By Larry Hodges

It was an unremarkable time, an age of average practicality, an epoch of maybe, a season of grayness, a spring of meh, with little to dread or look forward to, with all in spiritual limbo–in short, it was a time of unambitious joy, and it could have stayed that way if only Tom had had the dickens to think things through.

Tom strove for excellence in all his endeavors but always failed miserably, from boot-making to law clerk to writing. But recently, he’d begun formulating a theory, one so revolutionary it would rewrite the very fabric of human society. And that was that neither the excellence he’d aimed for nor the failures he’d achieved were good, both were bad. All extremes should be avoided. In a moment of clarity in the most average sense, he realized what one should strive for, for it was the secret to societal satisfaction, success, and sanity. 

Mediocrity!

Many think of mediocrity as failing, but that’s not what it means. Mediocrity is not an idiocy term, despite the two being anagrams of each other. Mediocrity meant not very good, but it also meant not very bad. It means right in the middle. With mediocrity, one neither stands out nor fails, but instead, in all ways that matter, remains in that invisible middle and thereby impervious to the trials brought on by life. 

Mediocrity!

But Tom knew that mediocrity did not come easy; one had to strive for such moderation. And that took a village, where all looked out for each other, with the same middling goals. But where to find such an unremarkable land of common, run-of-the-mill people? He did many painstaking hours of research but, as usual, failed miserably in finding it. Then he consulted with those who were smart and successful, and they found it for him, a city in the middle of nowhere that was the culmination of his desires, a city so middle-of-the-road they scored three stars out of five in everything, where the faucets never ran hot or cold but always tepid, and where all students received straight C’s. There were no Saint Bernards or Chihuahuas, just mid-sized Beagles and Bulldogs and everything in between. The city’s official color, bird, and meal were beige, pigeon, and Big Mac. 

Mediocrity!

The city’s name and location are secret, as its very success at being the most mediocre of cities would make it a center of excellence and therefore a complete failure in what it strove for. We’ll just call it Mediocrity City, though one more clever than average would have just dropped the “r” and called it Mediocity, with the “c” now making an ess sound. It was as average as a white sheep in a herd of white sheep, just what Tom wanted. It was here that he spent years searching through encyclopedias, developing his Theory Of Mediocrity, or TOM. He spent much of his time in the middle, in the L’s, M’s, N’s, and O’s, where he learned all there was about lukewarm, moderation, norms, and ordinariness.

And then, at noon on July 2—the exact middle of the year—with great expectations he published his opus. It took the world by storm. No longer did people need to strive for excellence with years of study or by working their fingers to the bone. It was sufficient to get by in more moderate fashion, letting others waste their lives in industrious endeavors, only to die in the end like everybody else. And who needed a fancy marble tomb with Greek columns and golden spires when a commonplace coffin of oak would do?

Tom was the toast of the town and the world. Scholars and common folk from around the globe journeyed to Mediocrity City, hoping to discuss TOM Theory with Tom. Life in Mediocrity City boomed as the multitudes paid for hotels, food, and other amenities, pumping money into the city’s now roaring economy. Many Saint Bernards were bought. The city’s official color, bird, and meal became green, peacock, and caviar. 

Then, in the midst of Tom Mania, while live on the suddenly popular Mid-Afternoon Show, as Tom once again lectured on the virtues of averageness to the ooohs and aaahs of the live audience, a child sprang to her feet. This child was average in every way, a perfect example of TOM Theory. Except for one thing, for she had the loudest, most ear-piercing scream ever known. The child stood on her chair in all her averageness and shouted the words that would reverberate through the ages, that would forever change the course of human thinking and activities and would end the dreams and aspirations of TOM advocates, those huddled masses yearning to be mediocre–or, as they are now more commonly called, the lazy people of the world. 

“TOM’S NOT AVERAGE!!!” the child screamed.

It was only then that the world faced what all had known but none had dared speak aloud—that with all his fame, Tom wasn’t average. He was, in fact, the most famous person in the world, an utter failure in mediocrity. A thousand dissertations and scientific papers would be published on the self-contradictory nature of a theory that claimed greatness in mediocrity but could only be plausible if it too were mediocre and therefore not plausible. 

Mediocrity City’s tourism died away, and it once again regained the middling economy they had always strived for. They went back to living average lives, rejecting TOM Theory while actually adhering to it, though none dared speak that aloud. The city was never heard from again for they had achieved their nirvana. 

Mediocrity!

Poor Tom was escorted to the city’s limits by the mayor and police and told to never return. Rejected and humiliated, Tom went into hiding for a time, then reemerged in London under a new identity, calling himself Charles. He now rejected TOM Theory and spent his remaining years industriously writing some of the great classics of English literature—but that’s another story.