Marriage, parenting, buying property: life advice from Donald Rumsfeld

Two of my greatest pleasures in life: reading obituaries and profound quotations.

When Donald Rumsfeld - twice American Secretary of Defense, among other roles – recently died at the age of 88, I couldn’t help but genuflect to his epic quotation:

‘[A]s we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don't know we don't know.’

For any students of English out there, that’s much less convoluted than it first appears.

Leaving politics aside – I don’t get into matters political here – Rumsfeld came under vicious attack for this seemingly mealy-mouthed statement. But I have always found it to be brilliant and full of wisdom. He uttered it in 2002; in 2010 the book Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb came out, and many of us now refer to Black Swan events almost willy nilly when something unexpected occurs. Or, rather, people ask each other: what Black Swan events might be on the horizon?

A Black Swan is an unknown unknown: 11 September, for example, a meteorite hitting the Earth, or something totally unpredictable and unforeseen. 

As an English teacher, I feel as if it is my duty to provide expert insight into the logic and grammar of the language of quotations. Countless politicians from all stripes have come out with some absolute clangers and we love to pillory them for their crimes against the English language. But I’ve always considered Rumsfeld’s statement to be such a profound, insightful and salient reflection on so many aspects of life. 

Think about how many known knowns, known unknowns and unknown unknowns we have in our everyday lives. Almost everything we do fits into one of these categories. Some of us are more aware of this, others less so. The known knowns are everywhere – it’s the other two categories that bear further scrutiny.

Now is the time for you, dear friends and readers, to start considering how events in your life fit into these categories.

Some stories:

MARRIAGE

Getting married in a foreign country – Ukraine – meant plenty of unknown unknowns, many things I only discovered as they were in the process of unfolding. Wedding receptions in my culture – and by this I mean the US and UK – are, in comparison to Ukraine, rather staid affairs. Well, they are plenty of fun, but it’s a rather simple formula: eat, drink, dance, catch up with old friends. That’s pretty much it.

Not so in Ukraine. I had my first taste of a Ukrainian wedding in 2006 in Lviv, in western Ukraine, where I was introduced to all sorts of sordid games and activities. Being the only foreigner in attendance, I was more or less obliged to partake in most of the shenanigans. 

Receptions are conducted by a ‘tamada’, somewhat akin to an MC or ‘toastmaster’. They’re in charge of running the show, providing running commentary, ribald jokes, banter, introducing ‘contestants’ to games, setting up events, etc. Therein lies the difference between East and West: whether it’s a wedding or a party, in our culture it’s fine to stand around, drink and talk. But here, there have to be games and competitions.

I could hardly remember my Lviv wedding experience, and I had only vague fragments I could recall from the wedding I attended in Kyrgyzstan, where the tamada came out dressed like former Soviet leaders: from Lenin to Stalin to Khrushchev to Brezhnev.

When it came time to plan our wedding, and we met with the tamada, I thought I had a decent idea of what was going on but some of the details were a bit hazy – known unknowns. On first glance, our tamada spoke enough English to be able to run the show, but only on the day itself did I realise that his English wasn’t going to cut it: guests from my side of the family were lost and clueless and even I barely knew what was happening until it actually happened. I ended up serving as the translator at my own damn wedding, winging it as I went along. But all sorts of bizarre things kept happening and I had to ask myself – ‘did I know this was going to happen?’ (unknown unknowns). 

I think it all worked out in the end.

The Kyrgyz wedding: all a bit of blur

PARENTING

Shit – you can read every damn baby advice book in the world, and there are plenty of known knowns, and some of the everyday experience along these books can alert you to some of the known unknowns, but much of the ‘joy’ in raising a sprog comes in the endless unpredictability of unknown unknowns.

Two things no baby books actually say but they should:

1 Before you have a child, make sure you, and especially you, and your partner are in GREAT physical shape. Nothing can prepare you for the bending and twisting you’re going to have to do.

2 Life changes so damn fast that what you’re reading might be outdated by the time you apply it.

Take the contentious issue of ‘screen time’ – it’s bad, right? All the so-called ‘experts’ say we should limit it. And dear and loyal readers, you know me – I’m an old fart, an old-fashioned anti-tech Luddite who hardly uses a phone and tries not to let my daughter see me using my tablet. But hell, I watch plenty of sport on TV and I’m not about to sacrifice any of that.

But what about phones? Hell, look at the world we live in – how are we to know that we’re not doing our kids a disservice by not allowing them to use phones from an early age? What if the parents who give their kids phones early on, ostensibly to keep them entertained, are also giving them a massive head start on the world of programming, hacking, computer languages, etc? Maybe the experts are wrong – maybe we should be encouraging our kids to bury their heads in phones and any and all devices to prepare them for digital age as early as possible. We may end up pitying the poor kids who are denied gadgets and forced to read books, who might find themselves at a huge competitive disadvantage by the time they start high school.

I’m sure back in the late 70s/early 80s, when I was a wee nipper, some of the toys parents gave to their kids were controversial and the older generation lamented the good old days of wooden trains and raggedy dolls from the 50s and 60s. And I’m sure that in 20 years’ time, we’ll reminisce about the good old days of the 2020s when kids played with mere gadgets, unlike the contraptions we’re giving them then!

Look at this tweet from Ryan Holiday, author of the Daily Stoic and proponent of living a Stoic life:

@RyanHoliday (20/5/21)

5 Things Every Parent Should Enforce: 

1. Make them go outside 

2. Prioritize reading 

3. Limit screen-time 

4. Hold them accountable 

5. Let them make their own decisions

I’m a fan of Ryan Holiday, but I’m not necessarily sure about points 2 and 3 anymore. Too many unknown unknowns for my liking.

Other underrated ‘joys’ of parenting:

1 The absolute horror and terror of playgrounds – they strike fear into the hearts of many parents. The screaming kids, the parents, the panic over what your kid is going to do next. 

2 Dealing with public temper tantrums: they come out of nowhere.

3 Public transport during rush hour.

4 Your kid will show no empathy or loyalty when it comes to sports:

Euro 2020 semifinals:

DP: ‘Sweetheart, who do you want to win, England or Denmark?’

Daughter: ‘Denmark!’

Euro 2020 final:

DP: ‘Sweetheart, who do you want to win, England or Italy?’

Daughter, with rising intonation: ‘and, and Denmark?’

DP: ‘No, sweetie, Denmark lost to England. It’s England versus Italy. Who do you want to win?’

Daughter: ‘Italy!’

An ideal playground: quiet, desolate, empty

BUYING PROPERTY

If you’ve ever bought a newly-built apartment in Ukraine, you’ll know what I mean.

And if you haven’t…good lord, it’s one unknown unknown after another and the process is endless and just goes on and on, and the expenses pile up and up and you’re waiting and waiting and you’re thinking will we ever move into this damn place?

Buying an apartment: plenty of known knowns, quite a few known unknowns and way too damn many unknown unknowns.

Much like in life.

Thank you, Donald Rumsfeld, for your service to the English language.

My friends causing mischief in Kyiv, days before the unknown unknowns of the wedding