Man has his wit, but woman has her way. --magnet on my refrigerator
Early in the summer, I got cornered at a couple of parties by a woman I know who, to be blunt, seems to have low self-esteem and needs to talk about herself a lot. The first time, we got ambushed as a couple by their couple (her and her husband), and my wife tried to retreat into her Blackberry while I tried to keep my focus on the pita chips and hummus dip until, finally, unable to take it anymore, we flat-out fled the party. Yep, just left abruptly with some lame excuse involving our children, who happen to be 16 and 20 and don't particularly need us to be home.
The second time, I got trapped alone with her alone somewhere between the drink station and a couch with nowhere to go and she had had some wine, and so proceeded to talk about being smart. She knew she was smart. She thought I was smart. She referenced someone else she knew who was smarter than either one of us. She went around the room, pointing out people and telling me that we were both smarter than each particular person. It was kind of like it was some kind of exclusive club.
The second time, I got trapped alone with her alone somewhere between the drink station and a couch with nowhere to go and she had had some wine, and so proceeded to talk about being smart. She knew she was smart. She thought I was smart. She referenced someone else she knew who was smarter than either one of us. She went around the room, pointing out people and telling me that we were both smarter than each particular person. It was kind of like it was some kind of exclusive club. I didn't say anything, just kind of nodded, acquiesced a little too much, looked for someone to bail me out. It reminded me a little of that scene from The Great Gatsby where Tom Buchanan is spouting racist nonsense and identifying himself and everyone else at his dinner party members of a "dominant race" that have to protect civilization from the lesser races.
And, yeah, I'm probably smarter than your average bear. Big fuckin' deal. I'm smart, you're smart, we're all smart, and then there are those who are smarter. And those who aren't. Big. Fuckin'. Deal. I'm also clever, can be quite clever. I may be able to put two ideas together more quickly than you can, or spin words for a laugh. And I'm quick. Yeah, fast as lightning with the irony. And I've got a good memory. Can remember details, song lyrics, not necessarily lines from movies.
What does it all add up to? I'm probably someone that you might want at your dinner party in hopes that I might make the table laugh once or twice and maybe someone you'd want on your Celebrity team or Encore team or _______ (insert favorite game here) because I know the story behind Deep Purple's "Smoke On The Water" and am conversational about hip-hop culture.
To traffic in your own intelligence--IQ, grades, test scores, whatever--as an adult is a pointless exercise and kind of a pathetic one at that. Smarts are best left to schoolyard bragging and, maybe, to the oneupsmanship that may still be important to a young adult before skills in a marriage, a family, a job, a civic organization matter more. Intelligence may get your foot in the door, but it isn't going to get you the job, the special project, the promotion. Or the girl.
And, yeah, I'm probably smarter than your average bear. Big fuckin' deal. I'm smart, you're smart, we're all smart, and then there are those who are smarter. And those who aren't. Big. Fuckin'. Deal. I'm also clever, can be quite clever. I may be able to put two ideas together more quickly than you can, or spin words for a laugh. And I'm quick. Yeah, fast as lightning with the irony. And I've got a good memory. Can remember details, song lyrics, not necessarily lines from movies.
What does it all add up to? I'm probably someone that you might want at your dinner party in hopes that I might make the table laugh once or twice and maybe someone you'd want on your Celebrity team or Encore team or _______ (insert favorite game here) because I know the story behind Deep Purple's "Smoke On The Water" and am conversational about hip-hop culture.
To traffic in your own intelligence--IQ, grades, test scores, whatever--as an adult is a pointless exercise and kind of a pathetic one at that. Smarts are best left to schoolyard bragging and, maybe, to the oneupsmanship that may still be important to a young adult before skills in a marriage, a family, a job, a civic organization matter more. Intelligence may get your foot in the door, but it isn't going to get you the job, the special project, the promotion. Or the girl.
Still, at first glance, we'd all like to think that we're in the Smarties club. Intelligence is something that we tend to use as a dividing line; the lack of intelligence is a basis for criticism, condescension, judgement against a policy we didn't like. And no one wants to be on the other side. Telling your boss that you disagree with him or her is one thing. Telling him that his plan is stupid is likely to draw a different reaction. And if you're the President and you tell the Cambridge Police Department that they behaved "stupidly," you're probably going to wish you had chosen different words, especially if both you and the victim in the case have Ivy League pedigrees.
Since Billy talked out about Outliers yesterday and I've just read it too, I'll point out a couple things in Gladwell's book:1. The smartest man in the world (by far) is a guy named Chris Langan who has worked as a bouncer for the last 20 years and couldn't figure out how to deal with the bureaucracy effectively so that he could finish college. (The second-smartest, of course, thinks she's the smartest and answers brain teasers for Parade magazine).
2. One of the researchers Gladwell talks about in his book explains that after a certain point IQ doesn't matter. All that matters is that a person is "smart enough," not that he or she is smarter than everyone else in the room. The baseline intelligence he references, while above average, is not particularly high, just high enough to allow all of us to gripe, "I'm smarter than my boss" and still realize that somehow he or she is smart enough to be the boss.
I suspect that maybe the club we really want to be in (half-kidding, of course) is that Smart Enough Club, that group of people who are fortunate enough to be armed with enough something upstairs to be able to navigate their way through life without too much outside help.
Ultimately, intelligence is like money. Great things can be accomplished with it, but there is no great joy in its accumulation. To wear it around one's neck like a gaudy piece of jewelry that says to the world, "Look what I've got," is to worship it for its own sake, which has never amounted to anything. In fact, having too much of intelligence, like money, probably undermines both a person's motivation and sense of purpose. Spend all of your time thinking that you're smart, knowing that your smart, having people tell you that you're smart, and you'll probably find yourself in a terminal condition of smartness. Incurable. Doomed to believe that you deserve things from other people because you've read all of Jane Austen's novels and went to fine schools and quote Latin phrases at the drop of a hat.
But, surely, all of that means something?
Yes, honey, the game is called Trivial Pursuit.
Rosanne Cash is available at Itunes.
I suspect that maybe the club we really want to be in (half-kidding, of course) is that Smart Enough Club, that group of people who are fortunate enough to be armed with enough something upstairs to be able to navigate their way through life without too much outside help.
Ultimately, intelligence is like money. Great things can be accomplished with it, but there is no great joy in its accumulation. To wear it around one's neck like a gaudy piece of jewelry that says to the world, "Look what I've got," is to worship it for its own sake, which has never amounted to anything. In fact, having too much of intelligence, like money, probably undermines both a person's motivation and sense of purpose. Spend all of your time thinking that you're smart, knowing that your smart, having people tell you that you're smart, and you'll probably find yourself in a terminal condition of smartness. Incurable. Doomed to believe that you deserve things from other people because you've read all of Jane Austen's novels and went to fine schools and quote Latin phrases at the drop of a hat.But, surely, all of that means something?
Yes, honey, the game is called Trivial Pursuit.
Rosanne Cash is available at Itunes.
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