We’re on a Need-to-Know Basis

My father-in-law had a favorite saying when his children asked him why the sky was blue or some other question to which he had no answer. He would reply, “We’re on a need-to-know basis, and you don’t need to know.

I love this answer. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate those who are intellectually curious. My husband is, very much so, in spite of – or perhaps because of – the nebulous response he got as a child. He loves the Great Courses series. He reads history voraciously. He loves learning new things in math. He has an amazing mind. I love going to museums with him, because he gives me my own personal tour, chock full of interesting facts that are far more fascinating than those inscribed on the little plaques on the wall.

Alas, I do not retain any of this kind of knowledge. He will read me interesting facts in some book he’s reading, and I will say, “Wow, that is so amazing.” Then the next day or the day after that, I will have forgotten. He, on the other hand, will file it away and retrieve it weeks or months or years later. And he’ll say, “Don’t you remember, I told you all about this.” And I will shrug and agree that he probably had, and that my mind is a sieve.

The things that my mind HAS retained are random and generally unhelpful. For instance, when was the last time someone asked you to sing the words to the Patty Duke Theme Song? Or to name the six wives of Henry VIII? Or ask you the meaning of life, the universe and everything? (It’s 42, by the way.)

I have come to accept my limitations. I am grateful that my brother understands and even embraces the world of electronics…that fiber optics are as familiar to him as the faces of his children. Stephen Hawking has my respect and admiration, but if I lived to be 193, his concepts would still elude me.

I don’t need to know why the sky is blue. Just that it’s there, above the clouds, predictable and lovely and just the color a sky should be.

Dad was right. I don’t need to know.