An introduction

In my short-lived youth, I spent more time than was truly necessary on the near-perfection of my writing. The school newspaper was a large and draining focus of my life, whether it was the overall editing of the newspaper, or the writing of the award-winning opinion column that shares the name of this current blog. I managed to tie at first place in a national competition once; the award medal long ago stashed away in the attic with my various other physical proof of accolades.

When bored to exhaustion by all of the drama surrounding my friends & family, I would retreat to my noisy bedroom filled with the ebb of whiny new romantic/goth music and scribble my frustrations over many pages of college rule notebooks. None of this was poetry, so please do not confuse me as the genesis of the emo movement. I shall surely perish by my own hand before boxy-framed glasses distort the ravishing image of my countenance, or PBR is viewed as an viable source of liquid refreshment.

University beckoned, and with it the promise of numerous adventures splayed across many more notebooks. Alas, although screenwriting courses taught me how to predict the sequence of events of every film I've ever viewed since, I began to struggle with my own creativity. Contrivance marred every page of script. My hope at not being taken seriously slowly slipped through my grasp and dare I say it, my stodgy professors began to enjoy my works.

No! This was not to be!

The years crept by, dragging the corpses of my once-nonsensical thoughts away with the seasons. Numerous suitors from more than one continent attempted to stifle my delusions. They succeeded, for a time. I was lost in a deluge of gastropubs, English Premier League & WKD Vodka Blue, followed by pool halls, technoclubs & Coors Light, and finally, one-after-another Craigslist skinny-jeansed transplant who believed a coffee date construed a betrothal. I then believed I was destined to embody the role of the old crazy cat lady. I adopted numerous flea-ridden friends, chopped off their naughty bits, and fed them when I felt inspired. A period of mourning followed due to health issues, parental divorce, and dissatisfaction with employment. I needed to escape the drudgery.

One spring I found myself standing in the midst of a group of ruffians. They wore many shades of green & white and had very questionable language. I was under the impression that football (soccer to you less-informed) was being played on the pitch, but I was too engrossed in the people-watching. I decided that this was a valuable use of my time and made the effort to attend every such gathering.

After a few months, I was aware of two gentlemen who stood behind me, often. On one fateful day, July 2, 2005, the gentlemen decided to introduce themselves, and I in turn made my famous self known. It was a waste of a gesture, however, as the ensuing months were plagued with frustration. These gentlemen decided that standing next to me was a splendid vantage point for the footie events, but ignoring me was as fruitful a venture. The culmination of my rage occurred after an away match to the festering cesspool up north, known as "Seattle." Our fishy-smelling counterparts provided the backdrop for the ultimate slap of yours truly by the gentlemen. They started out the match with a surprising friendliness only to later desert me and take up another post far, far away. What had I done to deserve the focus of such heinous villainy, again and again?

Once we had returned to Portland, the patchouli-scented center of the universe, I discovered the dark secret: I am a female. Yes, I suspected that I was of the gentler sex before, but this confirmed it. I was the creature that men fear most. Upon being confronted with this issue, one of the gentlemen admitted this to be true. I decided at once to marry this Star Wars-loving grizzly bear and spend every day torturing him, er, testing new ideas of folly on his tender sensibilities. Gradually, my abilities to tap into the absurd returned. The oft-occurring "writers' block" is no more.

I feel a slight bit of sympathy for all of you. You all tried so valiantly to reform me into a soulless bore, and nearly succeeded.