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How Can You Not Know This?
I have a peculiar area of expertise: I know a lot about death. Well, more precisely, I know more than the average person about bereavement, especially sudden, violent bereavement. I have come by this through my own losses, dedicated study, and, especially, through nearly 15 years of experience as a law enforcement chaplain. Law enforcement officers often have the sad duty of performing what is known as “death notification,” and it is one they gladly hand off to the chaplain whenever possible. It is one of the subjects I teach at our academy.
A few years ago, I began to receive invitations from members of the medical profession who wished to learn more about death notification. The first time the state’s chapter of the American Academy of Surgeons asked me to address their meeting, I was puzzled. After all, these were doctors: highly educated professionals that must regularly (if reluctantly) come face-to-face with death. “Don’t you know more about this than I do?” I asked.
Apparently not. So I went and spoke about the very early stages of bereavement: the first seconds, minutes, hours after news of a loved one’s decease has been transmitted. And as the assembled surgeons nodded, took notes, and intelligently asked what seemed to me pretty basic questions, I kept thinking how can you not know this?
We know what we know. And once our knowledge has been integrated into our mental processes, it becomes difficult to return to the time when we didn’t know it. Once you’ve learned to read, for example, you can’t not read a passing road sign, a phenomenon that has inspired some truly idiotic educational theories.
And when you encounter someone who seems like a reasonably intelligent, educated person who has no grasp whatever of information that seems essential for living a normal life, let alone having or voicing a political opinion, it just seems bizarre. How can you not know this?
I gave two Ricochetti that disorienting feeling the other day, when I posted my (passionate) opinion on healthcare reform. My new friends, with whom I had happily conversed on other issues, found themselves having to kindly explain how insurance works…in terms a third-grader might understand. Though I couldn’t see their faces, I’m quite sure they were staring at their computer screens thinking: How can she not know this?
One of my correspondents wrote: “Kate, I am giving you the benefit of the doubt that you just spend your time with people who don’t think like [other Ricochetti] and I do, because you are obviously quite intelligent enough to have already understood our viewpoint.”
I’m sure that if we were having the conversation in person, her voice would have in it the same despair with which my dear husband inquires how it is that I can have lived in our house for 10 years and not know where the furnace is?!
So okay, Ricochetti: What areas of ignorance encountered in others (here or elsewhere) cause you that heart-sinking dismay? And what blank spots on your own mental map would you confess to?
Published in General
Yes, it’s still possible.
Yes, Cato. Ditto BastiatJunior @ #61.
But what do you do with the old oil? (Back in the 70s, Dad would use it to tamp the dirt on the sides of the driveway.)
Question: how do you feel about Birkenstocks? :)
It’s been a few years, but I would drain the oil from the car into a close-able container, and take that container to Kragen Auto parts for recycling. I think some gas stations will take it, too.
In California, you would have to take the filter to a toxic waste station (same place you would take paint, etc.,) because throwing it in the trash can would be illegal. ;-)
Leather Birkenstocks or man-made material Birkenstocks? I can’t abide vegans wearing leather Birkenstocks. ;)
I am astounded by the number of Subaru owners here. We have a 2004 outback. It’s a pretty good car, I guess. But their advertising campaigns make me ill.
My wife absolutely loves it and wants a new one. Then again, she is a liberal.
May I suggest sfdebris.com? He’s a former teacher turned internet sci-fi reviewer, so he does things like read Moby Dick, King Lear, and Paradise Lost to pull appropriate quotes to show the depth and mastery of Wrath of Khan. It’s a two for one!
If Shakespeare confuses you think of Hillary Clinton as Lady Macbeth scrubbing the blue dress screaming: “Out damned spot.” Everything old becomes new and it will make sense to you.
The only reason to wear vegan Birkenstocks is if you need ones that can be run through a professional kitchen dishwasher. And yes, they make them to do that.
If you have really small hands and very flexible wrists, you can change the headlight bulbs in your Subaru.
Astonishing numbers of people do not know that shooting someone in the leg is not a choice for a police officer in a use of force encounter.
They quoted Milton at the end of “Space Seed,” the episode that spawned the “The Wrath of Khan.” :-)
Thank you, Amy. I’ll check out the site.
The first time AUDad tried to change the oil in my Subie, he drained the transmission fluid. $350, a tow truck, and the Subaru dealership’s repair department later, he learned how to do it.
My mother and I were driving up the lane from her farm in her truck. This makes Mom sound like a practical, can-do woman, right? Well, the lane was dusty, the windshield was filthy and, being a good young adult daughter, I naturally had to roll my eyes and comment.
Kate: ” MUH-ther, the windshield is FIL-thy. Can you even see the road?”
Mom:”Oh, I know…I’ll wash it when I stop to get gas.”
Kate: “Okay, but in the meantime, why don’t you use the wiper-washer?”
Mom: “The what?”
Kate:” The wiper-washer…”
Mom: [looks blank]
Kate: “Omigawd…look…”
I reached over and pressed the button. Squirt. Squirt. Swish. Swish.
Flabbergasted Mom:”Neat!”
I come by my lacunae honestly, I guess.
:) I’ve heard of them, but that’s about it. Our Subarus do have a bit of granola in their family tree however. We first bought one after I complained to my drum banging, Boulder living, mountain climbing sister about driving around Lake Michigan in lake effect snow in a Mini Cooper and she suggested we get a Subaru “like everybody out here.” Shortly thereafter, a 2011 Outback was born, and we haven’t looked back. (And I’m sorry, but no, I have no clue how to change the oil.)
Okay, just don’t tell anyone that I don’t know where my furnace is, okay? I mean, I have an image to maintain. Thanks.
Can I tellya, aside from the AWD in lake effect snow, a big part of the reason I’ve become loyal to them is a reason that might have some general applicability for Ricochetti — value. That’s a pretty conservative value, isn’t it? They’re really pretty inexpensive for a car with the size and comfort they have (we’ve got the aforementioned Outback and a 2014 Legacy), and your 10 y/o one has held on to more of its value than most brands do. I just feel sensible, frugal and, dare I say it, conservative, driving a Subaru.
There are so many Subaru owners here that liberals might decide that there are tea party sleepers at work….
This is why I don’t try. :)
LOL. I’m suddenly feeling much better about not being able to change the oil.
Thanks Cato! That does help.
In New Jersey, DIY oil changes are fine. My town even accepts waste oil at the DPW yard. So, in NJ you can jack up your car, get underneath it, open the oil pan, remove and replace the filter, fill and recycle all on your own.
You’re just not allowed to pump your own gas.
Are you serious (about the gas)? I’m not sure I’ve ever had anybody pump my gas in my whole life. I remember it when I was too young to drive. My parents and grandparents had their gas pumped somewhere about pre-1975. But I don’t even know anywhere that pumps gas for you now.
This. Auto parts store or a gas station that would take it. It has been a few years for me, too. My current car requires the dealer to do oil changes because the filter is very hard to get to and I’m not as nimble as when I had a Datsun 210.
I think it’s also illegal to pump your own gas in Oregon.
Just hanging out on Ricochet makes me feel ignorant. There are times I’m 14 comments deep on a post and ask myself “Am I the only person who hasn’t studied the philosophy of the ancient Greeks?” Or the writings of Saint Thomas Aquinas?
One mental skill I am very bad at is navigating from memory. Most people can go someplace 2 or 3 times and remember how to get there again without directions or help. My ex-wife could go back to a house she went to one time two years earlier. If it’s someplace that takes more than a couple turns to find, I’ve got to go there more than a dozen times before I can just find it cold. And if it’s been many years since I’ve been there, I won’t be able to find it unassisted even if I’ve been there dozens of times. It’s rather embarrassing.
It is.
You and my wife must have shared teachers because she is almost hopelessly ignorant of geography. I have to be careful not to tease her about it too much, though. I have a horrible memory for events or conversation, and if she wasn’t there reminding me that yes we did have the so-and-sos over for dinner last month I wouldn’t stop embarrassing myself.
Setting: After church in the foyer:
Me: “Hey, I was thinkin’ we haven’t had you and your family over for dinner yet”
Bro. Standley: “Um, yep, we came over last week, and obviously we made a big impression”
Me: “…” *runs and hides in sunday school*
-E
Hey hey hey ! Let’s keep it PG in here.
“Mommy, what’s hydraulic coupling?”
“Hush, dear, I’ll tell you when you’re older”
-E