First Posted: 9/3/2013
Admittedly, I, for the most part, enjoy the sliver of notoriety I get from writing for my hometown paper and one of its local magazines. I say, for the most part, because, like most folks, I can get a bit sensitive when it comes to those who criticize either my efforts or my fellow colleagues’ efforts whose work routinely appears on the local pages, especially if it’s criticism leveled at my pal, Tom Usher.
Of course, when you put your work out there, there will be times when you’re going to take some shots from those who eschew following that motherly admonishment from our youth, that bromide about not saying anything if you’ve got nothing nice to say.
So, I try to listen, glean what is worthwhile from a Facebook or face-to-face criticism that’s been rendered and move on to the next piece. To safeguard against committing any mistakes deemed by this former English teacher controllable, matters involving grammar, usage, punctuation and, especially spelling, I’m pretty meticulous when it comes to proofreading and editing before sending what I write at home on to those journalistic denizens who work in that fancy building on Elida Road. Doing something I told my students to do dozens and dozens of times, I proofread aloud to allow my ear to help my eye in my quest for error-free copy, and I also proofread several times.
I guess I knew my technique was working when I heard one of my rather acerbic bar patrons at the Knights of Columbus come in one day, order a tall, frosty 23-ouncer, eye me in judgmental fashion and proffer the most minimal of compliments a writer can receive, as in, “Read your column a couple days ago, and you spelled all the words right.”
While others might have been somewhat under whelmed, I actually was pretty well pleased by his assessment. After all, there are days when I’ll settle for that. Believe me; all writers know that not everything they pen is Pulitzer-worthy!
Among the most common criticisms I hear about my local paper, of which I am equal parts contributor and subscriber, is there are too many editing/typographical errors. And, of course, the reason for this criticism is that these, especially the typographical errors, are often discernible to even the least gifted of former English students.
A few weeks ago, on ESPN, I had to laugh when I saw a quick reference to an embarrassing moment for Notre Dame. To commemorate the opening game of this football season against Temple, souvenir tumblers were unveiled, ones that around the top read, “Figthing Irish,” certainly a less-than-prestigious moment for an institution laden with prestige.
I can remember pretty vividly the first time I saw a typo and my reaction to it. It was during my LCC days, in the elevated chapel behind the folding partition wall that separated where we prayed and the gym where we perspired.
It was a time when those religious types who were in charge of our Christian development decided to inject some contemporary thought into the liturgy used in our school Masses. That meant that even some of what we felt was our music wound up on mimeographed sheets, that is, no doubt, after the lyrics were scrutinized for questionable content.
So, while I don’t ever remember our singing The Kingmen’s “Louie, Louie” or The Standells’ “Dirty Water” at Mass, I do recall both folk songs such as Dylan’s “Blowin’ in the Wind” and Simon and Garfunkel’s “Sounds of Silence” sliding into slots generally occupied by age-old standards such as “Now Thank We All Our God” and “Holy, Holy, Holy.”
Although we all could have, no doubt, sung “Sounds of Silence” without consulting the sheet, having heard it on the radio so many times, we did use the sheet and noted just how hilarious a typo can be in the typographically challenged line “And in the naked light I saw, 10,000 pwople maybe more.”
The simple mistake made on a Remington typewriter keyboard when a teacher’s finger brushed the w key, which resides right beside the e key, was enough to send us into paroxysms of snickering and, of course, prompted us each time we received that sheet to sing the lyric with pwople and then try to suppress the heaving shoulders of our inwardly turned laughter.
So, of course, I get it when it comes to typographical errors. Pretty much everyone from the minimally literate to the Ivy League graduate recognizes them and can’t fathom how they happen.
But, like so many of life’s faux pas, they do happen, hopefully only occasionally but most certainly inevitably.
So, please take it easy on us writer types. For all of us, may I say to all you pwople out there, we’re trying.
