Aweh dearly beloved fellow ruminants & groupies
This last weekend Nerine and I caught up with two critically acclaimed movies of 2022. “Everything Everywhere All at Once” (EEAO), and “The Banshees of Inisherin” (BOI). EEAO cleaned up at the academy awards receiving 11 nominations and winning 7 Oscars while BOI received 9 nominations and won no Oscars.
The two movies could not be more different. EEAO was frenetic, crazy, and fizzing with energy and BOI was a slow examination of the breakdown of a friendship set on a remote island in Ireland in 1923. For me, BOI is the better movie, but it did not inspire this week’s blog.
Although EEAO won all the awards from my own perspective I found that it started very well but the second half became tedious and repetitive, and I lost interest. I have a short attention span. It only merits a 3/5 score on the Ruminant Pink Friday ™ movie meter. The concept of you existing in infinitely many universes where you live every possible life you could have lived is very intriguing to me and set me to ruminating.
What do my alternate lives look like? What could have been? What would have been? What should have been? If you look back on your life, there are probably only really a handful of very important decisions you make which create the tapestry that is your life. It is worth ruminating on some of those decisions. I will confine myself to the five most important decisions in my life so far.
I think Warren Buffet is right when he says that the most important decision you make in your life is choosing a partner. I have a formidable partner in Nerine, and, of course, I chose her but much more importantly she chose me. I often wonder why she did. I have now visited the alternative universes where I did not marry Nerine and it’s not a pretty sight. I don’t have access to Nerine’s universes where she did not choose me, but I suspect she could do much better than me. Our marriage has not always been easy, and I suspect I might be the culprit. It was also Nerine who decided we would have children and so the next most important decision in my life was made by her. Without Nerine, I became a reclusive and childless academic and lifelong bachelor with no blog and no groupies. Now I have Nerine, two wonderful boys, three dogs, and a cat. Nerine has made several important decisions for me, and she is usually right but I’m not so sure about the decision to get another Labrador.
The next most important decision I took in 1979 was to study chemical engineering and that set my career path for the rest of my life. Was it a good choice? In one alternate universe, I followed my mother’s advice and studied actuarial science. The definition of an actuary is someone who finds accountancy too exciting. When I suggested actuarial science to the educational psychologist evaluating Connor, my youngest son, he said that based on his very low score for clerical diligence that it would be a terrible choice. Like father like son. Actuarial work involves a lot of routine and repetition. In my day clerical diligence was not measured and in an unfortunate universe, where I became an actuary, my careless error on yet another routine pension calculation caused the fund to go bankrupt and to me being shot by angry pensioners. I have the dubious distinction of designing a plant modification that caused the plant to blow up spectacularly, but that is a story for another blog.
The next important decision I made was to leave academia in 1991 and pursue an industrial career at Sasol. The alternative I considered at the time was to pursue an academic career in America. In this alternative universe, I become a mediocre chemical engineering professor at a middling University in America but Nerine flourishes in the land of opportunity and runs a large mediation and negotiation practice that brings her fame and riches. Having to mediate and negotiate with me has honed her skills to rock-star levels. Nerine brokers a deal between the Democrats and Republicans that completely changes American history and Donald Trump is not even nominated as a presidential candidate. He goes on to pursue his career in reality television and becomes a porn star. After that Nerine brokers a deal with the National Rifle Association where privately owned semi-automatic rifles and machine guns are banned and school shootings drastically diminish. I give up my academic career to become a house husband and develop an interest in cooking so that I can cook delicious meals for our family while Nerine brings home the bacon. I write a blog on how to cook with my specialty being cakes and cupcakes.
The last important decision I took was in 2014 when Sasol had yet another restructuring and I was demoted (although they didn’t use that word). I stayed on, past my best-before date, until 2021 when I reached my sell-by date. Many of my colleagues who chose to leave at that time have flourished. Curiously enough in this alternative universe, we also end up in America but without the fame and riches. I become a climate activist working for an NGO while Nerine runs a modestly successful negotiation practice. Sasol does much better without me.
Dear readers, what are the five most important decisions you have taken in your life? What happens to you in your alternative universes?
Are there more important decisions I need to make?
Thank you for all the ideas and comments. I really appreciate them and please keep them coming.
Regards
Bruce
Ruminant Pink Friday 