Kid Logic

I have to admit that I have occasionally used the term kid logic. This is a misnomer. The thing is that a large part of growing up is learning logic and rational thought. We learn some of it the easy way by listening to what adults are trying to teach us, and we learn some of it the hard way by not giving enough thought to the consequences of what we want to do before we do it.

The lamps on the pier where I was walking cast a yellow glow. A bare foot child raced up to an object sitting on the pier and proceeded to stomp on that object. He then let out a howl and started crying. Perhaps I should have said he stomped in that object. Stomped in it is probably a more accurate description. I know this because of the information he imparted when his mother asked him what was wrong.

“It’s dog shit!” he wailed.

“Why did you step in it?” his father asked.

“I thought it was mustard.”

“Why did you want to stomp in mustard?”

This seemed like a perfectly logical question to an adult who would not consider mustard oozing up between his toes to be such a good thing. To the child, however, the question must have seemed like a condemnation of him for actions that had already been punished by the object he stomped in, and he cried louder and harder because of the criticism.

I suppose he thought it would be fun to see the mustard splatter. This, of course, is conjecture on my part. I do not have enough information for it to be anything but conjecture. Nor do I have enough information to determine all of the things the child learned from this experience. The connection between his bare foot and the dog shit and his reaction to that connection tell me he learned that stepping or stomping in dog shit was not a good thing. Whether he learned that it is not a good idea to step or stomp in mustard is not as easy to answer. Although I do have to give the child some credit; I am inclined to think that he was old enough to learn a broader lesson. By that I mean he probably also learned that it is not a good idea to step or stomp in something if you do not know what that something is.

The concept of knowing what something is before you step or stomp in it is simple enough. Putting that concept in practice as a rule is not nearly as easy. Few things in this world are certain, and we frequently act on incomplete information. We also get so distracted by what we want to do that we do not always see what we are really getting into. When the consequences of our missteps are undesirable we frequently refer to what we have done as stepping in shit. Older people become more cautious. I do not know if this is because the more years you live the more shit you have stepped in, or if it is because older people feel they have less time and energy to clean up the mess. It may be both. Draw you own conclusions. I am going to have to give the matter more thought before I do that. The one thing I can tell you is that age only reduces your fallibility to a slight extent. Older people have learned to tread carefully, but they also know that standing still is not a good option. There are still times when they have to act on incomplete information.

If you will pardon me now, I am going clean my shoes. For all our rationality and good intentions, we humans are still pretty clumsy creatures. What we step in also impacts others. I hope the people I have inadvertently insulted over the years will forgive me for soiling their emotional carpets.

First published in macsbackporch.foxtail-farms.com on Aug 17, 2010