Perspective

I've been watching a lot of pirated television recently, mostly because I have a lot of time that's not regimented by outside sources that I should be using to write rather than enjoy television that I don't technically have a legal right to be watching--or is it legal to watch but illegal to upload? In any case, it's on YouTube, and if the world's most up-and-coming software giant lets it go (or, in any case, hasn't found it yet), I see it as my Google-given right to enjoy it.

If you're curious about what I'm watching, it's mostly the British car show Top Gear, because I know nothing about cars and can't even drive, but find something hilarious about watching middle-aged English men complaining about cars and each other. Also, the book series I was reading at the time of my last blog entry is The Dresden Files. It's not the greatest writing, but it's a solid Summer page-turner, the chief draw of which, for me, is that the narrator is so sarcastic.

At any rate, as I was watching unhealthy amounts of Top Gear, I came across an episode in which the gang race against a team from a German car show I've never heard of. I watched the episode in English, naturally, but then I decided to watch the German version for a lark. The difference in the focus was obvious: the shows focus on their respective teams. What struck me was that I bought the perspective offered by each show. In the British version, the Top Gear team seemed the way they usually do on their show: fun, enthusiastic, and a little acerbic in their sense of humor. They laugh, they smile, they make fun. The German team seemed like a bunch of Germans complaining, which is something they do with German efficiency. On the German show, however, the German team seemed much more likeable (although they still spent most of their time complaining), and the British team looked arrogant and obnoxious. The point is that I actually found myself rooting for the British team on the Top Gear version and for the German team on their version.

Side-note: on the British show, they made lots of jokes about World War II and its aftermath, even playing up the team showing up to the challenge in Spitfire fighter planes. On the German show, although they showed the Spitfire entrance, neither the team nor the narrator said a thing about it. On the other hand, even the polite Germans couldn't help making cracks about Dunkirk and Arnhem when they were given miniature tanks to play with.

This naturally got me thinking about my own life and opinions. I must admit that most of my opinions were formed not by my independent thinking but by the persuasive charisma of people I have run across, the people I respected and treated as teacher. Now I can't help but wonder if I would believe things completely differently if I had other teachers, not to mention other parents. Would I be riding around in a pickup truck with my hound dog's ears flapping as he puts his head out the window, listening to Country and Western and flying an American flag above the porch of my house? Would I go to church if I had genuinely connected with one of my priests? Would I have majored in something actually useful instead of English, and therefore be working at a solid career instead of sitting in my apartment on a Monday afternoon writing a blog?

Perhaps. But the revelation I've had, or think I've had, is that it's vital for me to examine myself, to weigh for myself what I believe and what I hold most dear, and to determine for myself, not by the influence of others, who I am. Ever since I was in high school, I have defined myself by the reading and (attempted) writing of fiction. Perhaps it's time I had a good long look at that as well. It's not too late to become a theoretical physicist.