june 22 ego

The first time I read Ogden Nash's Reflections On Ice Breaking I thought it was funny. The second time too. The third time I read it, as part of some school thing, I started to think, well, okay sure, it's funny, and fun, but is it good? What really is there here? In case you don't know, the poem goes like this: Candy Is dandy But liquor Is quicker It's not a serious poem, but it's a great little moment. When I started writing as a teenager, I had these big dumb visions of what my future might have in store. Would I write a book? Two? Three? Would I write a bestseller? Would I create a character and a series that other people would consume the way I consumed Robert Ludlum's original Bourne trilogy as a teenager? And, like, that's great and all, but the reason I started writing in the first place —— the real reason, not the "oh I want to impress girls" reason —— was because I liked the idea of a writer like Ogden Nash becoming low key immortal due to a silly little seven-word poem and…