Luck of the devil II

When I started out I noticed a strange phenomenon.

I would randomly browse through all the very technical books on my bookshelf. Books that I had not been able to read, books too daunting to read. I would flip through and skim random bits here and there and put the book down. Most of the concepts were so advanced that I had no clue what they meant, Or how they fit into the grand scheme of things.

Within a day I would get a call from a guy and he would bring up some gobbledie-gook that 'rang a bell' .

I would use my reasonable short term memory and give him a word for word 'from the text' answer and the line would go quiet for a while.

Often the person would go on to say that be had phoned around and I was the first person who knew what I was talking about. In many cases he was from some super technical research arm of a university and all at once, I, a farm boy who didn't know his arse from his elbow would get credibility in high places.

This went on over the years and I have tried to explain it by saying that maybe I steered the conversation to that area and then sprung the trap on the  unsuspecting caller, or that my subconscious was actually absorbing things that were current and trending, but in the end none of the attempts to explain this was a good fit..

If I was a spiritual person this would be the perfect time to find absolute faith in fate and the guiding hand of destiny.

But sadly I am too much of a skeptic to make such an obvious leap.

I am really not much good in the morning if I haven't had a good nights sleep. As a result, if I have an early meeting in Cape Town or Johannesburg, I tend to fly out the previous day, spend the night at a hotel and arrive at the next mornings meeting fully refreshed and ready for action.

Once I was in Cape town at a hotel room, on a Sunday night, cooling my jets for a big Monday morning meeting. I passed the time flipping channels and came accross the Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. I had heard of it but sadly not had the inclination to truly understand it.

Next morning I walked into a truly high powered meeting of the captains of industry and I could see in an instant that I was terribly out of my depth and that they were going to eat me for breakfast.

It was a cold and intimidating group.
I was toast.

Just as I started my pitch, I paused and asked them to first explain what the Heisenberg's uncertainty principal related to their business.

I pointed to the whiteboard and on it was a cryptic formula that I recognized from the night before.

The director answered that they had a super consultant in the previous week and he explained how they could measure some factors at the expense of others. Never both. He went on with some incredibly boring explanation that totally went over my head.

Everyone was soon talking, and it was clear I was on the inside.
They had decided that the geeky looking farm boy was 'all right' and everything was "peaches and cream".

Despite the fact that I was clueless about, just about everything that was going on.

Like I said I have given up trying to explain these incredible coincidences that have shaped and formed my life.

I simply cannot deny the fact that
I have the luck of the devil.

Someday I am sure it will run out, and I hope that when that happens I am able to look back at all the amazing incredible fantastic things I have stumbled into.

M Parak 2017.