History
December 6, 2001
7:03 a.m.
Yesterday I zipped home from work and cut the grass, then fired up the grill and cooked burgers as it grew dark. December 5th. Geez. Of course, the weather guys are predicting snow tomorrow.   Sometimes I find myself thinking about the huge history of SF--and being a relative newcomer to the field, I tend to get a little overwhelmed. Sure, I read SF when I was a kid, and as a twenty-something, and so on and so on. But I didn't really stash all that stuff into the card catalogue of my memory, so I can't and don't whip out never-ending factoids about the little nuances of the field that make it so interesting. The problem is that there is so much miniscule trivia, and so many writers. And, worse, to really get to know these writers of the past, you have to invest some serious hours reading. It's a bit daunting. I have, however, been around it long enough to know a few things about a few people. For example, I do know a lot about current day authors, and a bit about current day publishers, and enough history to get along in a quiet discussion. I certainly don't know everything, and truth be told, I don't really care to know everything. But I do okay, and I know the big names and most of the medium names and even, yes, quite a few of the names and work of people still struggling to make their marks, you know? Don't ask me why, but I read an article yesterday about Destiny's Child--the hip-hop group that's sold a ton of CDs in the past few years with cool-sounding, but eventually (I predict) somewhat disposable pop music. It turns out that DC is planning to break up for a while, each of the three going their own way. They may get back together again, but they are giving no promises and no expectation of when this might occur--except that the break-up will only happen after their tour this summer, thereby, of course, giving them the opportunity to do a lucrative farewell concert. You might ask: what does my knowledge of SF history and Destiny Child's break-up have to do with each other? Not a whole lot, I suppose. But I was struck by a comment I read in the article. Kelly Rowland (one of the gang), when asked about the possibility of a reunion, said: "You know how the Beatles broke off, they all did their solo projects and they came back together and they were even stronger." And I just went, huh? Holy cows. Here is a musician (and, yes, I consider a vocalist a musician) who does not know the Beatles never reunited. Admittedly, Destiny's Child is a young group. But they've been around for four or five years now. Certainly long enough to know the Beatles didn't get together. Heck, they even sang at the Paul McCartney benefit a month ago. Somehow, this made me feel better about the holes in my own knowledge of SF history--but not in the way you probably think. Reading her comment, I realized that I don't expect Kelly Rowland to know everything about the Beatles. I don't expect her to know where they met, or what they were doing when they filmed HELP! There's too much trivia in the world to know everything. I only expect her to know the basics. And so it's only fair that I only expect myself to know the basics of my field, too. Let's see ... Didn't Niven and Pournell break up? Or was Heinlein the walrus? And didn't Kubrick want to set 2001 to the soundtrack of "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" until Clarke put his foot down? Maybe not. Oh, well. I guess I'm just a fool on the hill. Have a great day.  Daily Persistence is © Ron Collins |
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