Most Relatable Character in Spoon River

     For me, the most relatable character in Spoon River Anthology was George Gray. His fear of taking chances struck home with me almost too well; I do want to be an actuary after all. The job of an actuary is to minimize risk, to avoid failure. That's why no one knows what they are.
     For a while, I was about as afraid of rejection as a person could be. The fear isn't completely gone though; I have four other blog posts drafts that I haven't posted, most of which will likely never see the light of day. After all, if there are zero views, there are zero people who can make fun of its length, say that my jokes aren't funny, or just plain say it's stupid.
      At the beginning of the year, when we were all signing up for Google Classroom, someone noticed that I was signed in as "John Doe," and a few people wondered why. Though the simple answer is that the account is for Craigslist, the reason I have that account for Craigslist is that if I message people as John Doe and they refuse my offer, they won't have rejected Stephen Barr, student, they'll have rejected John Doe, anonymous entity from the internet.
    Writing this was, to be frank and honest for once, utterly h*llish. I just erased two paragraphs of typing. They were risky, so they were deleted. Some of them involved people in this English class, some of them involved other people, some of them go clean back to elementary school. All of them are regrets: things I've done that completely overwhelmed any victories around them. Over time, both groups have started to shrink. No reward means no risk, after all.