Great? Really?

Greatness is a woefully cliche topic on which to write an essay. Not to say that it is unworthy, boring, or unimportant; it is none of these things. The problem with greatness is the fact that everyone has written on this topic before, about someone they admire, some great hero they know about, or perhaps about some everyday incident that was great to them. All good things, but, in order to write a great essay, there must be some level of ingenuity, freshness, and individualism present. So, the task at hand, if I do say so myself, requires nothing less than the absolute greatest writing imaginable to bring something new to this overdone topic.

I remember 10th grade English, preparing for an omnipresent writing test that would seal our futures as "studs" (those who passed) or "duds" (everyone else). Oh how we toiled for long days, writing till our fingers cramped and under extreme pressure to procure that oh so elusive of papers, the perfectly structured essay. Everything about it had to be in order, from introductory paragraph to the neat and tidy "put your 'toys' away" conclusion. Our topic was often greatness, because this prompt had occurred so often among the test prompts, and so we were subjected to endless hours of writing about Johnny the fireman, who rescued little Billy, or "House" from House's TV show (which was quite popular at the time). It was, to say the least, quite boring.

Eventually, I grew completely unable to muster one more person I thought was great. I had written about my family, my church leaders, Jesus; everyone. So, in secret, I betrayed the prompt. Instead of writing about greatness, I wrote about the perfect peanut butter and jelly sandwich; how it must be layered just so, and how some people prefer chunky peanut butter over creamy. The possibilities thereof were endless, as anyone could well imagine. However, the desired outcome was not achieved.

My teacher called me up after class, demanding an explanation as to why I would do such a thing; why I would be discontent to fit within the narrow parameters I was given and write another mundane essay. "Did you not enjoy it?" was my question. The teacher was befuddled; "What should that have to do with anything?" she asked. "I enjoyed writing it," was my only reply to her, and I took the F.

Sadly, this prevented me from getting an A that quarter on my report card, a sad truth my parents were not pleased with. I did however get the top score on the writing test (the topic wasn't greatness, no worries). What this taught me, however, is what the soul of a writer really is. Greatness isn't putting on paper memoirs of past heroes, though they are great. Greatness is doing something you love, and not always worrying about the conventions you have to break to achieve this. Writing is thinking outside the box; shouldn't greatness be that as well?