This is a letter I wrote ostensibly to act as a creative cover letter, something that would represent me and my passions that isn’t the usual boring professional blah blah blah, but it became a little more than that. I don’t know if I have the courage to send it off in lieu of my CV, however, when I need to work to pay the rent, but I thought I could share it here anyway.
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I hold a Bachelor of Arts in Communication (Writing & Cultural Studies) from the University of Technology, Sydney, wherein I studied various forms of writing from short stories to novels to feature films, plays, creative non-fiction, essays, and poetry.
I love stories, regardless of the medium. I love fantastic stories, the kind with dragons, strange magic, and unassailable fortresses; I love weird stories, the kind that sneak up on you in an ordinary situation, on an ordinary day, and turn you into a frog; I love human stories, the sort that tug at your heart and remind you that you’re not alone; I love small stories, stories that don’t aspire to any great majesty, that have no pretention, stories that exist as moments and nothing more. I love tall tales, the type you spin over a campfire one night and no one believes but everybody enjoys.
I love engaging and sharing these stories, these films, books, shorts, comics, animations, poetry – these articles describing the latest gadget dreamed up by human ingenuity, these reports about new discoveries in the ever-expanding frontier of space. I blog, I tweet, I Facebook, I share because we exist in a giant global community comprised of stories that are always changing, old and new, from the magical to the everyday, which begins with a simple, ‘How are you?’
I love dark stories that make you shiver and reconsider the night; I love bedtime stories for kids that treat us to different times and different worlds, that remind us of who we were and who we are now. I love stories that challenge you, that make you think. I love big stories that charge headlong at impossible obstacles and dare to defy the odds. I love old stories about ancient gods, myths and legends, stories that charm you, hurt you, that make you want to shout and laugh and dance. Stories that make you remember, that cause your heart to pound and blood to sing, stories that surprise you, I love them one and all.
I seek Story out wherever I go, I engage with it, I add to it, I change it and spread it to those I know. It can be in the form of a news update in an ongoing saga, the development of a film, or studio, or concept; it can be a video or a song, a postcard or a meme, a text message or a letter. Stories change us. They give meaning to the world around us, they inspire us to keep dreaming.
Your story is important. It needs to be told, and I want to be in charge of it. I want to help you shape it into the narrative it needs to be, to launch it into an ever-expanding global audience. More than ever, I just want to be involved in the business of making dreams, crafting them from the ground up, and watching others delight in them. That’s what stories are to me, they’re dreams we have waking, dreams we can share with friends and family.
As Neil Gaiman once implored a graduating class, I want to make good art.
I can only hope I get the opportunity to do just that.
