Please Happy

Heard a guest speaker at Annenberg yesterday: Mark S. Luckie of 10,000 Words. At 27-years-old, he’s the new National Innovations Editor for the Washington Post.

He spoke to a roomful of new Master’s students. He told them about how they can use text, photography, video and audio to tell stories in new ways. The most compelling part of the presentation for me was when he ran around the room, stopping at random in front of students demanding: “What is Your Passion?” “What are you doing to promote it online?”

Everyone he asked had a passion. But, hardly anyone was doing anything about it.

From Mark:
“I have found out what my passion is and I had to put it out there for the world to see.”

Then, last night, I picked up the Best American Short Stories 1989 from Carey’s bookshelf.
Editor: Margaret Atwood (my fave!).

In the introduction, Atwood talked about storytelling at its most basic:

This is the story I must tell; this is the story you must hear.

I have been doing that personally on PleaseHappy for family and friends. And, in a few weeks, I hope to be doing it more professionally as an official Multimedia Journalist.

Thank you, Mark S. Luckie, for being an example of a dream follower who has melded professional and personal.

And thank you, Margaret Atwood, for being in my life.

A friend wrote yesterday to ask about blogging. Should she do it? Who would read it? Why blog…?

My abridged response to her:

Blogging is so awesome. It’s way more time-consuming than I originally thought it would be. I think if you decide to start a blog, you have to realize that it’s going to be a daily commitment, like getting a dog. You have to feed it, take it on walks, cuddle it, think about what food to buy, where to find the most environmentally-sound toys, etc. It’s another full time job.

So go for it!

But, think about your audience. Who are you writing/shooting for and what is the point?

At first, I thought I was writing for potential employers. They’ll see my witty posts and captivating pics, and they’ll want to hire me (still waiting on that one). At times, I was writing to impress the man in my life (if I write a great post, he’ll love me more). Then, I thought I was writing for teachers (you guys did such a good job that I’m now A Blogger!). Now, I try to write for my family, my fiancé, my faraway friends, my future kids and myself. As my mentor Judy Muller said, it’s about noticing things. Then, noticing that you’re noticing.

When I forget that it’s about noticing, not not only do I get depressed that I’m not wildly famous, but my stuff gets self-conscious and boring.

I had to take a break when I got to grad school because I started trying to write about the “future of journalism.” I wanted to be Jay Rosen or Henry Jenkins. But, then I remembered that the stuff I love to write about is the stuff I notice. Like, the reindeer and snowflake ornaments hanging from the banister at my new favorite coffee shop or the light in my cats’ eyes or the little shoots of green growing out of a Los Angeles sidewalk. Beauty in the chaos.

And it became fun again.

We spent 36 hours in Ann Arbor for a wedding. Didn’t take any pics of the festivities.

But, did see lots of signs. One educated us on the exciting world of info booth volunteering, another implored Wayne County to wash its hands and my favorite thanked us for participating in airport security. Thank YOU, Michigan.

I hate email forwards. Often just delete them, even (especially?) if they’re from my own father. But, this one, I love. You’ve probably seen it. I’m amazed. Amazed at Shakespeare’s immortality, talent, ubiquitousness. (Could also be amazed at our recent generation’s lack of those things, but let’s stay in the positive.)

“If you cannot understand my argument, and declare ‘It’s Greek to me,’ you are quoting Shakespeare; if you claim to be more sinned against than sinning, you are quoting Shakespeare; if you recall your salad days, you are quoting Shakespeare; if you act more in sorrow than in anger; if your wish is farther to the thought; if your lost property has vanished into thin air, you are quoting Shakespeare; if you have ever refused to budge an inch or suffered from green-eyed jealousy, if you have played fast and loose, if you have been tongue-tied, a tower of strength, hoodwinked or in a pickle, if you have knitted your brows, made a virtue of necessity, insisted on fair play, slept not one wink, stood on ceremony, danced attendance (on your lord and master), laughed yourself into stitches, had short shrift, cold comfort or too much of a good thing, if you have seen better days or lived in a fool’s paradise -why, be that as it may, the more fool you , for it is a foregone conclusion that you are (as good luck would have it) quoting Shakespeare; if you think it is early days and clear out bag and baggage, if you think it is high time and that that is the long and short of it, if you believe that the game is up and that truth will out even if it involves your own flesh and blood, if you lie low till the crack of doom because you suspect foul play, if you have your teeth set on edge (at one fell swoop) without rhyme or reason, then – to give the devil his due – if the truth were known (for surely you have a tongue in your head) you are quoting Shakespeare; even if you bid me good riddance and send me packing, if you wish I was dead as a door-nail, if you think I am an eyesore, a laughing stock, the devil incarnate, a stony-hearted villain, bloody-minded or a blinking idiot, then – by Jove! O Lord! Tut tut! For goodness’ sake! What the dickens! But me no buts! – it is all one to me, for you are quoting Shakespeare.

-Bernard Levin

When he edits my articles, Jake always changes Web site to website. That’s not AP style, I tell him. And change it back.

Turns out, he was ahead of his time.

This just in from Daring Fireball:

The AP Stylebook changes “Web site” to “website.” (I switched here at DF back in October.)

Since returning to Los Angeles after the holidays, I’ve been reading Billy Collins (the poet I fell in love with over a few haikus about an eel and the moon). In truth, I’ve been hoping to read about death and dying. Something to either ease the panic I feel at night after everyone else is sleep. Or something to make me feel like I’m in the perfect place of despairing self-pity. Or something that says “enjoy the quiet of the early morning and stop whining about the fact that one day you’re going to die. Go Live.”

Excerpt from New Year’s Day:

And one more night be a small consolation
to us all for having to face a death-day, too,
an X in a square
on some kitchen calendar of the future,

the day when each of us is thrown off the train of time
by a burly, heartless conductor
as it roars through the months and years,

party hats, candles, confetti, horoscopes
billowing up in the turbulent storm of its wake.

I have a million things I love about the former New York State and US poet laureate. One of them is how I can hear him saying the poem. Another one is the winding path we travel with him in each poem, from his birthday to his death-day, from the kitchen to the Andes. Today, I’m thankful for poetry. The real stuff. The stuff that makes you cry because he said exactly how you feel.

This one below is not as overtly about death as some of his others. And it doesn’t necessarily describe how I feel.

But, suddenly, I LOVE IT!

Tension
By Billy Collins

Never use the word suddenly just to create tension.
-Writing Fiction

Suddenly, you were planting some yellow petunias
outside in the garden,
and suddenly I was in the study
looking up the word oligarchy for the thirty-seventh time.

When suddenly, without warning,
you planted the last petunia in the flat,
and I suddenly closed the dictionary
now that I was reminded of that vile form of governance.

A moment later, we found ourselves
standing suddenly in the kitchen
where you suddenly opened a can of cat food
and I just as suddenly watched you doing that.

I observed a window of leafy activity
and beyond that, a bird perched on the edge
of the stone birdbath
when suddenly you announced you were leaving

to pick up a few things at the market
and I stunned you by impulsively
pointing out that we were getting low on butter
and another case of wine would not be a bad idea.

Who could tell what the next moment would hold?
another drip from the faucet?
another little spasm of the second hand?
Would the painting of a bowl of pears continue

to hang on the wall from that nail?
Would the heavy anthologies remain on the shelves?
Would the stove hold its position?
Suddenly, it was anyone’s guess.

The sun rose ever higher in the sky.
The state capitals remained motionless on the wall map
when suddenly I found myself lying on a couch
where I closed my eyes and without any warning

began to picture the Andes, of all places,
and a path that led over the mountains to another country
with strange customs and eye-catching hats,
each one suddenly fringed with colorful little tassels.