Hi Ev, I’m talking to you, yes, you. No, I am not giving you the finger.

Dear Ev Williams … An Anguished Appeal

WHAT do I Need to Do to Get my “Top Writer in Art” Label Back?

What do I have to do, Ev? Dime!

Update 27 April 19.00 CET: David Smooke kindly informed me that I’m a Top Writer in Art again. Yay!

The loss of a “Top Writer in Art”-label is like that of a limb; time may heal the anguish of the wound, but the loss cannot be repaired

Robert Southey

Even a simple banana slice and a handful of almonds can be art. Vegan is hot on Instagram. Check out my what_on_earth_do_vegans_eat profile.

I was in my seventh heaven when Medium conferred “Top Writer in Art” on my humble profile.

I can look the part, with boheme lace, frills, soft purples and greens.

I was listed as a Top Writer in Art along with Monet himself (Michelle Monet) only to have it snatched away this morning after an all-too-brief soujourn on my Medium Profile:

From the very fountain of enchantment there arises a taste of bitterness to spread anguish amongst the flowers.

Lucretius

From the very fountain of enchantment…

I had another art story in the pipeline, to celebrate the art of Nicholas Martin, my first Medium attempt at fiction.

Inspired by the glowing moon over the turquoise roof.

You can get a sneak preview of the pre-first-draft version here:

The Destruction of Camelot

Comments welcome.

I am not outraged; I am merely sad, disappointed, anguished; cut to the quick.

Why, Medium, Why?

For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst and provide for it.

Patrick Henry

I had plenty of diversity so it can’t be that.

I am aware that the call to suffering is a noble one, but let not that be my destiny, Ev; I have suffered enough.

I want the suffering to be over; to relax, to play, to have fun.

I want happiness, not suffering:

There is no true love save in suffering, and in this world we have to choose either love, which is suffering, or happiness. Man is the more man — that is, the more divine — the greater his capacity for suffering, or rather, for anguish.

Miguel de Unamuno

I bought a fancy camera to pep up my Medium articles.

I wanted to roar:

So great was the extremity of his pain and anguish, that he did not only sigh but roar.

Matthew Henry

I tried to roar but no sound came; only the dry clanking of bone grinding against bone. No fleshy mellow screams.

So I roar on Medium:

Here bring your wounded hearts, here tell your anguish; the internet has no sorrow that Medium cannot heal.

Thomas Moore

Still life. Will this pretty picture of this spring-green teapot tip the scales in favor of my title being reinstated?

Be Charles Bronson, Ev and give me my label back:

What kind of man would I have been if I had not been there to help her get her “Top Writer in Art” label back? I felt along with her — not the physical pain, of course, but all her mental anguish. You can’t be detached.

Charles Bronson

We’re here for each other, Ev.

Dear Medium, end the anguish.

You once saw fit to confer upon me this solemn and honourable validation that I so desperately seek:

Abel, Don’t Knock Validation

I bragged about it all over Medium.

I even wrote it on my LinkedIn profile.

The beauty of the world, which is so soon to perish, has two edges, one of laughter, one of anguish, cutting the heart asunder.

Virginia Woolf

#teamchristoffer

I have given you everything I got. Didn’t I, in the prolific nature of 2209 missives, write sufficent words of enchantment among the doggerel? I wrote some Haiku. One or two were even picked up by The Coffeelicious and PS I Love You. That makes me a poet. Here, in the words of my adopted town’s most famous son:

What is a poet? An unhappy person who conceals profound anguish in his heart but whose lips are so formed that as sighs and cries pass over them they sound like beautiful music.

Soren Kierkegaard

Some scenes from Copenhagen, my adopted city. I love this place.

Dear Ev Williams Let this appeal, written in words that I have stolen from greater writers than I on the Interweb, strike a chord of fellow feeling, of compassion in your VC-hardened heart and give me my title back.

I wrote a photo-essay about the most beautiful street in all of Copenhagen.

It dosen’t even have to be Art, it could be Politics, or Dating, Sex or Masturbation even. (Just kidding, I would be friggin’ mortified to be Top Writer in Masturbation).

While we’re on the subject of politics:

Politics separate men by bringing them together only superficially. Art and culture unite us in a common anguish that is our only possible fraternity, that of our existential and metaphysical community.

Eugene Ionesco

Politics? Some douche tossed my MAGA hat into the crowd.

I love politics. Here’s another quote about politics:

To strip a man of all loyalties but those to the state, makes him not only a worm but a monster, without a shred of humanity.

Haniel Long

Do not deprive us of our humanity

How about “Top Writer in Nordic Affairs”? Not that I’ve been having any affairs lately; I’ve been too busy writing for you, for FREE!

“Brian from Medium” never responded to my pitch for a paying article. He had no return email.

I couldn’t follow up to accomplish my mission of being a paid writer on Medium. What can I do?

I have even written about my affairs here. Basically, I have totally overshared on Medium. And y’know what, I don’t care.

Wouldn’t it be nice to have what this beautiful couple has? Yet, they too, have their trials and tribulations.

I stole these words for I burn with shame at the insufficency of my own ability to retain a “Top Writer in Art” title for more than a few weeks. (Why, oh why, didn’t I make a screen grab as documentary evidence? Does Wayback Machine work on Medium?)

Restore my Top Writer in Art label and I’ll bring this tilting photo back on the level.

Did Unisport make you do this?

Was it Timothy D Armour?

Whose idea was it?

First to plaster the title on my profile and then to snatch it away from me just as I was getting used to it?

I have designed my style pantomimes as white ink drawings on black backgrounds, so that man’s destiny appears as a thread lost in an endless labyrinth. I have tried to shed some gleams of light on the shadow of man startled by his anguish.

Marcel Marceau

I never denied being a neurotic:

The anguish of the neurotic individual is the same as that of the saint. The neurotic, the saint are engaged in the same battle. Their blood flows from similar wounds. But the first one gasps and the other one gives.

Georges Bataille

The neurotic gasps.

I don’t take medication, Ev:

Our culture has become increasingly intolerant of that acute sorrow, that intense mental anguish and deep remorse which may be defined as grief. We want to medicate such sorrow away.

Edward Hirsch

I don’t take medication, Ev. I play sports, I take photographs and I go for long walks on the beach.

In closing:

We know the seductive alchemy of art. To transform private anguish into a narrative of truth, if not beauty; to make sense where there was none; to bring order out of chaos — these are the promises art makes.

Kathryn Harrison

Let me achieve my promise, Ev.

Tell me what I have to do to get my title back.

More from Augusta:

Stop Using the C-Word to Describe My Writing.

Golden Shower Gate, The Golden Paradox‪ and The Number One Tricky Freudian Slip

To Those Who Would Say There’s No Such Thing As Internet Addiction