common sense

When I worked in state politics I noticed a trend, or pattern, when a legislator would tell me about something he accomplished: they tend to make it a little bit bigger and better than it was.

Like if, on a scale of 1 to 10 (10 being the best) the accomplishment (bill passed; bill killed; rules written; people convinced...) was actually probably a 7, it would be described as a 9 or 10. ... that sort of difference. Which is not to criticize; I noticed this tendency, with admiration and affection for the individual unmoved. (After all, you don't like someone because they're perfect: if you did, you'd have a SHORT Christmas list...!)

Thought maybe that was a trait of all people, not just politicians, but that theory proved incorrect. When I first began at my current workplace, I could hear Maintenance people talking over a two-way radio and I was filled with awe and question marks. ("What are they doing?" "What is that thing he told the other guy to bring from the shop?" "What is that?" "What does that mean?" ? ? ?)

If you looked at the gigantic, heavy, expensive equipment they have to keep running, it's amazing to imagine how they --
figure out the problem
find the answer
and implement the "cure"...

I wondered, "How do people learn to do something like that?"
So I asked one of the mechanics one day, "Did you go to school to learn how to do this work?"
No.
(incredulous): "Well, how did you learn it?"
{And as I asked the question of a variety of different mechanics, over time, the answers they gave were pretty much these...}

Working on a farm.
Working with my dad.
(shrug): I don't know -- just picked it up.
It's just common sense, really.
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I'd hear pretty much the same thing, with the words re-arranged maybe, from these various different guys and I started to think, It's funny -- they're like the opposite of the politicians -- instead of making what they do sound even better -- like, embellish -- they actually downplay it, understating their accomplishments.

I found that interesting.
I think being able to figure out how to fix equipment is more like a natural talent you're born with, like singing and dancing -- like Jerry Lee Lewis said about Chuck Berry: "God-given talent!"

"Common sense" definitely under-plays it.
I mean, my Grandma Snow had "common sense." I have common sense. Amy the bank teller has common sense. But probably none of us could fix industrial equipment.

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...and what the experts say:
"Common sense is the knack of seeing things as they are, and doing things as they ought to be done."
~ C.E. Stowe (son of the writer Harriet Beecher Stowe [Uncle Tom's Cabin])

"Common sense is genius dressed in its working clothes."
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson (American poet, lecturer, and essayist, 1803 - 1882)

"I can never fear that things will go far wrong where common sense has fair play."
~ Thomas Jefferson (3rd American Pres. & author of Declaration of Independence. 1762 - 1826)

"The three great essentials to achieve anything worthwhile are, first, hard work; second, stick-to-itiveness; third, common sense."
~ Thomas Alva Edison (American inventor. 1847 - 1931)

"Common sense and a sense of humor are the same thing, moving at different speeds. A sense of humor is just common sense, dancing."
~ William James (American philosopher and psychologist. 1842 - 1910)

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