And the point is?

 

WARNING: This post is likely to make me very unpopular.  

If something has no point it becomes pointless. Like a pencil for instance. If a pencil has no point it is pointless and of no use; unless you sharpen it again and it has a point.

It's the same with life. We need to have a point at what we do.

I hate it when I have to do something just because convention dictates it. Because others have done it and I have to slavishly do the same. Like when travelling for instance.

People would say to me, "You've been to Paris and not visited the Eiffel Tower? Or been to the Louvres?" Why should I? Millions of people before me have been to Paris and visited these and other places. Why should I do the same? Perhaps I prefer to visit a restaurant and have a nice French meal. I remember once sitting outdoors at a restaurant eating Al Fresco. That was the name of the owner. As I was served my French onion soup it started to rain. It took me ages to finish that soup; it kept refilling the plate.

Some tourists go to Italy and take photos of them pushing the Tower of Pisa. It doesn't mean I should do the same, does it? Or they go to the Sydney Opera House, or this or that place. It doesn't mean I should follow their example. When I get back to work and colleagues gleefully describe their holidays they are astounded to discover that I did not visit or take photos of certain places. "You went all the way there and did not take a photo of the place?" they ask. Why should I? I can buy a postcard of the place, or print one on the Internet.

I remember once going to the hairdresser and he asked me how was my holiday in Rome and the Vatican City. "Did you see the Pope?" he asked me.

Yeh ... like you can go there and ring the doorbell and ask to see the Pope.

In order to shut him up I said I saw the Pope and had a private audience with him.

"Really?" he asked, "what did he say?"

I replied, "He said, tell me who cut your hair so bad and I'll get your money back for you!"

And it doesn't stop at travelling; people also expect you to do certain things just because it is the convention to do so.

What? You haven't read any Shakespeare sonnets? You should do so.

Why? Why should I read his sonnets and his plays? He doesn't read any of my books. Besides his plays are boring. No car chases in any of them. Ben-Hur was written years before Shakespeare in the Old Testament times and it has a chariot race which Charlton Heston won. None of that in any of Shakespeare's writings. Can you imagine if he had written Baywatch, Magnum P.I. or Hawaii Five 0, they would have been pointless written in rhyming sonnets.

Music is not immune to the snobbery that is convention. I'll admit that I am ignorant when it comes to classical music. I know there are some tunes that I like but I cannot name them or tell you who composed them and why. When I need to know I just ask someone by humming the tune as best I can and more often than not they don't know either. I wish there was a computer app where you hum a tune and they tell you it is Mozart Piano Concerto played on the bagpipes because his piano was being retuned on that day.

Anyway, as I said earlier, no doubt this post will make me unpopular amongst my well-educated and well-travelled and knowledgeable audience. I just don't see the point of doing something just because everyone else seems to be doing it.

And that is why I refuse to take the trash out on Fridays because collection is the next day. Let someone else do it. The neighbours for instance. They seem to enjoy it. Why don't they take souvenir photos of them taking the trash out and leave me alone?