To Mary and Lou

I’m a student again. 

I know I’ve mentioned this recently, but it bears repeating. The teacher is now the student, and sometimes I don’t like it very much. 

More specifically, I don’t like it when I have to read my essays out loud to the class so all the other kids can tell me how to make them better. 

Okay, I don’t exactly read them out loud. I submit them to an online class forum, like everybody else in the class, and we all read each other’s work and comment on it. We’re supposed to be encouraging as well as critical. The idea is for everyone to help everyone else become better writers. 

My critiques often go something like this: Wow! This is brilliant. I love the way you said xyz, and paragraph six was especially moving. I might want to borrow that sometime. Oh, by the way, I think you might need a comma in the middle of sentence eight, but I could be wrong. Thank you so much for sharing this; I can’t wait to read more of your writing!

 Some of the other people’s critiques go like this: Thank you for sharing. I found numerous things that weren’t working for me. (Unrolls scroll of criticisms longer than Santa’s naughty list.)

To be fair, they don’t just shoot down my writing. They are equal opportunity executionists.  

The problem is, I’m the quintessential victim in these schoolyard incidents. I mean, I cry at McDonald’s commercials, when the kid sister is all grown up and crowned homecoming queen. I cry at the Ellen show, when the long lost siblings are reunited. So how in the heck do you think I’m gonna react when somebody says these articles I’ve written every week for ten years aren’t funny, and my stories are cliché, and they don’t know why I include a Bible verse at the end, and they don’t know why I start so many sentences with conjunctions? 

Okay, maybe I do start too many sentences with conjunctions. But it’s a stylistic choice. 

My point here is not to whine about the mean things the other kids said at school. It’s to whine about the fact that when I read their comments to Superman, he said, “Those aren’t bad. They said some nice things, too. I think they made some helpful suggestions.”

Wrong. Thing. To. Say. 

In case you are a husband reading this, and your wife ever, ever tells you that someone hurt her feelings, do not . . . I repeat, do not say that what they said or did wasn’t that bad. Do not, in any way, indicate that you agree with them. 

No. No. No. 

In case you ever find yourself in that situation, here is a script for you to use:

Wife: So-and-so hurt my feelings today. 

You: I never liked so-and-so. He/she is jealous of you. You are

brilliant/beautiful/perfect-in-every way. 

Wife: (Lets out deep sigh of relief.) Really? Are you sure?

You: I’m positive. As a matter of fact, if you want, I’ll go have a talk with so-and-so

right this instant. 

Wife: No, that won’t be necessary. I feel better now. (Sniff.)

You: (Wrapping your safe, protective arms around her.) All right. If you’re sure.

Here’s the credit card. Why don’t you go shopping tomorrow and buy

yourself a little something. Like a new blouse, or a diamond ring, hmmm?

That’s how it should go. Now that you know, you can’t claim ignorance, ever again. 

Two of the snipers, I mean critiquers, said that I should include more emotional connections in my essays. They said I should let my readers feel my emotions. Right now, my feelings are hurt. 

My chest is all tight. 

My head is pounding with tears that I refuse to release, because logical me knows it’s just a class, and I shouldn’t take the comments so personally. 

And I think it’s mostly because I know they’re right. About so many things. 

And it’s killing me.

But the whole experience reminds me of a Bible verse I learned when I was a little girl, about “the wounds of a friend.” When someone tells us something we don’t want to hear, but we know they’re only trying to help, we should listen. When people give us excessive praise and never say anything critically constructive, we might have reason to question their motives, or their level of commitment to helping us become our best selves. 

Sure, it’s always easier to swallow the medicine when it’s delivered with a spoonful of sugar, but not everyone is Mary Poppins. The world is also filled with Lou Grants. And though Lou Grant wasn’t anybody’s favorite guy, he was a darn good editor. 

So I’m dedicating this article to all the Lou Grants of the world, and the Mary Poppins, and everyone in between who are willing to be honest with me. Thank you. I appreciate your efforts, and I’ll try not to be so sensitive. I’m going to read back through my essays, lick my wounds and cut my conjunctions. 

And then I’m going shopping. 

“The wounds of a friend are trustworthy, but the kisses of an enemy are excessive,” Proverbs 27:6.