Trivia doesn’t fall far from the tree
The sports jacket was a little tighter around the chest than the last time I wore it. “Hmm,” I thought as I lied to myself. “Must have shrank while it was in my closet the last five years.”
I then felt a little bulge in the inside jacket pocket.
They were pieces of paper, notes and church bulletins from long ago, when this jacket fit me.
“Daddy, can we go to Dairy Queen after church? Please?”
There were about three notes with that message. Second-most popular is: “I need to go to the bathroom.”
Then this one, from my son when he was around 10.
“Did you know that in a town in New Mexico a dog was mayor for like 11 years?”
There were several others on this ilk from him, obviously from the same time period.
“Somewhere in Colorado, you can’t have an ice cream cone in your back pocket.”
There were several other notes from him — all trivial. He got it naturally.
I was, and am, an expert in expendable knowledge, the emperor of the arcane, able to deliver the starting lineup of every major league baseball team in the late ’ 70s and early ’ 80s, and ABC’s Tuesday night lineup of the same time period as well.
But all this wealth of worthless knowledge never paid off in any tangible way (except for providing this column topic). In fact, it was probably a hindrance of sorts. This proficiency never delivered any cash prizes, any awards, any girl, any job.
“What about that Robbins guy for this job?” “Robbins? Oh, you mean Rain Man? The guy who recited every starter for the 1976
Cincinnati Reds in the interview, but wore mismatched socks and had a moth in his hair? I think I’ll pass.”
The problem with filling your brain with useless information is that it’s, well, useless, except for playing Trivial Pursuit, which no one will play with me anymore. (I’ve never been beaten at the ’80s edition, for what it’s worth, which is nothing. See my point.)
But, as I get older, I find that my brain no longer retains as much as it did when I was younger. My theory is that my noggin became filled to capacity in my early 30s, which, coincidentally, is when my wife and I started having children. I tried to learn something new a couple of years ago and immediately forgot how to subtract. This is why I refuse to learn any more. That’s my excuse, and I’m sticking to it. This is where my son’s love of all things trivial — still going strong years later — is beneficial. Instead of learning anything new, or remembering anything old, I can just ask him.
“Well, son, the last time Georgia played for the national championship was in, uh …”
“1983,” he finished for me. “Georgia lost to Penn State, 27-23.”
“Yeah, that’s right. That was in the Sugar Bowl. Georgia’s played in the Sugar Bowl the last two seasons. But I can’t recall the time they played in the Sugar Bowl before that.”
“2008,” he replied. “They beat Hawaii, 41-10. You were there.”
“Oh, yeah, I remember some of that.” That’s not useless information, my friends. That’s useful. And knowing all those U.S. capitals will come into play one day in a class I can’t remember the name of right now. So there.