Thought/Rant-Provoking Comedy

Last night, a line in a TV comedy somewhat spelled out my feelings about my desired career-path since I was about 10.

While watching 30 Rock, Liz Lemon (Tina Fey) who is a writer for a TV show, was walking down the street, where she came upon a bum who told a child that a newspaper box was for peeing on. 

To this Liz Lemon said, “… We cannot give up on the written word! We need stories because I don’t have a Plan B!”

In that, I felt her pain.

Since I was 10, I wanted to be a journalist. I wanted to write for a newspaper and tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. I wanted to dig up dirt where there was dirt to be dug, to expose truths that the general public needed to know but were too busy to research on their own. I wanted to use words to change things – communities, local governments, schools, etc. – for the better.

I became a newspaper reporter. I loved it. But, I realized that many people don’t care enough to read. Instead, people would rather remain woefully uninformed and just complain. Period.

I changed careers. Kept writing, but for a corporate-type of organization.

And now, I’m a full-time stay-at-home-mom trying to help make ends meet for my family by working part-time as a freelance writer/editor/designer/etc.

Before, when I felt like people were giving up on the written word, it was disheartening because it was stealing the idealistic dream I’d had of my no-truth-spared stories being printed daily on newsprint. You remember it – the greyish-colored paper that used to be delivered to your doorstep in time for breakfast. If you were lucky, a strong whiff of fresh ink would hit you when you unfolded it. Ahhhh – I love that smell. You just can’t get that from a webpage.

Now, when I think of people giving up on the written word, it’s not only disheartening, it’s distressing. I need people to need my writing skills. I need people to value that I can put together a sentence with words spelled the way the dictionary intended rather than in text speak (txt spk??). I need to write so my daughter doesn’t grow up living in a cardboard box. (OK, so maybe the last point was a little overdramatic, but still …).

Come on people. Help a Mommy writer out. Much like Liz Lemon, I don’t have a Plan B.