“It’s not what you know,” the old adage goes, “but who you know.” I get miffed with my fellow Croats for sticking to it so blindly, but it is nigh universal. Even more, it is very well buttressed by ongoing research in social network analysis. In short, the better you are connected, the more you prosper in society. This has to do not only with wealth, but also with ideas. Having brushed against the adage so many times, today I thought about it as it applies to me personally at long last. The “what” has always been uppermost in my mind while the “who” has been utterly irrelevant to me from the very start. By and by, I have focused on things that matter to me. At the same time, I have cut my ties from all the social networks to which I have belonged. And the outcome is plain to see: I have enough to get by reasonably comfortably, and there are a few people who still find my ruminations worth their while, but that is about it. Put differently, the old adage applies perfectly in my own case. Perfectly! What you know is for the birds, and who you know is all that matters. Hooray!

Addendum (September 2, 2015)

Somewhat belatedly, I realized only upon bumping into this piece in one of my random searches that the old adage actually applies to me in a rather surprising way. And especially in my dotage. As I get longer in the tooth, the “what” is becoming ever less important to me, while the “who” is turning into my one and only concern. In fact, preoccupation. The only one I know reasonably well is myself, and everything I happen to know about myself, even if not very well, is of equal interest to me. If this twist in the adage appears puerile, I beg to differ. In my defense, there are at least two reasons behind the bewildering twist. To begin with, I cannot possibly know anyone else better than I can know myself. Perhaps more important, there is no better way to know everyone else than by knowing myself. The proof is in the pudding, as ever. And the pudding is my thriving Residua, it goes without saying. Thriving it surely is, too, as witnessed by both its girth and mirth. Slowly but surely, I will leave no stone unturned, at least not willingly. Or so I dare to maintain without any fear of contradiction.