Quintessence

The inane ramblings of a self-proclaimed literary luminary

 

February 15^th:

I hate my job.

I hate it so very much.

If it were possible to hate a job to death, then I would be sent to prison for committing atrocities akin to those of the Nazis.

The worst part is that I have a great job. I get to read, and read, and keep reading. This would be great if I wasn’t forced to read the most mindless drivel in existence! To clarify for you, I am in charge of scoring the essays that students write every few years to prove their proficiency in English, and this year, these leaders of tomorrow get to write about their pets. If these essays are an example, then our general populace is

less literate than Helen Keller. Here are some stories I had to read yesterday.

 

“hello my name is abby ridien. I have two kitites: their names r kitty 1 and thing 2 lol. i luv them sooooo much! a few monts ago mommy saw kitty 1 jumping on ting 2 a lot and now we hav a lott moer kitties and i call them all mewomix”

 

“poooooop”

 

“I like birdies J theyre so cyooot and cuddlly and fyzzy and warrrm and sweet and lovingg and yellow and they make me happyface”

 

“poooooop” was written by an 11^th grader.

 

This next piece is actually an example of one of the better pieces that I read. It is also incredible evidence of why I think mandatory sterilization is okay.

 

“I have a pet rakoon. we call her foamy, cuz her mouth is always so foamy.”

 

These bastardizations of our language is why my job is so horrid. They do not pay me enough to read that crap for 8 hours a day. Fortunately though, for every 100 stories about “kitties 1 2 3 4 and 6” I get a gem. No, not just a gem. A masterpiece; these stories would make the great William Shakespeare be ashamed of Hamlet, his magnum opus. These stories usually involved pets with names such as “Sire McMeow” and “Pyewacket.” They also involve actual punctuation marks. Rarities such as these are enough to make a man weep with joy.

 

February 16^th:

Good morning, fellow readers/linguistic enthusiasts. It is with pleasure, and dismay, that I inform you of what occurred today. I encountered a paradox, a paradox that bought me cheap liquor, brought me to its house, then took advantage of me and did not call back. This story I perused, it was… incredible. It perfectly juxtaposed writing like an idiot, and using the tone and intellect of a scholar. Mechanically, this story was atrocious: every sentence was the same length, there was no variance whatsoever in word usage, and it was generally hard to read. But it was still endearing. There was not one word, not one punctuation mark, that was not from the heart of the author. It literally radiated emotion.

 

When the author got Ruffles, his puppy, I could feel his joy about his brand new friend. And when Ruffles ate his owner’s shoes, not only was the author disappointed in the puppy, but so was I. When Ruffles got sick and had to be put down, I wept like a child. (I will not admit to creating the tear marks on that essay.)

 

This paper, it changed my way of thinking. I used to think that all that mattered in literature was how ‘correct’ it was. That being an excellent writer was black or white, you are or you are not. I now realize the error of my ways. Soul and emotion are just as important as punctuation and spelling.

 

Unfortunately, I am not grading this paper based on how it moved me and how it will move many others. I am grading it based on my former black and white standards. So this modern day Hawthorne will fail, and be forever unrecognized for what he is.

 

I love my job.

I love it so very much.

If I would not be sent to an asylum for doing so, I would sprint to a mountaintop and shout “I love my job!” for all the world to hear.

Reviews

[Kloud_Nine]

An interesting take, the angle i mean. Both this one and Fan have are like that. It's really a refreshing change of pace.

[Denise Deas]

I think you took the earlier advice? But still very good. i feel like im the grader. So o course very awesome. If only it were it were longer or something a bit more in depth of the narrators feelings and the like i suppose.