Screw Cartography
“When we get this project going, it’s gonna put this place on the map!”
“It’s a problem now, but it’s going to put us on the map.”
“We need to get this place on the map.”
I’ve heard it all before. Sometimes from people or institutions that end up in some way, “on the map”. Other times from people who couldn’t even read a map, let alone get themselves on one.
My response? What the hell is so important about being on this proverbial map? You always hear people wanting to get there, but a small percentage of such people ever seem worried about producing a quality product, providing a valuable service, or just being a decent presence. Those things are viewed, if at all, as means to the map.
It has been my odd and unfortunate lot to stumble into organizations just as they are deciding to place themselves on the map. Or, as I like to think, just at the very moment they decide that the community they have been serving just isn’t good enough. (Which is really, when you think about it, what “getting on the map” is all about. Escaping from a community that has been the heart and soul of what you do, but can no longer keep up with the greed, or thirst for power and influence sought by the institution in question.)
My high school was a rather elite but small private high school in Maryland. For decades, it had established itself as one of the premiere private high schools in all of Maryland. Some out of state people attended as well, of course. Word of mouth being what it is. Not to mention the draw of the place’s history. Yet once you got out of say the Maryland/Virginia/West Virginia tri-state area, my tiny high school, (population of less than 200 students at the time) was little known.
Until the year I, having been impressed by their pedigree, chose to enroll there after much thought. For it was that very year that somebody in the power structure decided that it was time to put this already highly regarded, rather elite, and solidly established private high school “on the map.” They hired one of the nation’s most famous and successful varsity basketball coaches. Hoping to increase the school profile.
Increase it, it did. By the end of my first year, the school was winning all kinds of tournaments. It was regularly featured on ESPN, Sports Illustrated and other such places. Indeed, more people became aware of our little high school by the end of that year, than in the previous 50, I dare say. And the term, “putting us on the map” was almost a rallying cry. Surely, this could only be beneficial to the alumni. The staff. The students, as well as to prospectives.
That depends on how you look at it. Because while the school’s name was becoming well known, things within the school itself suffered. Suddenly everything was channeled in one direction. Given the cartography of the basketball program, the sport, previously just one extra curricular activity offered within this academic mecca, became the pervasive theme of everything we did. Instead of academically minded students with an athletic interest, athletic powerhouse players from literally all around the world were now recruited to attend our high school, simply for the basketball program. (The ethics of which were always questionable to some….)
Pep rallies took place only for that team. The other teams received little to no official school recognition, and as a result, little to no attendance. Whether you played or not, basketball was part of your identity. Class pictures always included someone holding a basketball. Seniors, upon graduating, regardless of their reasons for being in the school, were asked to sign basketballs for the trophy room. An effort, at times rather forced, was made to equate being proud of attending that school with being proud of the team. And people who are proud of the team attend games.
For newer people, or people that were into this whole “map” thing, it worked. Enrollment increased. Portables went up like weeds, and more money poured in. But for a good portion of the last remnant of the “old guard”, it meant that the mission of the school, its very founding principles which had served it and students very well during their 100 years of semi-obscurity, were being abandoned. The very reasons I chose to go there were being pushed aside in order to gain fame. And resentment against athletes, who through no fault of their own were participants in a destructive program, built up over they years. But hey, as the waterboy wanna-be player in my class would always remind me when I complained, “Coach is putting this school on the map.”
Thanks a lot, coach.
“Coach” is long gone, and the school now has four times as many portables, and has a population at last check of about 500 students now. Still small, but huge compared to what it was. Their plans to build a new facility have been put on hold three times since I left, and due to lack of funding, recently abandoned outright. There’s your map.
The same thing happened when I went to college. When I arrived as a transfer student, it was a small, little known but locally renowned private college of about 1,100 students. Charming in its own way. Gorgeous old brick buildings. Wonderful mall area in the middle of campus. You could feel the history.
The second semester I was there, the announcement went out that that “Revitalization Plan” had been approved, and would be completed hopefully over ten years, starting right away. By the next year, ground was being dug up for a new ten million dollar sporting facility. (Not a sports school at all before then.) Half of the mall and walking area would be torn up a few years later for a huge, hulking 20 million dollar biology lab. Two new dorms as well, to house the proposed increase in the student population to about 2,500 when all was said and done. And with these mostly non-academic expenditures came of course, increases in student bills. The music program was cut, in part, in order to help save some money for all of this.
“A school is no more than the amount of students that come to it,” a professor told me once. “And I want more resources for myself and you.” She said that can only happen if we (say it with me) “put this school on the map”.
Mind you, this school had been around in some form on that very spot since the 1840’s. That’s the 1840’s.
With this came the predictable results over time, not unlike what I mentioned for my high school. Getting on the map became a priority instead of being content to serve an academic mission that had remained in tact for generations. (Including two previous generations within my own family, whom I never met.)
Even the theatre department, one of the few things about this quaint, smaller, but changing college that I loved, underwent a bit of this change. The theatre, unchanged for many years, started to focus more on community relevance and spectacle, than on intimate and personal in-house instruction in the theatre arts.
Not that this was the only theatre program to suffer this fate in my presence. A local community theatre around here, with an excellent facility had been under the stewardship of a much beloved and still-praised man for years. My first show there, however, happened to be during the first year after this man left. The new guy was quiet for a while. But soon everything became about expanding the brand, or getting corporate sponsorship, or raising thus and so amount of money by the end of the year. All in an effort to convert it into a professional, for-profit theatre one day. (Thus leaving those of us who for years had volunteered our time and energy to the place feeling as though our days were numbered.) Many regulars have over the years been driven away. Including myself. And of course the overall goal of this terrible, artless and talentless new manager was simple. “Put this place on the map.” (Casting his own wife in every single show he directed being a major part of the strategy it would seem.)
You get the idea.
So my luck in showing up at places just as they are trying to “put themselves on the map” has not been good. I will concede it may have just been the manner in which these places went about putting themselves on the map that I found distasteful. But speaking from my personal experience I have yet to encounter a single example of “putting something on the map” resulting in something better.
Just once, I would like to find an institution, an organization, a company, or a group which is small, effective, special, steeped in tradition, not particularly well known, but content to be so. I long to be part of a community that doesn’t fall into the first grade mindset of “whoever has the most toys wins“, or that making something bigger, by default, makes it better. (A lesson small towns with urban sprawl could, but have never learned.) Or that contributions to society are directly proportional to the number of people who have heard of you.
Not that I am against making money. (Though non-profits of course should not make a profit, though many act like they should.) Money is needed to keep things running. I am however against the idea of expanding just for the sake of making more of it. It’s lazy thinking, and only partially effective. I’m against not opting to find a way to improve the budget in-house. I’m against selling off the earned reputation in order to purchase a flashier, emptier one. Why is everyone more worried about “getting on the map” than they are preserving what made them great in the first place?
Greed. Keeping up with the Joneses. A mistaken notion of keeping up with modern times. Lack of internal vision. (As opposed to external.) Who knows why? But if I were a school or a theatre company, I would much rather have my reputation proceed me, than have my reputation thrown in the faces of anyone who happens to pass by. I’d rather establish a mission that doesn’t include expansion as a primary goal. Lighthouses, after all, don’t move. They stay right where they are. And thank god they do. How many people would be lost without them? I’d much rather be a part of a light house, than have my name in bold print on a map.
The King’s Speech and Our Problems.
Unless you have been locked away for the last few months you have heard of the critically acclaimed movie starring Colin Firth called The King’s Speech. The film, a bona fide hit at the box office, tells the story of King George VI of the United Kingdom’s speech impediment; from the age of about five onward the man was a stutterer. The condition at times was quite severe, which we see as the movie opens with a scene of the future King (who is merely the Duke of York for most of the film) failing miserably to give a coherent public speech to an assembled crowd.
It is a time wherein the Monarch has become a very public figure in the sense of having to appear and speak publicly. And with World War II approaching the symbolic stability of a Sovereign who can ease the nation with his words becomes all the more vital to the war effort. With the abdication of his older brother, this staggering responsibility falls on “Bertie”. (The name by which King George VI was known within his family.)
Believe me, I am not giving away anything that is not deduced in the trailer when I say that the Duke’s wife (Helena Bonham Carter) eventually enlists the assistance of one Lionel Logue (played by Geoffrey Rush), a man with extensive experience in helping those with speech defects. Logue’s methods are, shall we say, unorthodox from the first moment. Indeed so much so that “Bertie” abandons them totally for a while.
I loved the film. It would seem millions loved the film, and it is gathering serious hardware at various awards ceremonies. As with any film, The King’s Speech is without a doubt different things to different people. Or several things to any one person. Most of the very best movies have this quality. I count myself in this latter category, for I found the movie brilliant for a number of reasons.
There is the historical angle. The humor. The fact that it deals with the British Monarchy. Not to mention excellent acting and writing.
Yet there is an added element to this true story which I think contributed not only to my own admiration of the film, but may also be why it has such wide appeal. It is, in the end, the story of a great man that overcomes a great handicap. A handicap for which he is mocked and ridiculed even by members of his own family. A handicap which many back then, and even now dismissed as illegitimate. A handicap that the man himself eventually concluded (falsely) that he could not overcome.
And how did he overcome it? No doubt in the end it was something within himself that won out. A determination, a belief and confidence in himself that was lacking in his early life, but showed up just in time when it was needed the most. Yet it would not have shown up if he had not encountered and worked with the eccentric Logue. A man who had the audacity to speak to the Duke/King in familiar terms. He too called him “Bertie”, ignoring what Shakespeare’s Henry V referred to as “idle ceremony”. Logue opted to address the man as a man. As an equal.
This doesn’t sit well at first with “Bertie”, but there would be no movie if he never learned to accept it, of course. Yet it was perhaps Logue’s strange exercises and questions and conversations, all seemingly without purpose, that shook the protagonist the most.
What am I getting at here? That “Bertie” was brought up from the day he was born with certain and at times unrealistic expectations that go along with being a member of a royal family. Expectations that were dictated by tradition and precedent, with no concern for the individual tastes and difficulties of any given person. Expectations which, one could argue, exacerbated Bertie’s condition, the more he tried to conform to same.
The result was that a great man, a brave man, a witty, intelligent and conscientious man remained unseen by the world. And because this younger Prince, who unexpectedly became King was judged up until that point by what he was incapable of doing as opposed to what he could do, little faith in him existed. Especially when all of the traditional methods of “curing” a stutter had already been tried without success.
Enter Logue, who in the most casual of ways wipes all of that aside. He forgets social expectations, steps over tradition, lays aside judgment, and takes a personal interest. He calls the Duke “Bertie”, and has him singing his way through practice speeches, among other wild actions for a Prince of the Realm in order to prove the stutter could be controlled. More accurately perhaps to prove to Bertie that a great man resided beneath the stutter. Logue, in other words, addressed the man with a problem, instead of addressing the problem itself.
That is perhaps what appealed to me the most about the film. That in spite of all the strict expectations, the accepted science of the day, the knighted doctors and the protocol, it was a man with a funny hat and no tendency to genuflect that was able to help “Bertie” become the King George VI that the nation needed.
I am not royalty. And I doubt that any of my readers are. However I certainly identify with this royal character in this movie. I struggle with the reality of the better parts of me sometimes being obscured by expectations. Traditions. Conventions. As well as my own unique problems and difficulties. I know what it feels like to be assessed not by that of which I am capable, but by things such as a bad resume, being single, a small network, a blog without bells and whistles. Little to no money. No life coach. On and on.
In other words the things that are trappings that come quite naturally to most, but not to me.
There is, as of yet, no Lionel Logue in my life. But throughout my life it has been the rare times when I have been approached or assisted in a unique manner that ignored social covnentions that have had the greatest impact on me. I have come to realize, (as I have often said) that I have control over my own status quo. It is I who can, and will, refuse to accept the social expectations of someone in my position. I will not cower behind what tradition and convention expected of me. I’ll approach my problems, as Bertie eventually did, in ways that nobody finds acceptable, but will one day lead me to where I need to be. And I hope that you will do the same thing, if the conventional isn’t working for you.
And if a Lionel Logue type shows up with unconventional methods and an interest in my success? Well, unlike Bertie I don’t think I will hesitate to welcome his/her advice from Day One. Heaven knows I have absorbed as much of the conventional advice as possible for right now.
Any Lionel Logues in your life?
Doubting What’s Nameless
(Author’s note: The original first few paragraphs on this otherwise still applicable post were quite deeply tied into the Too XYZ blog itself, and thus have been omitted here. –Ty)
There are many named handicaps and disabilities out there. Many that, when properly identified can be lived with, or in some cases eliminated, provided the right resources, knowledge and personnel. Such obstacles have names because they have been studied. And they have been studied because they have a consistent pattern of appearance and of repercussions for those that suffer the impairment.
Take as an example someone who finds they wash their hands more than others. And as they get older, they wash their hands raw to the point of being unable to handle objects. In the extreme this behavior begins to make a person late for appointments, and unable to attend social functions, because so preoccupied are they with washing their hands they can barely concentrate on anything else. Though this may be indicative of any number of things, and a professional evaluation is necessary to determine an individual cause, the literature indicates that such a situation is often the result of something called Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. (Known as OCD for short.)
There is much we do not know about OCD. But we learn more all the time. Common symptoms like the ones I have described. We have discovered several things that seem to cause it. We have discovered therapies and medications which depending on the patient can lesson and in some cases eliminate the disorder.
While naysayers persist, abundant studies have been conducted at this point in history to convince fair minded people that OCD is an actual condition. And therefore when we know that someone officially suffers from it, we can make certain accommodations in our mind pertaining to the particular struggles and set backs such people experience.
Of course my point applies to far more than OCD. There are whole volumes of mental or intellectual disorders which have been named and successfully treated. Each of them opens a door in the minds of fair people. Not a door which will excuse any and all actions on the part of those with a disorder, but a door which will take into account the particular struggles associated with any given condition. The same with certain physical deficiencies.
There was of course a time, not very long ago, when none of these conditions had names. Or perhaps everything out of the ordinary might be labeled as simple “madness”. At those times those with depression were told to merely, “cheer up.” Those with Attention Deficit Disorder were told to “just calm down and pay attention.” Those with OCD were ordered to just “stop doing that. Just stop.”
These approaches did not work, of course. It was more than simply choosing to be different. And while the causes of any given disorder or illness continue to be debated in scholarly circles, (is it brain chemistry? emotional imbalance? Deep seated damage to the psyche?), these behaviors do have names and are at least seen as things which must be understood and treated in some specific way. In other words it is understood today that people are not going to simply talk themselves out of such conditions.
However despite how much we as a society appear to have learned about human behavior, it seems as though we have in reality learned very little. For in the absence of a named condition that appears in very specific journals and records most people still insist that those who have not succeeded according to the conventional definition must simply be lazy, stubborn, or just plain nuts. And it is not only the general, faceless public that fails to give much leeway in this regard. One of the cruelest ironies of them all is that it is often people with a defined, documented, clinical setback of their own who are most vocal in damning those who have fallen behind without the “benefit” of a specific diagnosis. As though struggling people without a diagnosis somehow take away from struggling people with one. I have been the brunt of such hypocrisy many times over in my unusual life.
I am willing to opine, (at risk of major backlash from the online community), that the self proclaimed most tolerant, open-minded, egalitarian, creative generation of all time, the so called Generation-Y (Gen-Y) is in fact just as much, if not even more prone to this sort of out of hand dismissal as any other previous generation.
As a demographic, the current as well as the upcoming generation is in love with the idea of breaking down boundaries so that everybody can succeed. They don’t need permission, they don’t need approval, and they don’t even need help. They are determined to tear down the status quo once and for all, flip off the naysayers and insist on success their way. On their terms.
That sounds great. Even noble and liberating. Until you consider that one major side effect of this approach is the assumption that “if Seth Godin can do it, so can I. And if I can do it, by God so can you and so can everybody.” Under this life view, there are literally no excuses for anybody to fall behind. Those that run the online world right now cannot as a whole conceive of any reason why anybody should not have exactly what they want, or be well on their way to same all of the time. And if anybody isn’t, they are not trying hard enough. Because, “you make your own luck, and you define what does and doesn’t happen to you.”
Unless of course you have been diagnosed with an eating disorder. Or dyslexia. Or fibromyalgia. Then you get to say you are going as far as you can given your circumstances. But to those, (like yours truly) who have great strengths but obvious weaknesses and consistent, sometimes problematic personality traits without a name? Well, you need to get off of you ass, suck it up, accept that life isn’t fair, subscribe to 1,400 blogs, read the last 25 books on self-marketing, (never mind they are all exactly the same) hire a life coach, get out there and network, and (my favorite) insist on success. Said as though my whole life has gone the way it has simply because I have failed to “insist”.
I believe in accountability and responsibility. Nobody gets to use their condition, named or unnamed as an excuse to do nothing. And indeed I know plenty of people with any number of certifiable conditions that do not in any way use them as a tool or an excuse. But in our success oriented culture we have got to start considering the myriad diversity of not just our success, but our problems. Our obstacles.
We cannot ever know with certainty what is happening inside somebody’s head or heart. That means that there are times when we are going to be bullshitted by those who just don’t want to put any effort into life at all. Yet we still need to stop and put some effort into learning discernment. Getting to the root of what makes someone do what they do, (or fail to do.) And certainly to create ways to help those who need unconventional help as often as we help those who can be helped in the conventional manner. If we can take the time and energy to read up and master WordPress, SEO, marketing, and all of those sort of “necessities”, we sure as hell can stop and take the time to master the human component.
Not all of our handicaps have names. We must accept that perfectly decent, brilliant, valuable people with a lot to offer the world may be getting held back by something that is deeply ingrained into them but is not mentioned in the DSM-IV. They may not, and often don’t understand themselves what their setback is. They too deserve help. And attention. And yes by God, a little bit of leeway as they make their way on their own terms according to their own timing. You don’t have to help them, (us) but if you won’t, for the love of heaven don’t stand in our way with your sanctimonious self-help platitudes either.
Named or not, we each struggle with something. It’s high time we dedicate ourselves to helping people get around those obstacles when all else fails them, as opposed to labeling, doubting, or dismissing them when they are unable to overcome problems in a conventional manner.
My (Non) Plan for 2011
All right. In all accuracy what I am about to describe is in fact a plan. So much for my cutesy, eye catching title. But it could be considered a non-plan in more ways than one.
2010 was about a plan. I joined Twitter, and launched this blog in an effort to not only describe the nature of a square peg trying to live in the round holes of a materialistic, productivity-obsessed society, but also to join together with others who felt the same way. I wanted to connect with other people who wanted to get ahead, but found themselves to be Too XYZ. Though that has occurred to a small degree, and I have in fact connected with several great people as a result of my social media endeavors, I have not, (as I have written about before) formed a coalition of such souls. 2010 brought about many things for me, among them allies of varying stripes. For which I am grateful. But the establishment of a network of almost total like-minds did not happen as I had planned or hoped.
I had decent exposure, through Twitter, Brazen Careerist, and other such places. I could always have more, as I have seen blogs younger than mine get lucky enough to take off like wildfire. But overall I have a network of well wishers. Yet what 2010 taught me was that I couldn’t take people who are Too XYZ, and network with them in the manner that more conventional people do so. In other words, I had thought I could achieve my unique definition of success, using my own unique methods, by simply applying the social media rules and art form to people of like-mind. I have come to theorize, however that being an unconventional person, with unconventional methods and yes, unconventional weaknesses means that attaining even my own unconventional idea of success is nearly impossible when applying conventional tactics.
I know what many are thinking. There are all kind of gurus, super-bloggers, location independent freelance billionaires with passive incomes in the tens of thousands a month who got there by being exactly that: unconventional. Maybe. But as I have spent the last year looking into social media, and its alleged heroes, I have realized that for most of those types there is actually a common, and dare I say conventional thread. That common thread is their manner of marketing.
Leaving the rat race. Traveling the world. Living a dream. Saying “up yours” to the status quo. Creative visualization. LinkedIn. Blogs. Subscribing. Commenting. Linking. Tweeting. Re-Tweeting. TEDs. Podcasts. Conventions. Give-Aways. E-books. Asking “How can I help you today?” On and on and on. After awhile it all starts to sound the same to me. And maybe it is all the same, since in the end it all comes down to one (and I mean one) thing. Constantly selling.
Now, some people will flat out tell you that is it. Always be selling. Yourself and what you do. Sell, sell, sell. How? (See the above paragraph.) They make no bones about it. That’s fine, for them. I actually respect them a bit more for just coming out and saying it.
But then there are those who disguise their riches, their new “free” lifestyle, their fame, their influence, in terms of how much they loved life. How much they faced fear. Made themselves uncomfortable. Went out there and “just did it!” And they encourage us all to do the same thing, because there is no such thing as luck, and anybody anywhere can do what they did.
To me that is buying the house based on how lovely the weather was that day. What all of these gurus, (some of them very well intentioned I will admit) are actual selling is….salesmanship itself. They only think it is their desire, their vision of their future, and their passion that they are selling. But really, look carefully at almost all of their stories, and you will find, in the end, that they learned how to sell, or get hired, or mentored by, or subscribed to the blog of, or was introduced by an acquaintance to someone who taught them how to sell the shit out of themselves and what they “offer” the world. In some cases it is clear that selling was far more responsible for their success than quality of their product.
Then others see the lives these people live, and how passionate, and eager to help, and lovely they are, and we start to think that it is those things that got them where they are. Those things may have kept them where they are. But in the end, selling got them there.
And you know what? I hate selling shit. I tried it as a career and it sucked every bit as much as I thought it would. I have tried to sell myself at networking events and you know what? It sucked just as much as I predicted it would. Good, talented people get ahead by selling. As do really lousy bastards. But to quote a line from one of my favorite films of all time, Primary Colors:
“I don’t care. I’m not comparing the players. I don’t like the game.“
And I don’t. This game of selling is for the birds. Actually I have a caveat; this game of selling as currently defined by most people is for the birds. This version of marketing yourself and your wares that people insist you need to master in order to get anywhere as a freelancer. The version of marketing yourself and your wares that even the most open minded, generous, and status quo hating individuals in social media will beat you over the head with, and insist is necessary, only to turn on you when you determine you cannot do it. A version of marketing yourself and your wares that has at some point transformed into a nebulous altar at which 90% of the ironically self proclaimed non-conformists gather and before which they all genuflect whilst immersed in the ecstasy of the game changing wonders of Social-Media marketing and networking.
Yeah. For the birds.
It’s this manner in which we sell things, and ourselves, from which I am clearly unable to launch my life and my work. And reading the top 25 books on current marketing trends, subscribing to Seth Godin and 100 other blogs, stopping in on every web chat by every guru on this side of the equator (all of which have been emphatically suggested to me) is not going to change any of that. When it comes to traditional marketing (and social media does have its own traditions) I’m not worth a damn. Period.
And so 2011 is going to be about going at it my own way. And by my own way, I actually mean my own way. Not living life in my own way only to try to market it in a conventional way, but to proceed with my daily life, communications, research, passions, and yes, even marketing in my own way. If the gurus cannot cure themselves of their traditional social media marketing fetishes and help all of us, then I will do it myself.
And yes, I will be doing it. I never said that marketing and getting the word out in some form are wrong for me. I see their value. What I am saying is that it has be done at my own pace, using my own methods, and paying little attention to how it was done by “Cindy Happypants: Blogger Extraordinaire”, who changed the world while writing about selling donuts and living a dream. (Though I would date such a woman if she existed.)
In 2011, it may come down to me living with my family again for a while. If so, I’ll do it. It may mean less time networking, and more time alone, perfecting me. Fine. It will mean most of my day will be spent writing. Not selling my writing, or pitching my writing, or talking about writing. But the actual process of writing. Like doors closed, curtain drawn, I do this because this is all I know how to do, writing.
My novel at first, and then blogging, and then whatever time is left can be spent seeing if there are any magazines out there that want my stuff. And if I find them the days will be spent reading them, not making calls the schmooze the editor. And when I finally do decide I may have a piece worth pitching, I will pitch it. This may happen ten times next year. Maybe more, or maybe even less. I won’t be forcing it.
It will mean that I will be reading scripts, looking for acting projects and memorizing speeches. It will not mean saving up and moving to New York to make it on Broadway, because I don’t want to be on Broadway. I want to be a better actor, and that means acting, and studying same. Not paying someone to tell me how to do it, but doing it my own way. It’s not a hobby. It’s what I do.
I won’t be trying to learn to cook more things very often. I won’t be attempting to tackle home economics or Apartment Management 101. I’ll be going to bed when I am tired, and getting up when I am no longer so. I’ll be writing in the passive voice, and not all of my protagonists will be different by the end of my book. I’ll pass up the chance to attend the local business card exchange and instead opt for an audition at a local community playhouse. And if I get in to the play, I’ll blog about it on my acting blog that nobody reads, which brings in no money, and for which I have done all the marketing I know how to do, and for which I still have almost no readers.
I’ll retweet things I like, and not because I want to get on the good side of someone else who isn’t following me anyway. I will leave comments on friends’ blogs just because they are friends and deserve to have their stuff read, whether they have “social proof” or not. I won’t bother commenting on sites who require me to prove my expertise in something before taking me seriously and I will not prove my expertise through anything but the work that I do. Content shall be king in 2011. Judge my abilities by that and not by a work history, or to hell with you.
And it won’t matter what I know or who I know because I will be too busy being better than I was in 2010. And when it comes time to start knowing more people, I only want to know people who know how to behave in public, treat everyone with respect, and have the decency to return a message. Because nobody out there is important enough for me to sit around and wait weeks for just for the chance of kissing their ass. I don’t care how many pings their blog gets, whatever the hell they are.
And if I starve? Folks, half the time I am close to starving anyway. At least I’ll starve while doing my damnedest to be productive in my own way, and not starve while trying to tweak a resume so that it can be summarily ignored by the 30 trillionth hiring manager who just doesn’t have the time to understand that my “employment gaps” are due to misfortune and things beyond my control, and not because I’m not worth anything. If someone has no time to read what I write as a writer, and instead wants a flashy resume and some name dropping, they don’t want me. Nor do I want them.
And just maybe, in so doing, I will get to the point where I do what I want, just like Cindy Happypants: Blogger Extraordinaire. The only difference being I’ll get to be whatever I want first, as opposed to playing a half-assed game in order to have the privilege of doing so. Then I will have a product that will sell itself. (With a little bit of luck, which unlike most, I am not afraid to admit is a big part of our lives.)
And if anyone wants to join me…well…I’m still not Too XYZ for a little bit of company, and a little bit of help. And I am willing to give any help I can to anyone who wants it. But I’m not a guru, thank god.
Happy New Year.
Yes, Virginia, There Was a Writer
Due to it being the most reprinted newspaper editorial in the history of the English language (verified), most people, regardless of their faith, are familiar with this piece, known now to history as “Yes, Virginia. There is a Santa Claus.”
Unsigned at the time of its publication in The Sun in 1897, it was of course written in response to a letter received from eight year old Virginia O’Hanlon Douglas. Though over time there has been some amount of scholarly doubt as to whether or not an eight year old actually penned the letter bearing her name (appearing as “Virginia O’Hanlon” in the paper), the woman to whom the letter has been attributed lived a life that was rather well documented. Her Wikipedia page, as well as other more legitimate sources cover her life in plentiful, if not meticulous detail. Virginia herself received fan mail for the rest of her life, to which she graciously responded. She indicated near the end of her life that the attention she received as a result of her famous letter had effected her life in a positive way.
Several movies, animated specials, and other works have been created that tell the story of Virginia and her letter. She has become a rather integral part of the Christmas zeitgeist. At least in the United States.
Coming in a distant second to Virginia in this story, in regards to eventual fame, scholarly investigation, dramatic presentation in various media, and inspiration to generations of Christmas lovers? One Francis Pharcellus Church. Who was he? Nobody special. Just the man who actually wrote the editorial itself.
I don’t want to go on and on about that. But I did think it worthy of mention that the author of the words which move so many of us that love Christmas, and the work of whom sparked the most popular editorial of all time seem almost to be an after thought.
“Oh yeah,” folklore personified seems to say. “He took care of that whole writing part of the Virginia story.”
Folks, nothing against Virginia, but in the end Mr. Church was the story. Mr. Church is the story.
Yet his section of the link I provided is basically just his picture. His Wikipedia entry merely mentions he wrote the piece, where he went to school, that he died childless and where his body is buried. It’s barely longer than the piece for which he is (not so) famous.
Now I am not beating up anybody over this. Virginia deserved some attention and admiration. However I do confess it has over the years annoyed me a bit that though it is Mr. Church’s work that instantly captured that hearts of millions, it continues to be Virginia’s story.
So, that being said, allow me, on this Christmas Eve of all days, to talk a little bit about what this work of Francis Pharcellus Church says about him, and about writing.
Set aside how famous it is. Really think about the piece. The prose is eloquent but concise. Touching on a multifaceted and deep spiritual truth in a manner that is accessible to an eight year old without boring an adult reader. It both confirms the truth about “Santa Claus”, without blowing the mystique of Santa Claus. It upholds the magical in a child’s Christmas experience without telling one single lie or half truth. On top of it all its magnificent diction makes it perfect for easy recitation or performance.
In other words, it is a brilliant piece of writing that accomplished its mission. And far, far more.
There is much we will never know about the circumstances of Mr. Church composing this editorial. We cannot know what exactly Mr. Church was thinking when he wrote the piece. We probably have no way of knowing if it was assigned to him as opposed to being a request he made to write it. And certainly his muse, like those of all us writers, will remain a mystery. Certainly more of a mystery than what Virginia went on to do with the rest of her life.
Still I think we can make a few assumptions safely. It is safe to say that this was more than a staff writer cutting his pay check. There is a superior quality of soul within the words. I find it hard to accept he didn’t believe each and every one of them as he wrote it.
Safe, also, is the assumption that Church had no idea of the impact he was about to have on an entire nation’s holiday experience over the next hundred-plus years and counting. Anybody who sits down to pen something with that as a goal needs to be locked up someplace.
He did know, as we know, one thing; he was a writer. It was his job to write, and to do so well. To live up to the standard’s expected of him by his employer and by himself. Pursuant to that, he sat down (as so many of us have before and since) with a goal, a resource, his experience, his talent, and his words. And he penned something. Something to which he could not (or would not) attach his name originally. And as a result of his gift for words, he changed not only Virginia’s life, but millions of others. Perhaps even Christmas itself to some degree. And all of that would be true whether or not the “Virginia” letter was really written by an eight year old.
This is why I write. This is why I seek out places and opportunities to make use of this talent I apparently have to assemble words in such a way as to effect, inspire, change, entertain, inform, provoke, and perhaps on occasion save other people. It is why I chose to be a starving freelancer for now. (Unless some perfect staff writing position should show up.) It is why I do my damnedest to write even though I know that nobody is reading. Why, despite a hiatus here and there I muster up within myself time after time that exhausting, that perplexing, that frustrating, that miraculous and inexplicable component within my spirit that accounts for me being a writer.
This stuff isn’t easy, folks. But it can be worth it, when you get it right. Even more worth it when the right people read at the right time what a writer composes. Just as they did for Francis Pharcellus Church. Just as they still do 113 years after he submitted it to the paper.
Was that ubiquitous yet beloved editorial a fluke? Did Church merely get lucky, and strike a cord or two, or a million? Maybe. But I think not. He was, as history tells us a “veteran” journalist, which means he had been writing large amounts of copy for at least quite a few years. That experience may have sharpened him and his words over time in just the right way to make his tapping into the consciousness of a whole culture more likely than it otherwise would have been. But that isn’t being lucky. That’s showing up. We get rewarded for showing up.
Thus far I have shown up to write far more often than I have been rewarded for same. And I get weary of it. Sometimes I even step away for weeks at a time. But the knowledge that showing up can lead to that one moment, article, sentence, speech or novel that changes everything eventually brings me back to the bottom of that hill, ready to push that bolder ever upward. I wonder if Francis Pharcellus Church ever felt that way.
As I mentioned, we know Church died having had no children. But did he? If children be extensions of ourselves and our love, while also taking on a life of their own as time goes on, I say perhaps the man did have at least one child. That child was an unsigned editorial in the September 21, 1897 edition of the New York Sun. And look at how many children, of all ages, it has touched in the decades since.
All because there was once a writer who showed up.
Ty Unglebower 