Five days out of the week, I spend an hour round trip driving to and from my government job. The journey consists of traveling a two-lane highway and a fairly unoccupied county road (as opposed to those stressful five-lane freeways where everyone is crawling home at 30 mph during rush hour), and so, unless there is black ice or a potato truck going 65 while chucking large bakes out the back like Steve Dalkowski, I have a lot of time to think and observe and ponder life’s more Byzantine questions. This morning, as I was listening to NPR’s Morning Edition, there was an announcement for their upcoming program about environmental microbiologists who study the guts of termites to better understand our country’s energy crisis. Yeah, I KNOW. I had to ask, too. OUT LOUD. TO MYSELF…. WHO are these people?? How do you make the decision to get into that field? These have got to be people who never watched TV, who weren’t influenced by the likes of General Hospital’s doctors, Chips’ cops, Dragnet’s detectives, the West Wing’s politicians or even, Chico and the Man’s mechanics who mingled with Mabel, the mailwoman or Louie, the garbageman. What makes a person say, “Gee, I wonder if I could make a buck studying the bacteria that grows inside the belly of a termite? And, who knows, maybe I can even figure out how to get this country weaned from their wacky oil addiction in the process!”
Props to anyone who actually grows up thinking along those lines. For your ambition and intellectualism and warped sense of humor, I am unworthy of breathing your air. Because, although I am not an environmental microbiologist, I did study the sciences. And I don’t really know what I’m talking about because there weren’t ANY soil scientists on TV. And I would know because I did grow up watching loads and loads it. Scooby Doo and the gang didn’t convince me to become a teen investigator, nor did The Brady Bunch convince me that architecture or professional housecleaning was what I should grow up to do. What actually influenced my decision to jump on the soil science bandwagon was a one-time TV special about saving the earth… It had NO mention of soils in it, by the way. But, believe it or not, soil science could be construed as “environmental.” UH HUH! The credit actually goes to my killer salesman advisor who said the sciences NEEEEEDED women and minorities, not to mention my then-bottomless NEEEED to please people. But loving science, loving it like I love storytelling and studying the dialogue in my workplace’s breakroom and finding the perfect home for words like supercilious and refulgent, I absolutely did not. And therefore, I bow down to the true scientists of the world. May your refulgent dreams of finding a cure for my addiction to car lubrication (even if it’s through the bowels of a social insect) come true. Just please, try not to let your egos become supercilious in the process.
Believe it or not, I knew what I wanted to be when I was in second grade.
ReplyDeleteNot because I had seen any graphic designers on TV or art directors featured in episodes of The Partridge Family. (Although, Ruben Kinkaid must have had a side gig going - no way could he have made a living just pimping that band.)
Mainly because numerous family members are involved in the arts; designers, illustrators, architects. It just seemed natural to take this path, much like so many musicians' and actors' offspring follow in their footsteps (maybe not such a good decision for Chrstian Brando)
In keeping with tradition, my two daughters (7 & 9) have already decided they are going to be artists. Or rock stars. It changes daily.
I'm so jealous of people who have been bred well. Genetics do seem to play a role in the artistic department, doesn't it? Maybe it's the same with environmental microbiologists as well.
ReplyDeletePlease God, say it isn't so with pencil-pushing bureaucrats... otherwise my poor children haven't got a chance.