The Giant Spitwad Theory

I'm a questioner. I have a need to know about everything I encounter in my daily life. I endlessly ask "Why? What? Where? When?" like a curious 5-year-old. Why is it that way? Why did they do that? What's that made of? Where did it go? When will that happen? I have an insatiable curiousity.

Actually I have a giant spitwad in my head.

That's what I call it, the giant spitwad. It's an accumulation of all the tidbits of information learned over my lifetime. It's The Big Picture I'm always trying to complete to make sense of the world. I call it a spitwad because most of the information is probably useless. I don't know that I'll ever need it again once I understand it, but it fits a hole in the puzzle and the puzzle must be completed.

As I find a new bit of information I mentally chew on it a while. If it logically fits on my giant spitwad I stick it in the appropriate place. If it doesn't, the little Iota of Non-Understanding (INU) is launched into orbit around the giant spitwad. Later, if I discover a new bit of information that will connect, I retrive the orbiting INU. Those get stuck together then stuck onto the spitwad.

I have a lot of junk orbiting out there: that question I missed on the ACT test; bits I've read and don't understand; actions of people that don't make sense. I have faith that some day I will have understanding and these bits will be stuck in place to complete The Big Picture.

Sometimes it takes years for an INU to find a place on the spitwad.

When I was a little kid, maybe 5th or 6th grade, I read the novel "Valley of the Dolls." No reading material was off-limits to me as a kid, by the way. There was a passage or two where a guy was doing something to a girl. I didn't understand the words used, but from the context I got the gist that it was a sexual encounter of some kind. The girl didn't want to do something the regular way, she wanted the guy to "go down on her". This going down business was apparently more pleasurable than the regular way. I didn't understand at the time what "going down" meant, so that little INU went into orbit. Somewhere around the age of 19 or 20 I had a Eureka! moment where I was able to retrieve the 'going down' INU and stick it to my giant spitwad. A notable day in the life, that was.

Some INUs float about aimlessly - Pez dispensers for instance. Most people look at a Pez and think "Pez. Candy. Want/don't want that." But not me. I think, "What is that made of? Who designed that? How does it work? Why was it invented? Who decides what heads get produced? How long do they stay in production? What's in the candy? Why did they decide 10 candies per dispenser; why not 15? What's the profit margin per item? How many are produced yearly?" Yep, I could stare at a Pez dispenser for an hour and entertain my brain. One day there will be a TV show on Pez dispensers and all my Pez INUs will find a home on the giant spitwad. That or I could look it up on the internet.

Other data I have stuck to my spitwad I know for sure I will never use. Cockfighting. I know a great deal about cockfighting because I asked. I got an hour-long tutorial from a guy who was passionate about cock-fighting. He loved his birds more than his wife and children and took better care of the birds. He brought me cock-fighting magazines the next day because I didn't grasp the concept of the metal spurs. The mags had ads for all different kinds. He took the time to explain when and why each type of spur was used. I'll never raise fighting chickens, I'll never fight chickens, I'll never attend a chicken fighting event. But I know about it now. The data is stuck forever on the spitwad.

Sometimes I ask about things I don't have an interest in simply because I am very interested in the person to whom I have asked the question. People will talk endlessly about their passions and in doing so reveal a lot about themselves. Cockfighting, beekeeping, steeplecross...things I wouldn't do, but someone does, and I'm very interested as to why. I collect the information about those topics for the spitwad, but more importantly I collect a person's motivation for doing them. People are endlessly fascinating. Why they do the things they do will entertain my brain for my entire lifetime. That stuff goes on the spitwad too.

One day I will understand how the world works and why it works the way it does. One day there will be no more orbiting INUs. On that day I can die happy. Until then I will be asking questions, collecting data, and building my spitwad of useful and useless information. It's my obsession and my passion.

Now you know.

Another blob for your spitwad.