Whenever someone asks me why I write for the East Tennessean, I usually say something not quite witty like, “Well, I write a lot anyway, so I might as well get paid for it.” This answer is usually enough to pacify those involved in light conversation. These days, however, I find myself truly wondering why I really write for the East Tennessean.
Every week I manage to come up with something more, a thousand or so words, jammed together to try and say something. But why? It’s not the money. The pittance everyone at the East Tennessean earns precludes this job as a full-time or even part-time occupation. If not money, what then? Could it be recognition?
I don’t write for the recognition. When I started writing I didn’t even think anyone would read my work, much less pay attention, and even more remote was the consideration of the possibility of praise.
Even today I feel a little awkward when people come up to me and tell me that they like what I write, or that since they read such and such column, they thought about or did such and such thing. Not that I take credit, but I certainly accept that I am seen as a contributing factor.
Maybe I get a high out of seeing my name in print, my words and face on a publication that people actually read. Yet, to be truthful, since most things I write go through at least two drafts, I read and re-read them so many times by the time they go to publication I only read them in the paper to scan for typos.
Maybe I secretly think that I am making a difference in peoples’ lives. This could be, but since I am an avowed cynic such a belief is not within my capacity, although it is a nice thought that people read and maybe they care.
But every column takes hours to write and edit, so why do it? Every time I have a great column, I am sure that it will be the last and that the next one will suck and everyone will decide that I have nothing to say worth listening to.
Every week I find myself walking a fine line in my content. Too much personal stuff and people are uncomfortable, too general and loose and no one gets anything out of it. Imagine that every week you voluntarily exposed a part of yourself and your experiences to a couple thousand people.
The trick is just to find universal lessons in individual experiences. Sounds really straightforward doesn’t it? Yet, why should I share my life with everyone else? What makes my life so special that it’s worth reading about? To answer the first question I should say that there is no reason except to feed my own understanding, and in doing so, sharing what I have noticed in others and myself.
As to the second question, there is nothing particularly special about my life to make it worth reading about. Most people do what I do every day. Go to class, go to work, hang out, get screwed over by other people, recover and do it all again next week. I don’t write because I consider myself spectacular.
Maybe I write because I hope, however idealistic this may sound, that somewhere along the way something I say will touch someone else, that they’ll learn from or take seriously some of the things I’ve learned and observed and by doing so make their life better. I must say though, if one thing I write makes just one person smile, think, cry, learn, act, or question, I would say that all the hassle every week was worth it.
In the end it’s not the money, it’s not the “fame,” it’s not the arrogance or pretense. It’s not that I’m anything special, or that I feel obligated to share myself with the world. No, in the end, I’m just a guy that wants to help other people the best way he can: with words.

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