Finding the Knot

So...

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Bert and Ernie
The Lone Ranger and Tonto
The Team
The Tribe

To review: a couple of posts back, in a little essay titled, Keeping Company I mentioned a group called The Inklings. It's the kind of group that C.S. Lewis described as "a little knot of friends who turn their backs to the World."

As I said, I would like to have a group like that—a Knot, if you will. To explore the idea further, I started with identifying "six" people I would like to invite to a dinner. These people wouldn't actually be in the Knot, but in going through the process of who to invite, maybe, I thought, I can discover something about myself and the kind of people I could potentially be in a group with.

If you take a look at my "six": David Letterman, Flannery O'Connor, Paul McCartney & John Lennon, Tina Fey & Amy Poehler, Yo Yo Ma, and Atticus Finch, some elements are evident: humor, music, creativity, gregariousness, a strong B.S. filter, and a certain, healthy irreverence.

Maybe it's a guy thing. I don't know for sure, I've never been a girl. But it seems like guys like to be a part of the something. Maslow called it "Belonging" needs. Back when I was a kid, guys had clubs and lodges they could join. I'm not sure what all went on, because by the time I was old enough to join in and find out, Gloria Steinem had burned her bra and all males were chauvinistic pigs. Now don't get me wrong. I'm happy for women, and probably would have said something like, “You go girl!” had I ever met Ms. Steinem; but I will admit, I would have liked to go to one of those lodges where guys wore funny-looking hats and had a secret handshake, and maybe smoked a cigar and acted like big shots and maybe had a bowling team.

Now, men seem to be relegated to impromptu little gatherings at places like McDonald’s or The IHOP where they can drink cheap coffee, and complain about the dang democrats. That's not the kind of Knot I'm looking to be a part of. I'm not even sure I would want to go bowling with those guys.

The fact is, the Knot is already forming in my mind. (Wow, out of context that sounds ugly and ominous.) What I mean is, I already know some of these people and we're actually loosely knotted now. They may not look at it that way, but I do. 

So here's my plan: over the next few months, I'm going to interview these people, these potential Members of the Knot, and introduce them here at About Pops (if they'll let me that is). So stay tuned.