IGNORANCE

  What would you do if you were the hero of an action thriller being chased up a cliff by a gigantic flying monster and suddenly you came to a true cul-de-sac where you couldn't escape.  What if the monster closed in; you had already thrown your backpack at the beast; had dropped your sword during the climb, and were weaponless.  What if, while hovering beside the cliff it moved its drooling snout toward you to get a better look at lunch.  What if its 15 foot bloodshot eyeball was right in front of you and you knew there was no way to escape your fate as the monster's next meal. What would you do?  

   I know exactly what I would do.  While holding onto the cliff with one hand I’d poke the monster in the eye with the other.  As it blinked, I’d jump onto its snout, climb up its nose ridges, and grab hold of its eyebrow. Leaning over, I’d kick it in the other eye, then scramble up and sit behind one of its horns until the monster flew over a lake.  I’d jump off and swim to safety.  (Oh wait, that's in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows isn't it?) The monster couldn’t see right, so what I'd really do is wait on its head until it was about to crash into a snow covered mountain because it couldn't see.  Then I'd jump to the ground wait for the monster to bash itself to death against the mountain.  I'd skin it with my Swiss Army knife and using its rib bones I make a saucer to slide down the snow to safety. (Is that in Indiana Jones   After all this is an action thriller, and I am the hero.

   Ignorance is a monster that wants to swallow all of us.  We have to keep poking it in the eye each time it rears its ugly head. The cliff we are climbing is life and we only come to a dead end if we stop trying to learn.  As Yogi Berra said, “It ain’t over till it’s over.” Again the pin stripped Yankee sage said, “If you come to a fork in the road, take it.”

   To paraphrase another great thinker, "To read or not to read, to try or not to try, to dream or not to dream, that is the question."  Take the fork in the road and poke ignorance in its repulsive blood shot eye.

TEN FEET TALL AND BULLETPROOF

   I was reading in the newspaper about a hiker in Utah who was inspired by the movie 127 Hours to hike the same terrain as the fellow who had to hack off his own arm when it was pinned beneath a boulder in order to save his life.  The hiker in the newspaper story was a 64 year old man who came all the way from North Carolina to live the dream.  Well, he got his wish.  Hiking alone he fell ten feet, broke his ankle, dislocated his shoulder and without cell phone service he was forced to crawl for four days across the desert before being found by Canyonlands National Park Rangers.  Once again he was alone and had not told anyone where he was going.

   I call this the "Ten Feet Tall and Bulletproof Syndrome."  It is a hold over from our youth when we thought we were indestructible and could conquer the world because it had to conform to our wills and wishes.  The rules of common sense were for other lesser mortals to follow.  We ignored them because they simply did not apply to us for in truth we knew a secret--we were immortal and nothing could harm us.  

   The problem with this kind of thinking is that it actually has provided breakthroughs in many fields of human endeavor:

• See that strange animal over there.  I going to go over and yank on that "udderly" disgusting think hanging down from between its hind legs and drink whatever comes out.
• I'm going to strap two straight boards on my feet, point them down this snow covered hill, push off and see what happens.
• I'm going to jump off this building and see if this bed sheet will lower me safely to the ground. 
• Let me fly this kite during a thunderstorm to see if lightning is really a form of electricity.
• The fossil fuel internal combustion engine is just what we need to make this country great.  Don't worry about the emissions. They are harmless.
• We're going to bombard this little piece of uranium with electrons and hope the resultant chain reaction does not destroy the entire world.

   Each generation thinks the previous generation is old fashioned, conservative and out of touch with reality.  I'm not sure about the out of touch with reality part because I think we are all on that journey but I know the old fashioned and conservative part usually comes because we finally have realized that we are not ten feet tall and bulletproof just eight feet tall and bullet resistant.