“Go West, Young Man!” From the first time I heard that line, it has echoed within my head. Sure, life has taken me many places—many wonderful places, many exotic places. Still, the allure of this simple sentence keeps coming back. It’s been a never-ending whisper, lingering just below the surface of everyday life.
It’s in the quiet moments before dawn when the deepest sleep removes all inhibitions that the call echoes loudest. But upon waking, it disappears. The daily routine takes over. Yet it gnaws. Beneath the skin. Yearning to be free.
Then, one morning, it happened. The bags packed snugly into the family truckster (an aptly named Ford Expedition, courtesy of the also aptly named Enterprise), the phrase became a reality. We, the Carosas, were heading west. No longer a young man, the spirit of my youth danced sprightly in my mind.
On this day, we would heed the siren call of this purely American vision.Continue Reading “Go West, Young Man! The Open Road Calls”
Are You More A Marxist Or A Lennonist?
Karl Marx (John Jabez Edwin Mayal) and Vladimir Lenin (Unknown, presumably official), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
During dinner at the recent New York Press Association Publishers’ Conference, talked turned towards the misuse of the term “click-bait.” In a strict sense, the term applies to misleading descriptions of internet links. These phrases “bait” you to “click” the link; hence, “click-bait.” Links that have nothing to do with the sentence that lured you to click makes this technique unethical. That’s why “click-bait” has such a negative connotation.
Copywriters for more than a century have searched for sentences that “sizzle.” Elmer Wheeler documented the early years of this journey in his 1937 book Tested Statements That Sell. If you don’t recall the name of this Rochester native dubbed “America’s Greatest Salesman,” you will certainly know his most famous phrase: Continue Reading “Are You More A Marxist Or A Lennonist?”