"Great Men"

One day when our son was very little, we told him we needed to take our dog to the “dog doctor”. Gabe was strangely excited about this and very much wanted to go along. When we got to the vet’s office and the vet came out to meet Sirka, our son was clearly disappointed - it turned out he expected the “dog doctor” to be a dog.

I always wanted to meet a “great man”, who I thought could somehow answer life’s questions for me. I have come to suspect that there are no “great men” in that sense, and that the whole notion is a dangerous and fascist idea.

Indeed I have met a number of remarkable men and women, and some famous ones as well. But when you actually get to know someone, they turn out weirdly to be as human as everybody else (duh). This should be strengthening and comforting to us, I suppose.

I don’t mean that there aren’t people with exceptional gifts, talents, and abilities, and people who have life-histories that inspire reverence. But if you think anyone is better than you, you better think twice, because you are diminishing yourself in a needlessly damaging way.

As Dylan explains, “Each of us has his own special gift, and this was meant to be true. And if you don’t underestimate me, I won’t underestimate you.”