Reinvent the Wheel

What was man's very first invention? It would be hard to provide a definitice answer to that question. It would depend on how novel, or imaginitive, something has to be before it classifies as an invention. The use of fire, for example--would that be an invention, or a discovery? At the end of the day, it is probably not an important question to resolve.

It is hard to imagine life before some of the most basic inventions, and hard to imagine what went through the minds of the first inventors. One of the first inventions might have been a pointy stick, or a pointy rock, which could have many useful applications. Imagine being the very first to think or tying the rock to the stick to make an axe, with many times the cutting and chopping power. With that axe, you can now sharpen more sticks and more rocks faster than ever before.

Without a doubt, the most famous of the early inventions is the wheel. Perhaps someone observed that heavy objects are much easier to move if they are also round. Moreover, heavy objects that are not round are easier to push if they are sitting on top of something round, like a log. Before the wheel was invented, I can imagine people pushing a heavy sled piled high with rocks using logs as rollers. At some point, another someone found a way to attach the round logs to the sled, and the wheel was born. Well, that's just speculation, but it could have happened that way.

Now, both the axe and the wheel, and many of the inventions we use every day, were invented a long time ago. More recent inventions such as the light bulb and the computer came at a time when people already knew about the wheel. If everyone had to start from scratch, we would never see any advanced ideas or technology. The wheel has already been invented, and doesn't need to be invented again. This is the background to today's idiom--when someone is working on something that has alrady been done before, we say that they are reinventing the wheel. Usually, this idiom is used in a negative way: "don't reinvent the wheel". If you can build on someone else's work, you will have more time and energy left over to do something new.

However, there is another side to the story. Today, we aren't using the original model of the wheel or the axe. If we never reinvented the wheel, our cars would have heavy wooden or stone wheels and wouldn't be as useful or efficient. The wheel has gone through many improvements and adaptations, and we now use it for many things that the original inventors would never have dreamed of. When someone improves on an existing idea or invention, we say that they are building a better mousetrap. We may also say that they are standing of the shoulders of giants. Isaac Newton helped to made this idiom famous when he said that his own accomplishments in science were made by standing on the shoulders of giants.

Par for the Course

Golf is one of many sports that is more fun to play than to watch. Some people might say that it spoils a perfectly good walk, but other may counter that it enhances it. There are a handful idioms that come from the world of golf, many of which are centred around the concept of "par".

Every hole in golf has a par--that is, the number of strokes that you should need to get the ball in the hole. Usually, the numbers are chosen for experienced players, and beginners can't actually expect to hit par very often. A par 3 course is one with only par 3 holes. These are the shortest holes, and therefore the most fun and least intimidating.

If your score is under par, that's good; if it is over par, not so good. If you are having an average game, then your score is right on par. Similarly, anything outside of a golf game can also be right on par or par for the course. That means that things are happening just as excpected. A new employee may witness strange behaviour from one of his coworkers, or his new boss--yelling or talking to himself. Then another coworker will pull him aside and tell him not to worry, that this is just par for the course.

We also use the concept of par to describe above- or below-average work of any kind. If something is not too good, or leaves something to be desired, then we can say that it's below par. On the other hand, if something is above par then it is better than normal. The strange thing is, in an actual game of golf, it is better to be below par, because the lowest score wins. Somehow, when the idioms made the transition to general usage, they were flipped around. By now you probably know that that's just par for the course for the English language.

Saving Grace

You don't have to be particularly observant to see that there are a lot of problems in our world. Every day people mistreat others, because they belong to a different group, or maybe just to steal their watch. There are wars that seem to have no hope of ever ending, and sometimes brutal violence against innocent people. All the while, there are environmental problems that nobody seems to be doing enough to stop, and the rich get richer as the poor get poorer. You could say that it looks like we're going to hell in a handbasket.

Some people think that religion is responsible for most of the problems in the world today. I suspect that if we tried to outlaw religion, we wouldn't actually solve many of the problems, and we might even create new ones. However, there is no denying that religion is behind many of the horrible deeds that happen in this day and age. It is also behind many of our idioms.

When someone has numerous character defects, they may be judged harshly and find themselves with enemies. That is not always the case, though. Many people--well, all people--have character flaws, but they also have good traits. The good part of someone's character that makes them likeable, in spite of their defects, is called their saving grace. A saving grace may be humility or honesty about their past misdeeds. It might also be a good sense of humour or a way with words. A person with a quick wit and a sharp sense of humour can get away with murder. That is, they can say a lot more than someone who is less eloquent.

In spite of all the problems that I listed before, I think the world also has many saving graces. Most of these saving graces are small actions, or individual people working to make a better world. There are people who are willing to do whatever it takes--to move heaven and earth--to bring things like justice and security closer to reality. I find their stories to be inspiring. There are beautiful things all over the world: small miracles like the procession of clouds across the sky, or the never-ending story of death and rebirth that is told by the changing seasons.

There isn't much around that is totally black and white. Most systems and people still have their saving graces. If you happen to notice one, perhaps this idiom will come in handy to describe it.