Reidquirements

Ms. Reid; Avocado Rick signing in as requested.

These days I write and talk for a living. Although I have always talked, I haven't always written. In fact, like Ben, there was a time in my life when I was so ignorant that I didn't know sposta wasn't a word...it's not a word.... right?

The sad truth is that sposta is not a word and will never be a word but gosh darn it, it should be a word because it's a great word. I admit that it's not quite as culturally pugnacious as 'aint-got-no' (which I'm pretty sure is an honorary word all along the Michigan/Wisconsin border) but I would certainly argue that sposta is a far riper and more flavorful word than the benign, and ubiquitous, huh? (which is not a word at all but just an insipid onomatopoeia disguised as a word). In fact, although sposta isn't a word, and therefore should never be spelled in public, I have to admit I love it.

But life being what it is, I accept that sposta, while beautiful when used in its proper place, is a greasy gravy stain on a brand new linen shirt when used in the wrong crowd. I know because I have the dirty shirt hanging in the closet to prove it. I once used sposta in a high school paper and spent the rest of the year ducking gravy. The sad thing about the event is that although every single person understood exactly what I meant by the word, they also knew I thought sposta was a word. The word, although clear and expressive in the context of the paper, exposed me as an illiterate hack that could neither spell, nor write, nor, it seems, think.

That is not to say I couldn't think. I could, of course, think. But my thinking was like my spelling: creative. My creative thinking worked fine in art and fantasy, but around hard sciences I was hopelessly lost. Things like Math, Physics, Astronomy (not the paint by number, pin the name on the planet type of astronomy, but the "how the hell do they do that?!" type of astronomy) were simply unobtainable. Truth is, they remain unobtainable today.

I wish it weren't true. I wish it were different and at 21 I had the ability to breeze through Calculus or attend Harvard Law , but sadly, I could not for reasons that were revealed (again) the day I wrote sposta in a high school essay.

Am I a better thinker now? Not sure. I believe I am. But belief isn't science. If it were engineers would build bridges on clouds and make cars run on dreams. Unfortunately, science dictates that we only know what we can measure. So what can I measure concerning my writing? I can measure with absolute clarity that I am a vastly better writer today than I was a decade ago. What I can't measure I relegate to the realm of belief. What do I believe about my writing? I believe that over the next decade (should I live that long) I will be a vastly better writer than I am today.

Again, I apologize for being a slow learner. I know it's sposta be different.