One of my earliest memories involves discovering that the perfection and omniscience of adults –particularly one’s parents– is a brittle ruse. The memory in question involved a huge set of orange and black Encyclopedia Britannica books that my family kept, for some reason, in the hall closet. For those who don’t know, encyclopedias are like the precursors to the Internet, except without so much pornography and advertising. You could look up all kinds of subjects and read all about them while looking at color photographs or drawings.
In this case, I had snuggled in the hall closet between the vacuum cleaner and a foot locker full of blankets, propping the volume “T” between my knees and flipping through it. I came to Einstein’s Theory of Relativity and paused to look at the bizarre line diagrams and photographs of space –a subject which used to fascinate me as a kid.
I don’t think I was old enough to read much, but I could make out that this entry dealt with a theory of relativity (I spelled the word out phonetically as I had been taught to do), that it was really complicated, and that it involved Albert Einstein. I knew Einstein was really smart. Beyond that, the words and diagrams were beyond me. And that was weird, as I thought the subject should be pretty straight forward. I thought I knew all about relativity, but apparently I only knew a little bit.
Puzzled but intrigued by the pictures of space and the diagrams full of wavy lines and concentric circles, I took the book to my mother and asked her to “explain the theory of relativity to me”.
I remember quite clearly her blank look that flowed into amusement streaked with anxiety. “I can’t,” she said. “It’s very difficult to understand. There are only a few people in the whole world that really understand it.”
This was an unexpected answer, and a pretty unsatisfactory one. “I think I understand it,” I said.
“Really?”
“Yeah, it’s like how Shawn’s my sister and I’m related to her. Aunt Jo and Unc are related to me. Are there other kinds of relationships?”
At that, of course, my mom laughed. She explained that that’s not what “relativity” meant. I was slightly annoyed at my own ignorance, but then asked her to explain what it did mean. No, she couldn’t. Could Dad? No, she didn’t think he could either.
So I was left not only with my own sticky ignorance of Einstein’s Theory of Relativity, but the realization for the first time that there were things my parents just didn’t know. I dealt with it, of course, and it probably spared me a lot of perplexity later when other adults, especially teachers, did assinine things or tried (unsuccessfully) to veil their ignorance.
But still, that’s a tough moment for a kid no matter how unavoidable it is. Like with demolishing the myth about Santa Claus, it’s kind of what we psychologists like to call a “critical incident” in the occupation of childhood. I see it as part of the promotion process into the much more cynical job of being an adolescent. Already, I’m wondering about the time when my own daughter will ask me a question I can’t answer.
Perhaps I’ll just lie and tell her that Einstein had discovered a new kind of cousin that only became apparent when one approaches the speed of light. 🙂
Mom probably still has those books stashed somewhere! 🙂
Jamie, that was similar to my moment. I became fascinated with astronomy when I was about nine and would just pummel my unsuspecting father with questions. How far away was Saturn? Could we go there? What were the rings made of? Why did the rings look different every time I saw a picture of them? What was space made of? Is it cold? Is it hot?
The look of ignorance on my dad’s face grew at the same rate of my constant questions. That’s when they science books started appearing on the shelf and a telescope entered the house. Pretty soon, my dad had a clever answer every time: “you know, I bet you could look that up.”