I always wanted to be a ‘’Renaissance Man’’...nowadays, it’s commonly known as being a ‘’polymath.’’
"Renaissance man" was first recorded in written English in the early 20th century.[9] It is now used to refer to great thinkers living before, during, or after the Renaissance. Leonardo da Vinci has often been described as the archetype of the Renaissance man, a man of "unquenchable curiosity" and "feverishly inventive imagination".[10]
Many notable polymaths lived during the Renaissance period, a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th through to the 17th century that began in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spread to the rest of Europe. These polymaths had a rounded approach to education that reflected the ideals of the humanists of the time. A gentleman or courtier of that era was expected to speak several languages, play a musical instrument, write poetry, and so on, thus fulfilling the Renaissance ideal.
Well, in a way, I suppose that I am one since that is the name of the high school that I graduated from.
I do take people’s word for the fact that I seem to have some modest talent in writing which I have developed over the years.
And, actually, I do tend to do pretty good with mathematics and numbers and stuff when I run across the need to work with them...I suppose that’s something that I could further develop even now.
And I have done a beginning study of several languages (French, Latin, ancient Greek, German) but I only have the most rudimentary knowledge of French which comes and goes...and I do recognize certain words in Latin but don’t get me started on sentence structures and verb placements and whatnot...I don’t recognize them.
I think that, on the temperamental level, I probably don’t have the patience to learn languages...even though I would actually like to learn other languages...and even though I have several books to learn Spanish or French or Latin in the house.
Like many other people, I have taken to singing in the shower but take my word for it...I sound like a howling dog trying to sing a Whitney Houston song.
People who know far far more about music than I tell me that I actually have a baritone singing voice.
I do know that when I sing a very little bit of the baritone-bass parts in my favorite opera, Richard Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde, I don’t sound as horrific as I do when I try to sing Whitney Houston...in fact I don’t sound bad at all…
Most of all, I do wish that I had any sort of talent to paint or draw or something...and I know that I have absolutely no talent or even aptitude for it.
Art class, for me, may have been the most frustrating class that I took in both middle and high school because of this very fact...it was never true that I didn’t try (as one art teacher accused me of); I couldn’t follow even the simplest directions in drawing a stick figure...well, I am exaggerating on the stick figures but not by much…
Sad because I greatly enjoy great or even good drawing and painting or sculpture and the like (I’ve always enjoyed comic).
But don’t even ask me to do anything like that.
Oh, last but not least, don’t ever ask me to fix anything mechanical that’s broken down...no aptitude in that area, either. Whatever you ask me to fix will become even more broke down if you ask me to fix it.
Today’s question: I do believe that everyone has a talent or an ability to do something. Is there a talent or an aptitude that you wish you had but you just don’t have it?
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