Johnny America

 

We Love Your Grief But We Have Some Notes

by

Illustration of a graveyard

Be­fore we get in­to it, let us just say— we’re FANS. 

Your grief over THAT geopo­lit­i­cal clus­ter… well, it’s why we got in­to this busi­ness in the first place. The memes and the su­per raw self­ie videos and the thought­ful screen shots from your notes app — you’re in­spir­ing a gen­er­a­tion of emo­tion­al­ly wound­ed hu­mans — okur­rrr?

Yaaaasss.

THAT SAID, the old brain­trust got to­geth­er — it IS our JOB — and we found a few holes. We al­so have some builds, a cou­ple fast-bad ideas, but YOU’RE the griever. 

To­tal­ly yours to take or leave. 

(Though we DO think there’s some there-there.)

For starters, let’s talk in­clu­siv­i­ty. When you shared your feel­ings and your per­spec­tive about your lived ex­pe­ri­ence, we each kin­da said, “Well, what about me?” Today’s au­di­ences want to see them­selves in your “scared,” in your “I’m run­ning on emp­ty!” At the end of the day, this isn’t about you — this is about EVERYONE ELSE feel­ing name checked and lionized.

Next (Oprah voice)… EXPECTATIONS!!! 

Look, the bar is just too high. Sure, friends and col­leagues could ac­knowl­edge your grief at the ex­pense of feel­ing 1% awk­ward but let’s be re­al: THAT SOUNDS LIKE WORK! AMIRITE?! And we get it, you’ve been there for them, you’ve showed up be­cause that’s “what ya do” but reci­procity is overrated. 

Reci­procity ac­tu­al­ly TANKED in all of our test screenings.

Last but not least — you’re… how do we put it… not per­fect?! By be­ing open and vul­ner­a­ble, you run the risk of say­ing some­thing that might touch oth­ers or even spark a di­a­logue. UMMM… NIGHTMARE?! 

Just a pitch but… have you con­sid­ered emo­tion­al paral­y­sis? Be­ing so pet­ri­fied of of­fend­ing an army of pro­fes­sion­al vic­tims that you don’t share any­thing at all?

If you on­ly take ONE note, maybe try this last one. We think it’ll solve SO much.

At the risk of sound­ing like a bro­ken record — keep killing it! We love your grief! We just think it’ll play a bit bet­ter if you grap­ple with it silently.

Lunch soon?

Filed under Fiction on December 8th, 2023

Care to Share?

Consider posting a note of comment on this item:

—§—

Previous Post

«

Next Post

»

Join our Irregular Mailing List

For very occasional ramblings, word about new print ephemera, and of course exciting investment opportunities.