What's Behind Door #3?

The second day of reunion sessions was informational yet surprisingly fun and amusing. Luis Fraga, a former professor at Stanford who now works at the University of Washington, spoke on race relations-specifically about our country's readiness for candidates like Barack Obama and Sonia Sotomayor. In addition to his position as a political science professor, he is also Director of the Diversity Research Institute on campus.

Some of the assertions he made based on his extensive research was unnerving, such as slavery's importance to the way our nation is shaped today. (Probably true, but our presuppositions about even talking about slavery in other terms besides 'horrific' and 'wrong' are difficult to wade through) His candidness paired with a lively sense of humor made the presentation fascinating yet easy to stick to. A Powerpoint presentation can be stimulating (though some people may doubt that) and Fraga's ability to engage with the audience on a tough topic helped move his visuals along nicely. He is intelligent, charming and definitely someone we need right now. The race issue is so huge, so intimidating, so powerful--I'm glad to have someone of his abilities on the front lines to help us make sense of it all.

The second presentation was given by Baba Shiv, a professor with the Graduate School of Business. His talk, entitled, "The Frinky Science of the Human Mind" delved into how emotions influence our decision making. Most of us came away from his discussion with this in mind: Arranged marriage is the way to go.

Shiv has done research on "simultaneous" decision-making vs. "sequential" decision-making. And guess what? Turn out that more people were satisfied with their choice when they had all of the options in front of them, decided and moved on with their lives. So, if you have three potential mates, for example, you'd be better off choosing one of them, marrying them and moving on to whatever else you need to decide upon, like paint colors for your newly shared apartment. But those people who date one person at a time are more likely to have unresolved issues with their choice-perhaps thinking that the next candidate will be better.

Unfortunately for most of us, we tend to engage with potential significant others on a one-to-one basis. We date one person, that works or doesn't, and we go on to date another person. Maybe our ancestors had the right idea. The yenta, the matchmaker. And now the girlfriend who hosts the cast-off party or even speed dating--maybe we should decide on our life partner the same way we would the fish at the fish market: Line 'em all up and see which one is the least stinky.

But for me, what's at the crux of all this is the choosing part. It's interesting to think about the energy we put into our choices, from a potential partner to a pair of pants. I think of the line from "Soak Up the Sun" by Sheryl Crow, "It's not having what you want, it's wanting what you've got." And if my life partner is reading this somewhere, don't worry--after all these years, I still want and choose you. :)