Knowledge

Knowledge. What is it and where do you get it? Is it inherited? Or maybe absorbed by parents, teachers and peers?
First of all, is it something real special, academic or just plain old common sense?


Personally I think it's all of the above. Knowledge is a complex thing. You can't see, taste, touch, smell, see or hear it. And yet you can recognise it when it's there and you can recognise it when it is not there.


I have a thirst for knowledge. I admire people who are knowledgeable. This does not mean that they are highly educated, although education will not rule them out. I know some people who are highly educated and yet one would never call them knowledgeable or wise.
Now there is another word...wise. Maybe that is more the word I am looking for. Wisdom and knowledge seem to be good bed fellows.


I once tried to make a friend of a woman my age. We both loved art shows. So we made a date and spent the afternoon together. Up until this time we had only greeted each other and had not spent any time together. As we walked around looking at the art works, we found we both liked the same pieces and for the same reasons. Then over lunch we discovered that we had both married men who had similar occupations; had both married in the same year and had both given birth to our first son in the same year. We had lived oceans apart and yet we were very similar.
It felt as if I had spent the afternoon with myself. How boring. Nice but boring. We never pursued our friendship.


As I take a closer look at my friendships now, I realise I like friends who are very different to me. People I can learn from and hopefully I have something to offer them as well. Most of my friends are not academics. I am not an academic. But my friends are intelligent and interesting.
Ah! There is another word intelligent. What have intelligence, wisdom, and knowledge have in common? Have they anything in common. Now I have opened up an area I can research and blog about another day.


There is so much to learn in this universe. No one mind can absorb all the knowledge there is in one lifetime. I often say I do not have enough time to make all the mistakes one can make in this life, that is why I learn by others mistakes. Also there is so much to learn, that is why I learn from others.
The best way I know how to do that is to read. I am always sad when I meet people who don't read. I cannot imagine living my life without reading.


I thank all the teachers who taught me to read and to love books. My favourite shops are of course book shops, stationary shops and plant nurseries. I love to garden too. Sadly I don't do much of that anymore. I'm too busy reading and writing.