Wednesday, September 18, 2013

Unpublished Editorial

Alright, I am not very good at updating a blog, but like I said, this is a work in progress for me. I'm still getting the hang of this. Eventually, I will use this to talk about art, design, and sustainability, which are all important to me, but for now, I'm just trying to get into writing more regularly.

Once that's down, I'll be able to start getting into this more seriously.

But as I promised, here's something more thought-provoking. This is my unpublished editorial for my university's newspaper that I did three years ago, while I had a friend as opinion editor. To make a long story short, it ended up getting shelved and I forgot about it. Until recently of course, when I started thinking about how true it still is today. Which is why I would like to share it now.

In the meantime, I'll work on my writing habits, once and for all. For reals. For science (not really, I just wanted to say that).

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“Did you know that pandas eat…” “Many Americans are faced with…” “How many times have you…” “When you were a child…” “Imagine being in line for lunch and…”

Attention grabbing devices. We must have heard 4/5ths of them by now, the last fraction making it through the strainer of boring, recycled trash to become a plate of new, tantalizing anticipation. “How difficult do you think it is to…” “Have you ever noticed…”

I went to a version of summer camp for artsy kids the number of musketeers ago. During a project that required long walking by foot forth and back from a beach, one of our teachers (this was when the whole first name calling of teachers began for me, but that’s as useful as this bad simile) talked about a philosopher ex-boyfriend whose life goal was to have an original thought.

“At the time…” “I bet you’ve had many…” “Do you know how difficult…” That memory pops into my head the way a dysfunctional Jack-in-the-box likes to pop out and scare Will Ferrell because I imagine original thoughts are rarer than unicorns and all the good attention grabbing devices are a member of their private poker club on Tuesdays.

I’m guilty of using these stale bread, don’t-stop-I-want-to-hear-this-joke-again-even-though-I’ve-heard-it-500-times, phrases every day and in everything I’ve ever written. I spend a cornucopia of my time simply rearranging words and these phrases the way I would the furniture in a room just to make them seem fresh and more new. I expect Ezra Pound to smile at me and say, “It’s good  kid,” if he indeed talked like that, over my shoulder while he disappears in and out like the Cheshire Cat. What I do is the same. Same as you. Same as her. Same as him. Same as J.K. Rowling sitting at that cafĂ© writing a story on napkins about a boy with a weather related scar on his face. This one is called repetition.

“Life would be so much better …” “If we changed our old incandescent light bulbs with…” More original ideas. Scientists are inventing new advancements in technology as fast as rabbits spawn and we’re still using the same phrases of words. Anybody know why? Is there security in these phrases? Are they just that much fun to say? Am I the only one complaining?

I think it’s time for us to evolve our writing. Together we shall brandish our pencils, pens, quills, fingertips, and pointy-sticks and begin a new age of creativity – let us now write new phrases every time we write! Make our generation the ones with words! No longer shall it be the land of milk and honey, now it can be whatever you want, as long as you promise to get out there and think with ferocity and hunger! Otherwise, may Ezra Pound haunt you in the form of a broken Jack-in-the-box and follow you around until you strive for creativity.