Invitation

Draft in Development – shaped through continuing conversations with others

Invitation is the essayist’s third honesty.

The essayist cannot honestly invite a companion into an inquiry while remaining untouched by it. To invite another person to look alongside you is to acknowledge that their presence may alter what is seen. In declaring invitation, the essayist declares an openness to change.

The companion does not merely accompany the inquiry. Their presence may reveal patterns, questions and possibilities the essayist would otherwise have missed. To say, “Come and look with me” is also to say: “What we discover together may change my understanding.”

The essayist must embrace the uncertainty that accompanies exposure to revision

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A Living Draft

This page is a draft in development. It evolves through conversations with readers, with writers, with thinkers, with anyone who helps clarify what it means to stand somewhere and write from that stance.

As those conversations deepen, this page will deepen. As perception shifts, this page will shift. As position becomes clearer, this page will become clearer.

Essayism is a living craft. So this page remains a living surface.