Over the weekend I was presented with an article I'd written for my then-local paper in 1994. It was around the same time that I had my first long-copy ad published, also in the then-local paper, while on work experience in a then-local ad agency. But that's now-irrelevant, really.
What's relevant is that my capacity for producing carefully phrased bullshit -- hype, if you prefer -- was strong even at that tender age. If you had something to say, no matter how dreary, it appears that, even then, I could help you say it in a way that sounded appealing. Even when I didn't believe it myself.
When you work with stories all the time -- you spend your days deciphering what people want to say, then making those people and things sound better than they are -- you tend to lose your grip on reality. You tend to want to believe your own hype -- a dangerous thing for a copywriter. Or a human being.
The alternative, of course, is to become inordinately cynical, which seems to have been the most recent turn in my path of unrighteous writing. What next? A vow of silence, I expect.
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