Eight

Wanted: Brain Cells

I like to fancy myself a somewhat intelligent human being. I’m no Einstein, but I watch the news, listen to NPR every so often (when there’s not a good song on elsewhere), and have my “home screen” set to the New York Times (which I will occasionally peruse). Although I avoid political discussions because 1) an intense fear of being/looking/acting ignorant and 2) Mama shies away from conflict, I can hold my own in conversations about the world around me. For the most part. I read my fair share of Entertainment Weekly, true, but I also read real-live books that usually do a pretty good job of exposing me to the world.

So yesterday’s second came as a fascinating, unsettling surprise. 

Last night, Mike reminded me of a conversation we had with our family friend Aashish the other day. Aashish’s family is Indian, and we were talking about where they were from, who’s still living in India, and so on. He mentioned something about Bombay, and then quickly corrected himself: “I mean, Mumbai.” Something clicked inside my head, something either telling me to listen up and learn something or whispering to me, “What? WHAT?” 

You see, that was THE first time in my life I’ve heard that Bombay as a named city no longer exists. I’ve heard of Mumbai, don’t get me wrong, and my husband has even traveled there quite a few times for work. When I first heard of where he was headed, I thought, “Oooh. Never heard of that city! How exotic. Tell me about it.” But that’s about as much as I knew, clearly. The other night, upon inquiring further, my ignorance was exponentially exposed. Calcutta? Nope, not Calcutta any more. And the list goes on, of course, as most intelligent, informed citizens of the world should rightly know.

Mike was somewhat stunned by my ignorance on this particular topic, as well he should be. After all, I play Jeopardy each night with such zeal that I occasionally push family members out of the room, and I take the “Adult On-Line Test” each year, religiously. While Mike was stunned, I was simply . . . disturbed. How did I miss this? This huge, immensely important international evolution of one of the biggest, most intriguing and beautiful countries on the planet? Something tied so tightly to the citizens’ heritage and identity and culture?

I could blame it on information overload--too much going on all around us all the time--but that’s no excuse. After all, it’s been a slow evolution of renaming and respelling, certainly not solely since I began my career as a carpool driver and baby raiser. But I think it’s simply that I cannot keep up with the changing news, world, geography, around me; that worries me a bit. Thank goodness I have my daughters, ten times smarter than I was at their age, to keep me informed. Did you know there’s another OCEAN, for God’s sake? Yup. Found that out not long ago. And they will undoubtedly continue to be my keys to the technology vaults of understanding that surround me, having some sort of innate ability (or is it lack of fear?) that makes them able to solve the most maddening, scream-inducing problem with a simple click or swipe. 

But the fact remains: the other night, I was so embarrassed. I guess I should settle down a bit, not let it upset me. Look at this flub on my part as a reason to remain engaged, involved, and ever-inquisitive, like the person I used to be and still fancy myself as most of the time.  An active citizen of the world, even if the only exploration I do is through online news or the television. 

Actually, maybe more than embarrassed, I was intrigued. We’re surrounded every day by the NEW that makes up our future by altering the past. That’s exciting, dynamic. Keeps us on our toes. It’s intriguing to me when, at the age of almost-forty-five, I learn something I’ve never known before. As I get older and become more and more aware of the beauty, life, suffering, and sadness in the world, I’m compelled to keep trying. After all, it's important. It means something to be informed about the cultures, world, people around us: it means we care.

Better brush up on my World Geography for a start.