Monday, April 14, 2008

Selective Hearing

I'm in the middle of reading The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell. http://www.gladwell.com/tippingpoint/ He writes about how the smallest movements can trigger epidemics, fashions trends and write history. Over dinner last night I was discussing what I'd read thus far with my husband and stepson, Pres.
In one portion of the book, the idea that one person can have tremendous effects on diseases and epidemics was explored. We discussed Gladwell's remarks about the French Canadian flight attendant who claimed to have 2500 sexual partners and was linked to at least 40 of the earliest AIDS cases in North America.
We went on to discuss another portion of the book in which Gladwell discusses how personalities and social gifts can affect social epidemics. One illustration was the famous ride of Paul Revere. Paul Revere and another revolutionary, William Dawes both rode out that night to warn that the British were coming. We never hear of Dawes' ride because he failed to get the attention necessary to round local militias. Hence, the towns he rode through were not prepared because they did not listen to him. This led to a family discussion about that period in history and social factors that led to the Revolution. In all, the three of us discussed the events listed above for fifteen to twenty minutes.
This morning after getting dressed for work, my husband stopped me to tell me Pres had a question later after the discussion was over. It went something like this: "So Dad, all that stuff we were talking about earlier......Paul Revere was gay, right?"

1 comment:

TheOriginalAlicat said...

Hey Babe!! LOVE LOVE LOVE the new blog. I feel your pain... kinda. As the mom of two girls, who was sorta tomboyish herself... I'm drowing in a sea of pink and purple, hearts and butterflies and more make-up than I could EVER figure out how to apply. I'm raising Princess Squared, and am completely clueless about the proper positioning of a tiara. BUT! I do have a five year old that can swing leftie better than most kids can bat rightie. Gracie plays with dead bugs and takes a break to check her lip gloss in the "miwwor". Brit can catch a pop fly and carry on a conversation on her cell. If nothing, I did teach them to multi-task.