In the course of my searching for my old hair photos and then catching up on at least six months worth of check balancing, a disturbing little thought came to me:

I use very little of what I learned in school.

I’ve spent over half my life in classes, from pre-kindergarten to a bachelor’s degree, and I’ve learned everything from the story of Beowulf to finding eigenvalues for a matrix. Yet here I am doing “research” for my “report” on hair and doing basic addition and subtraction to keep my check register up to date with all my bank statements. How sad.

At least H.E. was able to use some calculus when he worked as a navigator, and doctors use their knowledge of anatomy all the time. But me? I’ve read practically all kinds of literature, studied math higher than I can see, and learned the names of the three basic codons that make up the sequences in genetic code, and what do I do for a living? I lay text and images out for catalogs, brochures, web sites, and whatnot.

The irony isn’t lost on me.

So now I’m trying to decide, of all the things I learned in school, what is the most useless? I’d venture a guess, but first I’d have to figure out all the things I’ve forgotten before I can make a fair decision.

And if all that stuff is useless anyway, I’d rather not spend the time recalling all that knowledge.

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