Tomorrow I'll Be Perfect

I once read one of the What Color Is Your Parachute books. In trying to explain how to find your ideal career, the author related an incident where he was advising a client. He asked the client to find three things he really enjoyed, and the three he chose were psychology, gardening and carpentry. A little research showed that there is a branch of psychology that deals with plant therapy, thus combining the client's top two interests. The author then points out the need for wooden shelves to hold the plants.

When I read that, I wasn't sure I'd that was the dumbest or most brilliant thing I'd ever seen. I mean, surely you could combine those interests in a less literal way. Like if you're interested in carpentry, it's probably not just exposure to wood that you're looking for; it's probably a more abstract working with spatial ideas, or honing a craft. Surely you could find those things in some other, less contrived career.

But at the same time, I secretly was jealous. I mean, wouldn't we all love to be working in a job that combined our favourite things? Doing something you love would be great, but this would be better, since you could never get bored, or come to resent that one activity. Curse you, modern economy, for not providing a job that combines political punditry, driving, and watching sports!

And strangely, it was watching sports that made me think of this passage from the book. During a baseball game, the commentators informed us that the Dodgers' Cody Belanger was the only player in the Major Leagues to hit a home run in every possible count this season. That is, there are twelve possible counts of balls and strikes, and he had hit at least one homer while in each of them.

At this point, I asked the question every modern sports fan asks from time to time: how the hell do they come up with these stats?

But between my knowledge of sports and computers, I can understand it. If a person has a strong knowledge of both sports statistics and databases I think it would be pretty believable that they could come up with oddball facts like that. You have an inkling about a possible statistical point of interest, compose it into a database query and check it out.

Of course, that means having a great interest and experties in two different areas. But if you do happen to fit the qualifications, then it's your perfect job. Those are some pretty specific requirements, but then, there won't be many openings for it either, so this occupational serendipity is pretty rare. That's unfortunate; wouldn't you love a world where everyone got to work in a job so perfectly tailored to them? I'm still looking, so I'll have to go back to the book.