, anywhere, anytime, and people lose their minds. Except in Sweetwater, Texas, where they have that Rattlesnake Roundup yearly for the tourists.

The one that ends up suffering is the snake. Odds are good that the snake wants to leave the scene when a human shows up, because snakes see us as a threat. Since some of us lose our minds and act like idiots around them by trying to kill them, the snakes are right to fear us.

Snakes serve a purpose, believe it or not. They kill and eat mice, rats, and other critters which would otherwise explode in population. Mice and rats can carry various diseases that are harmful to people, in addition to getting into our homes and eating our food. The snakes are doing us a favor by taking care of them before they get into our house. Just the thought of a mouse or a rat in the house gives me the heebie-jeebies, even though I know that my cats would immediately locate and kill it. I don't want to have to get blood and rat guts out of the carpet.

I am not afraid of snakes. However, my husband is terrified of them. Frozen in his tracks, eyes bulging, heart pumping, hyperventilating--just plain scared. There's no rhyme or reason for his fear--I have the same initial reaction to cockroaches.

It's not the fear. It's the overreaction that bothers me.

The best antidote to fear is knowledge. Learn what kinds of snakes live in your area and what they look like. Learn how likely you are to see a particular kind of snake. I have only seen ONE poisonous snake in my entire life, for instance. (I imagine that if I lived on a farm or in the woods, I would see more, but I am a city chick.)

If you do see a poisonous snake, don't shoot it. Nobody has good aim when they are screaming their head off. Don't try to catch it, because you'll end up getting bitten, and anti-venom is expensive. Call animal control. They have people specially trained to handle these situations without getting bitten.