Genius we can't imagine

Alex Beam wrote a piece in yesterday's Boston Globe about what he called "the Mozart problem" ... genius so total that it can inspire, cause despair in people who are themselves accomplished ... or both.

"Mozart, of course, was the shutdown corner for the ages. Here’s what Billy Joel, no mean music man himself, told The New York Times a few months ago: 'Mozart [ticks] me off because he’s like a naturally gifted athlete; you listen to Mozart and you go: ‘Of course. It all came easy to him . . . ’ Mozart was almost inhuman, unhuman.'”

If you think about it, there is some level of brilliance permeating every aspect of our lives. The lights we illuminate our houses with, the motors in the cars we get around in, the medicines that extend and save lives, the computer I'm typing this on and whatever you're reading it on ... these all exist because someone figured something out, and most of us can't conceive how they did it.

For those of us who write, like Beam, we chase the great writing. I read Kevin Cullen, and I know I could never be that good, but when I write here or elsewhere, I'm hoping someone who reads it enjoys it the smallest, tiniest fraction of a smidgen as much as I enjoy him, because that means I've done something.

However, I can't relate to someone who writes great music, because my mind literally does not work that way. How awesome must it be to put together music and lyrics (or not, if someone's writing a purely instrumental piece) that turns out brilliant? What must it be like to be Billy Joel, whose songbook goes back decades?

I heard an interview with Alicia Keys on NPR around the time "Girl on Fire" came out, and when she talked about the songwriting process, to me, it sounded like a bunch of babble from someone trying way too hard to sound deep. But I'm willing to guess it made perfect sense to her as she was saying it.

And what must it be like to be a scientist, doctor or inventor, to have done something that literally changes people's lives? How did Thomas Edison feel when he saw his light bulb in wide use? What would Alexander Graham Bell think of cellphones? Jonas Salk discovered the cure for polio ... and then lived another 40 years to see what his work did for the world.

How amazing is that? And wouldn't we all wish we could do something close to that, even once?