Empty Erudition

Tonight, as I sit upstairs avoiding my reading list, I’m again reminded of the futility of it all. My reading list… okay, not technically a list so much as a stack… is filled with books covering a ridiculous range of topics. I’ve got hundreds of those so-called classics awaiting my attention from Aristotle to Wolff, two dozen history texts from ancient Rome to the Vietnam war, half a dozen science tomes and of course those Latin, Spanish, Russian, French and German textbooks. All of these topics have seen some amount of my attention in the recent past and each time I’ve picked up a lot of miscellaneous tidbits of great interest to absolutely no one but me.

For the most part, since the Emancipation (see November 29th, 2005: The Emancipation) and a lot of the time before it, I’ve spent my free time doing things that other people would consider ‘work.’ For whatever reason, the activities that most consider recreational in nature strike me as utterly silly. How, I ponder, can they sit there reading the latest Stephen King novel when there are so many interesting things they could be reading like science and mathematics and not to mention the vast joys of history! It seems a horrible waste of time to piddle ones time away on such plebeian, tripe pursuits.

Then, immediately after my egomaniacal fit subsides, I turn the same searching eye back on myself. What, in the name of all that is sane, am I going to do with any of this random trivia? After reading the first third of ‘The History of Private Life’ I now have a general idea of the internal workings of the ancient Roman government. So Frigging What? What does this mean? What positive impact does this have on the life of a computer programmer?

If anything, the impact is a negative one. As a social oddball, I already have difficulty relating to normal people. When conversing with Joe Average, the fact that Romans painted phalluses on their walls to ward off the evil eye is not a useful one. In general, attempting to use such a fact in any form of conversation is a complete dead end. I’d be much better served to plant myself in front of the television and watch whatever’s on. Humans spend a lot of time talking about television and I’m sure that some great friendships and business deals have been forged because of a discussion that started as some nicety about a TV show.

The average reader will at this point suggest perhaps that if I must read something factual that I should read something in the area of my profession. It of course makes perfect sense that the most practical and useful thing to pursue is one that furthers your own career. The potter looking for more business seeks to lean more about pottery, not shipbuilding after all. The suggestion is a reasonable one: I should be spending my time reading books about all the latest operating systems and programming languages, shouldn’t I?

This too, I would argue, would be meaningless to me in any practical way. Even if I were twice as expert in my chosen vocation, the net change in my workplace would be negligible. To all appearances anyway, my company already has a completely sufficient esteem for my skills as a programmer. What is lacking (and what will keep me forever a “3rd-class turd in the bowels of the company” [See December 17, 2005 - Missin’ the Christmas Party]) is my complete lack of social rapport. During my tenure with my current company, I have exercised the utmost in responsibility and never failed to do more than was expected. I do my job well and efficiently and more or less without complaint.

Despite whatever previous success I can claim though, I’m stuck at my current position and probably always will be. While others around me grow as employees and acquire new responsibilities, I’m doing basically the same job I was when I started. Management points and I scuttle over and tidy up the mess. Management points again and I scuttle in a different direction. I certainly can’t prove it, but I honestly believe that if I was half as competent at my job but twice as gregarious then I would somehow be in a better position with more responsibility. In some exceptionally absurd way, my career path is determined by my complete ignorance of NCAA basketball and American Idol contestants.

It should not be perceived that this is unique to my situation. No matter where you go, the person who does his job and keeps to himself will remain forever planted firmly where he is. No amount of job competence can compensate for lack of easy social interplay between employee and employer. Without the lubricant of meaningless and inane chit-chat, the wheels of career advancement grind to a halt. Employers find it much easier to promote those that they themselves can get along with on a personal level, not those that excel and do their jobs well but hide themselves quietly in a corner. Often, the true spoils of workplace competition go to the person who blows his horn the loudest without regard to how tarnished might be the brass of which it is made.

So in a very real way, this big stack of books is screwing up my life. No matter how interesting or satisfying any topic may be to me, it will only serve to widen the gulf between me and those upon whom I need to practice the art of sycophancy whether it be in the workplace, a job interview or at the grocery store. I certainly can’t wheedle my way up the corporate ladder with any amount of knowledge on any topic in which I have an interest. What really seems to count is the knowledge of popular culture and the ability to turn that conversation which starts out as inane small talk into one with real workplace relevance.

If the stack of books and the information within has no practical relevance in terms of career, then what good is it? I have just enough information to bore the average person who knows nothing of it and too little information to talk coherently with someone who deals with it for a living. Pursuing this knowledge simply puts one in a sort of limbo. In reality, it only serves as entertainment. No better and no worse than the dime romance novels I’d typically refer to as plebeian tripe. Sad it is indeed to admit that Dickens has achieved moral equivalence in my mind with Danielle Steele. Dreadful sorry, Boz.

[Note to selected readers: If my employer should actually read this, it should be noted that it is in no way an indictment of my actual working conditions, position or compensation. Rather, it is a statement of my own personal limitations in the subject areas.]