Introduction to SKitW: An Appreciation of Stupidity

“Give me a child until he is seven, and I will give you the man.”

• Jesuit motto

Americans appear to possess an abundance of appreciation for genius or at least exhibit the capability of it.

They seem to admire the brilliance of scientists such as Stephen Hawking or Neil de Grasse Tyson. They certainly praise the work of a great actor or the skills of a sports superstar. And on occasion, a deserving writer, with a critical command of language and storytelling, actually tops the bestselling charts.

But this hardly compares with American obsession with stupidity. They relish the exploits of the idiot.

What else could account for the decades-long success of such exploitation talk shows as the Jerry Springer Show or Maury or prank programs such as Jackass, Ridiculousness, or Tosh.0 or any reality show? We can point to politics, where it is simply too easy to poke at Donald Trump and anyone who ever voted for him, but then could just as easily note that Joe Biden and his supporters do not always possess sharp tools either.

That does NOT let the rest of the world off the hook, however. If Americans have an obsession with stupidity, then the world has an obsession with Americans. And if I remember my high school math well enough, then the transitive property means that the world is also obsessed with stupidity.

Despite this obsession, where is the in-depth analysis of stupidity?  As Socrates possibly stated: “The unexamined life … no matter how stupid … is not worth living.”

The great writer Malcolm Gladwell has written many fascinating books about blinking and tipping points and outliers and 10,000 hours. Books line the shelves of online stores and libraries about genius and intelligence – what comprises it, how to get it, how to recognize it, how to exploit it.  

But who really tries to explain stupidity? Where are the deep dives and the careful examinations of the levels of stupidity? I suppose the comedy channels, Adult Swim, comic strips, and the former Dave Barry columns would delve into the issue a bit. But stupidity seems to be a concept unexamined.

As the grown-up version of The Stupidest Kid in the World, I don’t obsess about stupidity, I experience it personally … often display it … nearly every day.

There’s the time I restored a tiny 26-foot sailboat in Norfolk, Virginia, and even though my sailing experience and skills were rudimentary at best. I opted to sail for Washington, D.C. at the break of several huge thunderstorms. Amid 12-foot waves, I got seasick, lost all power, sprung a leak, and ran into a buoy in the middle of Chesapeake Bay. Somehow I managed to navigate the vessel to our nation’s capitol along the Potomac River in one piece and then lived on it for a year.

There’s the hockey match where I dove like Bobby Orr and managed to drive my foot into the boards on a poorly executed defensive play. The foot popped off the leg, and I was out of commission for nearly a year. The ice dive was for naught, as the other team still scored. Despite separating the foot from the leg, it eventually healed, and I returned to playing and since then have screwed up an elbow and a knee and then actually dislocated a wrist, popped it temporarily into place, and finished the game. I used duct tape to secure the wrist for two weeks, which surprisingly helped it heal.

My efforts put a serious dent into Darwin’s survival of the fittest theories because I am alive and well and writing about all of this many years later.

It would be best if I didn’t go into details about other aspects of my adult life because this is a site about the Stupidest Kid in the World, and a site about the stupidest adult would face pretty stiff competition. And if my wife’s reactions or my daughter’s comments to some of the things I do are any indication, they are living within their own stupid reality show just by knowing me.

The only difference between me and anyone who appears on the Jerry Springer Show or on the myriad reality programs is that I don’t possess the gene that compels me to go before an array of cameras and a live studio audience to air my grievances or live my life.

And yet I apparently have the gene that urges me to fully contemplate my story and put it on a computer screen, so maybe I am really not that different.

But I am here to examine a life lived stupidly.

There’s a certain narcissistic bent to these memoirs and blogs, the thought that anyone besides the author himself would be interested in any part of the narrative or even one little story. Maybe there’s a certain cathartic exercise to this, whereby writing it out is the equivalent of casting it out and embarking on a recovery to common sense.

A few acknowledgments … of course to my parents, who had to deal with the stupidest kid in the world for the entire span (and dealt with it well into that kid’s adult life); my brother, who was subjected to quite a few of the stupidest episodes; my daughter, who has wondered aloud about some stupid things she has experienced with her father; and my wife, who has had borne the brunt of this for the past decade.

A few caveats.

I may change some names in some entries not so much to protect the innocent but to protect them from additional stupidity.

I will be making no claim of 100 percent accuracy as this is a collection of recollections from a middle-aged man peering at the past through the filter of the eyes of a child, a boy, or a much younger man. Besides, where humor and silliness collide with reality or fact, I may skew more toward the humorous and silly remembrance bears out…  because that’s how I remember it or that’s how I tell it.

And as I recall more of my stupid moments, I will be keeping in mind the Jesuit motto above or a similar line Wordsworth once wrote: The child is the father of the man.

With that, I have a good understanding of whom to blame for all of the stupid shit that goes on now: The Stupidest Kid in the World.  There are those who say given the opportunity to alter the past, they would not change a thing. But as for me … if I could go back in time … I would strongly consider kicking some sense into the sorry ass of The Stupidest Kid in the World.