Obiter Scripta, no. 159

I love ideas as much as I love women. I derive a sensuous pleasure from playing with ideas. Genuine ideas dance and sing. They sparkle and twinkle with mirth and mischief. They titillate the mind, kindle the imagination, and warm the heart. They have grace and promise. — Eric Hoffer, Before the Sabbath Hoffer saw the flirtatious side of ideas. But ideas are not always coquettes at a party. Sometimes they are cold hands pressed against your back just as you were drifting off to sleep. They give you the silent treatment all morning, then want to talk when you are driving, showering, or carrying groceries. They flirt outrageously in the margins of a book, then become prim and distant when you sit down at the keyboard. Sometimes they ask “Does this paragraph make me look fat?” and you must gently suggest that perhaps the second sentence is retaining water, or that possibly it wouldn’t hurt to lose a couple adjectives. Sometimes they keep you in the friendzone for years: intimate enough to…