Mensa is a group for people who score in the top 2% of IQ
tests. I don't like to admit it very
often, but I'm a card-carrying member.
I find this embarrassing, I suppose like someone in AA would feel. If you're an alcoholic around other
alcoholics, it's perfectly fine to admit you're a drunk. If you're smart, it's okay to admit you're a
geek to other geeks. They're my
people. I love them. We have great conversations over
bagels.
I learned cool stuff about mercury from a respected chemist
this month, and he seemed tickled to find someone interested in learning about
it. I have no plans to do anything with
mercury, and he won't repair his mercury clock because filling it with mercury
would be too heavy and toxic. I know,
nobody else cares. That's why there's a
group for people who like to learn completely useless stuff, where nobody rolls
their eyes at us.
I've spent a lot of my life hiding my brains because it's so
uncool. Being "too smart" can
get you beat up on the playground, though luckily I never had that
problem. I suppose some people feel
intimidated by Mensans, but I've found most of them to be open and helpful in
explaining anything and everything that anyone else wants to know. They're like Labrador retriever mutts. Stick!
Cool! Let me get that for
you! Do you want another stick? Squirrel?
Sock? Ball!!!
My original plan in joining in my 20s was to find someone
interesting to date. That accomplished,
I let my membership lapse. It wasn't
until a lot of years later, and the breakup of another relationship, that I
decided that I just wanted to hang out with my kind. I discovered my brain was really, really rusty. I felt intimidated and didn't say much until
I discovered that Mensans are just like everyone else. They've got opinions and biases. They're nice or not. The only thing you know they've got in
common is that they're good at taking tests.
Many of the members are scientists and engineers, though
there are a splattering of artists mixed in.
I think plenty of artists would qualify if they believed they could
because artists often have that same kind of interest in everything. Artists devote a lot of time to reading and
studying all sorts of things. There's a
young lady in my group who loves Harry Potter as much as I do. It's not all about molecular chemistry. We spent an afternoon coloring together
recently.
Sometimes the young daughter of a member comes to our
group. She colored with us too, and she
blends as well as the grandparents in our group. Age, sex, color, etc. doesn't matter, and I really enjoy
diversity.
