“You give us 22 minutes, we’ll give you the slanted news”

As a professionally inexperienced writer, I was able to enjoy what we all know as “writers block,” which is basically what happens to someone with a lot of excellent talent, but their ego gets bigger than their brain, the cells in the frontal lobe area start to slow down, causing a chain reaction of a function abnormality, thereby that raw talent starts to fizz and blow a fuse. (sounds like the same type of thing you get when you’ve had too many Martinis)

For now, I will just tell you that Wikipedia (my most favorite website that thinks it knows everything by using very long fancy sounding words ending in “ism” or “mania”) describes writers block as a phenomenon. Which basically means that we don’t have a good answer so don’t ask any more questions.

So as I was suffering from this “phenomenal” type disease, I tried working through ideas in which to inspire and entertain my long list of readers. Hence, I came up with nothing. Until…. The other day, I received a piece of very exciting and interesting news (otherwise known as gossip). I was a little shocked, (does falling out of ones chair constitutes as “little” shock ?) and I am still trying to come to terms with this piece of news. And truth be told, the news is great and really quite wonderful! Yet what I found most interesting (in other words, pissed as hell about) was the fact that I was on the bottom of the totem pole in which to hear this piece of news. To make matters oh so wonderfully worse, someone told me “ehh, its no big deal, I’ve known already for a while.”

And so, I decided I needed to do some soul searching. Why in fact was this bothering me that I found out so “late in the game?” Was it because I felt unloved that noone thought to tell me? Was it because I felt like I wasn’t included in this week’s gossip session? Or maybe I was just pissed because its been raining all day and there’s still no damn snow!

In any case, it was bothering me that I was wasting my very precious time being upset about a piece of news that was inherently good. I spoke to my husband about it and after giving him my long winded explanation, he answered with great wisdom, “huh?” After delving into the conversation some more, I came to the realization that here lies a greater concept to be examined: Gossip.

Jewish people NEVER gossip – they merely “yenta” to their friends. You take a simple statement such as “Did you hear about Rachel” and instead, throw in a few “bubbales” a couple of “Nu’s” and an “oy” at the beginning and end of every sentence, and you’ve transformed a piece of gossip into “yenting.” Is it really evil to share pieces of news with each other? Is it inherently bad? It says in the old Testament, “Do not go about spreading slander among your people" (Lev. 19:16). But seemingly this wasn’t clear or frightening enough because the new Testament had to come along be a little bit more graphic: "If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless" (Jas. 1:26). Somehow, this didn’t scare people enough (must be the fancy words again), and a third verse: "Men will have to give account on the day of judgment for every careless word they have spoken. For by your words you will be acquitted, and by your words you will be condemned" (Matt. 12:36, 37). I guess at this rate, I’ll be serving a life sentence down under.

My point is, does it really matter when we find out what it is we need to find out? Do we feel superior when we know the juicy details of someone’s personal life? Are we really better off knowing the minute that your mother’s brother’s, sister’s cousins friend’s dog lost 5 pounds?

Whether you agree or not (and the readers never do), it seems to me that in today’s society it really is GOSSIP that makes the World go round, and if that’s really the case I must ask,

“So nu, do you vant to hear about Rachel? Oy vey!”