Given everything that has happened in the past 12 or so hours, I cannot in good faith do a writing bootcamp today. My responses to the writing prompts have been facetious and lighthearted, and I feel the opposite of that right now.
Like many people my age, Robin Williams has played a huge role in my life. From his roles in childhood movies to his insanely hilarious stand-up specials and his heartwrenching roles in more serious movies. I quoted Hook as a child, Live on Broadway as a teenager, and any slew of his movies or routines as an adult. I am also reminded of a difficult time in my life when I had to deal with the loss of a beloved mentor due to suicide. I touch upon that briefly in an article I wrote for Thought Catalog today, and, to be honest, right now that’s all I want to say about it right now.
Robin Williams’ humor was the embodiment of lighthearted and facetious and tongue-in-cheek and snarky. And tomorrow you’ll get another installment of my lighthearted and facetious and tongue-in-cheek and snarky bootcamp entries. But today I’ll leave you with a quote from one of my most favorite movies: Dead Poets’ Society. You might know it as that voiceover in that recent iPad commercial, but, for a good number of us, we know it as one of the most inspirational quotes about poetry and art (and life in general) that you will ever hear:
We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. Medicine, law, business, engineering: these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman, “O me! O life!… of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless… of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life?” Answer. That you are here — that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse.
That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse.
What will your verse be?
That (Not This) Abby Rose 