Thank you, Mr Sour.

I've formulated several retrospective observations from little scraps of ideas left in the wake of a discourse I had with a somewhat irrational deviantArt user, whom I will henceforth refer to as Mr Sour. Mr Sour began the dialogue by submitting an ambiguous, dismissive comment in the advanced critique encouraged section of one of my posted fiction pieces: "I'll bother to read this when you bother to format it properly"—I hardly find such critique to be very advanced. I shouldn't have responded, but I sent him a note offering advice on how to be constructive with criticism. I didn't mean to be condescending, I promise, it’s just that I have learned the hard way that a poor attitude will nearly always come back to haunt its perpetrator. I was just trying to help, but Mr Sour totally missed my point and turned what was meant to be friendly advice into fodder for his ostentatious, argumentative exactitude-fetish. Did I mention he was irrational? In looking for proof of my alleged writing ineptitude, the guy exulted over a misspelled word—to him proof positive that I can’t write well. In actuality, the correct correlation between mistake and ineptitude lies in my skill as a typist. And if one mistake in spelling signifies that I'm a faulty writer, then one mistake in reasoning signifies that this guy a faulty thinker. But I digress. Compulsive obsession over who’s correct and who’s faulty is the stuff that divorces, estranged friendships, and job-terminations are made of.

I’ve gained a few revelations from this episode:

1) Save instruction for those on whom it will not be wasted. “Do not give what is holy to dogs or throw your pearls before pigs; otherwise they will trample them under their feet and turn around and tear you to pieces.” –Matthew 7:6. “Do not rebuke a mocker or he will hate you; rebuke a wise man and he will love you.” –Proverbs 9:8

2) I’ve succeeded in my writing. The following is an excerpt from the acrimonious Mr Sour’s ultimate analysis of my posted work: “…what you produce is trash. Looking past your formatting reveals a bleak, toneless waste of textual juxtaposition. You have no concept of imagery.” Thank you. First, the fact that he bothered to give my work that much consideration means that it in some way affected him. Good. My love of Impressionism began with strong contempt for Monet: I couldn't ignore his work, and it eventually won my appreciation. I assume that Mr Sour harbors a passionate love for my work that underlies the apparent tension between my writing and his stylistic leanings. This counterintuitive ardor confuses him, as it defies his pretentious, aesthetically-composed predilections. He's my biggest fan, but what would his friends think if they knew? Second, I’ve recently been trying to compose works that, to a degree, contain all of the attributes mentioned in Mr Sour's ostensibly negative review. For reasons that extend well beyond the scope of this journal, I’ve been trying to construct poems and narratives that feel somewhat empty. A wasteland beneath a veneer of milk-and-honey pastureland. An awkward, empty shell of elegance. Thoughtful nothingness. You get the picture. Like Neutral Milk Hotel songs playing on an antique phonograph in an otherwise empty room whose walls are wallpapered in pages ripped from both Sherwood Anderson's Winesburg, Ohio and Ernest Hemingway's In Our Time. Sort of.

3) Finally, I’ve learned that it is good to convert pointed, negative commentary into encouragement for the discouraged. As a result of this episode, I happened to take particular notice of a journal entry written by a recent visitor to my deviantArt site—a young girl who had been harassed by elitist dA users over trivial protocols. A self-proclaimed amateur, she was humbly requesting assistance, but received only inexorable criticism for having done so. I left an encouraging comment on her journal page and proceeded to peruse her gallery. As it turns out, she’s a very good writer—much better than I was when I was her age, arguably much better than I am now. I hope my words contribute to her future success, as I have no doubt she possesses the potential to be a famous writer someday. It is good to speak life.

That’s all I have to say about that. Almost. Before I conclude, let me just reassert my belief that formatting, however important, is simply a means to an end. Such a statement would certainly offend the rigid sensibilities of one Mr Sour, and the thought of Mr Sour with an especially puckered expression makes me happy.

--the management