Day 26: Outliers

Bonnie is also quite interested in this book, which I just finished reading (Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers.) I managed to catch a picture of her, using my flash, while she studied a chapter.

Actually, she was most agreeable to be my model, to get back into good graces, after knocking my husband's laptop over yesterday, and bending part of the charger. Many bad words emanated from our house, and are probably still floating around in frozen ice chunks up and down our block.



All of Gladwell's books have been fascinating reads! This book is making me think about my own growing up years/culture/class background, and the impact on my life decisions. It makes me think about decisions I've made regarding my children, and how my husband and I bring our different life stories to bear on this.

I think this is one of those books where now that I've gotten to the end of it, I want to start all over and read it again, because I just keep thinking about new implications.

Unfortunately, the author doesn't address gender, at all, in any of his three books. I'm seriously thinking about writing to him to tell him what his next book should include! Freud said, "Biology is destiny," and I think Freud had some points, but was a nutcase. I think, though, it may be that "Biology(gender), as interpreted by culture, is destiny."

But within Gladwell's framework, being aware of our cultural learnings gives us much more choice in changing what needs to be changed (like when you're trying not to crash into a mountain!) Seriously! Read the book! The whole part where he talks about reducing mitigated speech among pilots, and how it tremendously reduced accident rates in the airlines industry over the last 15 years, is well worth the price of the book alone!