Close Encounters

XIX

Paul F Walsh

Ignorance was dancing down the street when he met Knowledge.

‘We won!’ he cried.

‘No,’ Knowledge observed.

‘What?’ Ignorance was so shocked that he stopped dancing. ‘Look at the scoreboard, you idiot! We won, 60 to 40!’

‘But it’s only half-time,’ Knowledge said. ‘And you just scored an own goal.’

‘NO!’ Ignorance declared. ‘You’re just a sore loser.’

‘You’re never going to score saying NO all of the time,’ Knowledge explained. ‘So, who’s the real loser here?’

‘You!’ Ignorance answered. ‘Our side won the cup!’

‘That’s not a cup,’ Knowledge observed. ‘It’s a poisoned chalice, full of half-time bitter lemons.’

‘I’m right,’ Ignorance declared. ‘And you hate me for it.’

‘Well, even my grandmother’s broken clock is right twice a day,’ Knowledge admitted, ‘and I love that bloody clock, mate, so I look at you without hate, even though that clock is twice as right as you on a daily basis.’

‘We were the better team,’ Ignorance said.

‘Your fractious NO team can’t agree on anything except saying NO,’ Knowledge suggested. ‘But the YES team is more cohesive and focused on kicking a progressive question in the second half that NObody will take NO for an answer for! And your goal-keeper will find out too late that the goal posts have been shifted!’

‘But that’s not in the rules,’ Ignorance complained.

‘Keep dancing,’ Knowledge advised, ‘because in the second half of the game the rule of unintended consequences is going to share its match-winning wisdom with you.’

Close Encounters XIX