Opus 2014-85: Panini and Artichokes

As I walked into the bakery to get my morning coffee and bread I noticed an advertisement for the lunch crowd.  Panera was proud to announce that we could now purchase “Roasted turkey and artichoke panini.”  Excuse me?  While out of town and staying in a motel my wife was watching a cooking show on cable.  I think the title was “Chopped.”  The contestants would open a hamper and have thirty minutes to create a dish.  One set of ingredients included granola bars, cherry tomatoes, Asian five spice and a block of brown sugar that one of the “all star” chefs had no idea about.  I may have confused the ingredients of a couple of segments.  It doesn’t matter.  It is wonderful to live in a society that has so much leisure that we are using our creativity to mix turkey and artichoke for lunch and watching chefs create specialties from nonsense.  Admit it, some creativity is rather silly. 

Some intelligence is really creative, others are just a variation on someone else’s.  For instance, the first paper clip was really creative.  Changing the shape, having different colors and offering different sizes are simply variations on a theme.

We need both types of creativity.  One type jumps culture ahead.  One type takes the jump and adds lots of little steps.  Both can be beneficial.  Don’t confuse the two.  The genius of the Founding Fathers was that they made allowance for both in patent and copyright protections. 

Beware of condemning real creativity.  I had heard it before but I read again recently about the doctor that originally noticed that washing hands between patients lowered the death rate.  He was mocked and harassed.  Small minds could not grasp the jump.

I am grateful to live in a culture that allows people to mix turkey and artichokes.  Who knows.  Maybe it tastes good.  I will leave it for the people who like sushi to find out.

homo unius libri