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I hate people who are always saying "If only I...", and "I should have...", and "I wish I..." You couldn’t have, you wouldn’t have, you didn’t.
But it’s hard not to wish I was alive when there was more opportunity: like to discover gravity. Sir Isaac’s sitting there, apple falls on his head, next thing he’s so famous they name a cookie after him.
I’m sure I would have invented potato soup if the Chinese hadn’t served it up in 1500 BC. I would have invented vichyssoise the next chilly day.
Somebody got rich by inventing the can opener. I could have done that. A few less teeth maybe, but I would have definitely worked it out. Somebody thought "Hey, put this skin on the ground--there, I’ve invented the rug!!" That could have been me.
I could have come up with the kitty litter box, the garbage can cover, the ash tray, the towel...
The problem is that I’ve had a history of inventing things that people already invented. I remember as a boy one rainy day I invented the umbrella. My version was quite large and carried by a parent at either end. When I saw my first real umbrella, I knew I was born too late.
My Irish background is rich in invention and creativity. The limerick, for example... Irish clog dancing... warm beer. The wedding brawl, I believe, is uniquely Irish.
WILLIAM SOUTHEY
My father’s mother’s mother’s father coined the word "autobiography". This was before someone invented the word "automobile". A couple of syllables away from generations of wealth.
He (great great great granddaddy Bill) also wrote the poem "Sugar and spice and everything nice, that’s what little girls are made of; snakes and snails and puppydog tails..." You know the rest. Everyone in every country has picked up on it. I may be prejudiced, but I think it’s right up there with "The itsy bitsy spider went up the water spout". And people remember that one even in places where there are no waterspouts.
The problem is, with six billion people, every three seconds a new life gives your ideas less chance. There are twice as many people in the world as there were when I graduated from college. It’s not fair. I wouldn’t know how to coin a word if I had one.
The further we explore with telescopes and electrical beams, the further we focus with atom smashers and quarks, the more we see that life is a mystery. Infants become parents; inventions become necessities. Sometimes we’re in the right place at the right time; sometimes, I suspect, the apple falls up.
The story OF INVENTION, NECESSITY IS THE MOTHER is Copyright 1998 by Dennis Lamour.
The collection of works called Fish Eggs For The Soul is Copyright 1998 by Brian Rickman.
Copy edited by Sara Fawbush, editor of The Young Writer's Collection.