Have you ever noticed how a theme will suddenly develop around
you? Serendipitous events occur, snatches of speech overheard
begin to form a pattern, and you think, I need to pay attention
to this.
Recently, I was at dinner with some dear friends. She is an English
major, as am I, and she told me that she’s counseling her
daughters away from anything so frivolous as an English degree.
She believes they should go into the medical field where the future
employment demand is projected to be high thanks to the aging
population. This saddened me, because I remember so well my own
university days when, if I was foolish enough to announce my major,
someone was bound to sneer, “You’ll never get a job
with an English degree.”
Then, just yesterday I was at an outdoor market, a charming place
with stalls and booths selling clothing made from recycled garments,
hand made jewelry, organic fabrics and bags. I stopped at a booth
full of whimsical cards and pictures and fridge magnets, compelled
as I always am by words, for this artist combined famous and obscure
sayings with her own drawings. As I stood there reading from this
eclectic smorgasbord of pithy sayings, I overheard the artist
say to another customer, “My dad said I’d never get
a job if I took an English degree and I’m glad I got to
prove him wrong.” There it was again.
I wanted to throw back my head and howl against the mothers and
fathers, the well-meaning friends and acquaintances who try to
keep any child or young person from following their passion. Writers
matter. Artists matter. They are the soul of the world. Of course
we need commerce and science and medicine and all the other fine
pursuits, but we need to encourage our artists: our dancers and
singers, poets, playwrights, actors, film makers and, yes, writers.
Can you imagine a world where all our story tellers gave up and
got law or engineering degrees?
I don’t want to.
Nancy Warren is the proud owner of a degree in English. She has
been gainfully employed as a writer all of her working life.
