Around here, and on Twitter, I occasionally hear people say, “Jesus be a fence.”
Right now — to be brutally honest — I’m finding some members of my immediate family to be annoying, so I often find myself asking for Jesus to be a security fence between them and me.
Protect my mind and my fists, Lord. Inshallah it never comes to blows.
But I also find myself asking for divine intervention in other areas of my life.
Today, as I was alone with my thoughts, I started thinking about the folks who work in PR. These people go out and film things, and then they go back to their editing suites, and then they produce the final package. They’re responsible for the whole thing.
As I write and post things on Medium and Substack, I start to get excited. Not overwhelmed, not really, but jumpy. I have something that’s ninety-five percent complete — but then I start getting antsy.
I’ll be editing something, chopping over here and adding over there, and then I think, “Surely this is it. Surely I can go ahead and click Publish. Surely it’s done. But what if it isn’t? What if I need to go back and …?”
I start to wonder if I need a user’s manual, or at least a little guidance.
There are industry standards, I’m sure, in making advertisements and things of that nature. But what about personal essays, and blog posts, and newsletters? How will I know when I’ve met all the terms and conditions? How will I know?
Then I realize that it’s probably a good thing to have a little freedom. It gives me a chance to use my own voice and do my own thing, without having to be hyper-vigilant or punishing myself. I can just … exist.
And I’m pretty good at doing that.
Jamais Mayville 