I have an interest in perfection, a subject easier studied
than possibly attained. (Although I
found the previous sentence to be remarkably successful.)
This curiosity began unfortuitously when, as a precocious
eight year-old, I proudly proclaimed to my grandfather,
“I got ninety-six on my arithmetic exam.”
To which he unsmilingly replied,
“What happened to ‘the other four’?”
Is there such a word as “Grand-patricide”?
(I may have then wondered, and probably
did.)
Still, the incentivizing “seed” had been permanently planted. How exactly, I urgently pondered, do you
scale the seemingly unreachable summit of “a hundred”?
Then, I went into writing, a pursuit in which “perfection”
is functionally inoperative, partly because writing’s a subjective operation so
“Who’s to decide what exactly constitutes ‘a hundred’?’”, and partly because
there are so many words it is practically impossible to consistently hit the bull’s
eye with each of them.
I’ll bet even Hamilton’s
prodigiously gifted Lin-Manuel Miranda has sleep-sapping second thoughts about
rhyming… I just flipped through the booklet of Hamilton lyrics and was unable to identify one regrettable
rhyme. (Although I am certain if you
asked him, he’d go straight to the
spot and say, “I just could not come up a better
one. ‘College’ and ‘astonish’? Ay, Carumba!”)
Still, despite my inability to approach close enough to “perfection”
to see it with the Hubble Telescope, I assiduously examined that conundrous
enterprise in others, to determine
why that sought-after objective is so frustratingly beyond human achievement. (Although animals
can do it. CHEETAH: “I have an
unblemished record at ‘bringing down antelopes.’ Which would be noteworthy, except that all
the other cheetahs do too.”)
Recent Memorable Example:
I saw the 2017 Dodgers,
at one point this season, winning an astonishing 51 out of 62 games –
challenging the best “Won-Loss” record of all time – suddenly losing 20 out of
their next 25 games, capturing, during that dismal decline, one game, while contemporaneously losing 17.
Yes, there were injuries.
And yes, the “Marathon”-length season eventually exhausted their
energies. And yes, there is the inescapable
“Regression toward the mean”, the “Law of Averages”, inevitably bringing one’s “Icarus”-like
performance more predictably back down to earth. (Though, hopefully, without the accompanying Icarus-like “splat.”)
Those factors were unquestionably contributory. But there was, I believed, some more salient
and ultimately more satisfying reason for the precipitous nosedive.
Of course nobody
ever wins all their games – an “imperfection”
my grandpa, in a mistaken incentivizing technique, would have unhelpfully pointed
out. Still, in baseball, you take 51 out
of 62 games, that’s a stratospheric “Winning Percentage” of… you know, numerically, it’s a ton!
And then, the rains came down.
After record-setting successes, pitchers with pinpoint
accuracy were suddenly “just missing” their locations. Batters who regularly punished the opposition
pitchers’ “mistakes” now fouled them harmlessly out of play, or whiffed entirely,
the missed pitches popping tauntingly into adversary catchers’ welcoming gloves.
Inevitable winners becoming inevitable losers?
What the heck was going
on?
Suddenly, I “got” it.
(A spontaneous insight, seen as the illuminating “Answer”, because, for me, “spontaneous insights” have
never once led me astray.)
In baseball, with its under-appreciated standards of Major
League proficiency, where even the worst
teams can defeat the most talented ones, there is an indefinable “Winner’s Edge”
that ultimately generates champions, an edge the juggernaut Dodgers once possessed but had allowed, unconsciously,
to slip away.
You win 51 out of 62 games, then take your foot imperceptibly
“off the gas”, the propelling “wind at your back” turns in the other direction,
and before you know it,
You are a horrendous “one-and-seventeen.”
It is a precarious proposition, the players – and teams –
being carefully tuned machines. You deviate
from your typical game – by, say, the softening distraction of being so far
ahead in the standings – you lose your enabling “Winner’s Edge”, and, shortly
thereafter, you lose 20 of the next 25 games.
I recall, not dissimilarly, as a performer on the 1974
summer replacement series, The Bobbie
Gentry Goodtime Hour, I was waiting to tape my sure-fire “Making a Peanut
Butter Sandwich from ‘Scratch’” routine – involving the essential ingredients:
a sack of shelled peanuts, a skittish elephant and a measured infusion of
scurrying mice. (Use your imagination,
remembering the reliable “‘Eek!’ Effect” scurrying mice have on highly-strung
elephants and their shattering consequences on strategically strewn shelled peanuts.)
As I waited backstage – confident, prepared, and ready to go
– a visiting producer, a transplanted Canadian who, I believe, mistook me for my
older brother, began loudly berating me for “… thinking you are ‘so great’.”
When I finally appeared before the cameras, that disquieting
incident threw off my studied “calm but focused” equilibrium, leaving a once
can’t-miss “Mice and Elephant” routine edited strategically out of program.
The “Good News” is, with preparation, experience and fueling
enthusiasm, you are nearer “Perfection” than you can possibly imagine. The “Bad News” is, the slightest buffeting
distraction, and your excised “Peanut Butter From ‘Scratch’” routine lies
ignominiously on the production’s cutting-room floor.
More than any conceivable factor, it’s that vaguely determinable
“Winner’s Edge” that spells the disparity between “ninety-six” and “a hundred” –
the difference between (arithmetical) “Perfection” and “Just missed.”
To this day, I wonder what deflecting determinant robbed 8
year-old Earlo of that elusive “other four.”
(And why my infuriating grandpa felt it maddeningly necessary
to bring it up.)
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