Thanks for the Insult!

Did you ever hear that old Yiddish proverb, “We grow too soon old but too late smart?” Back in high school, these words adorned a little painted sign in the kitchen of my friend Miriam’s house. I spent a lot of time with Miriam’s family and in that kitchen. Having read it hundreds of times, this little gem of wisdom seemed to sink in.    

Several years later, I was writing articles for a healthcare industry trade magazine. It was my first job and I was young and excited. But my confidence, ambition, and exuberance began to outpace my abilities. One morning, my boss, Carol, delivered this knowledge with a one-two verbal punch. Carol had given me a great opportunity to get paid to write full-time, fresh out of college, and I was grateful. As a publisher, she had taken me under her editorial wing as a protégé, perhaps also as a daughter figure. She taught me invaluable lessons in the arts of reporting and writing that allowed me to grow. But I wanted a bigger piece of the pie, and when I asked for a shot to edit as well as write, she handed me an article to finesse. 

With only a few years of college journalism behind me, I delivered my editing masterpiece a few days later. Carol would be so impressed! But when she took the highly unusual step of walking down the hall in her high heels from her command center office to the small digs I shared with another writer to summon me, my heart began to race. What had I done wrong? 

I sat facing her on the visitor’s side of her large, mahogany desk. I waited, my mouth going dry. She flapped the few pages of edited copy at me and uttered words I’ve never forgotten: “Judy, you’re a good writer. But you’ll never be an editor.”

I had a flash of that little sign in Miriam’s kitchen that said, “We grow too soon old and too late smart.” Carol’s smackdown hurt, but I wanted to be smart while I was still young. Also, I wanted to prove her wrong. 

Could I have heard right? Never was a long time! I was as stunned as if she had slapped me. Who had body-snatched my supportive, encouraging boss-pal Carol and replaced her with this mean old lookalike? Even though Carol had vastly more experience than I did, I knew in my gut she was wrong. Still, I had blown this assignment I had asked for, and I paid close attention as she explained what was wrong with my edits, the things I should have caught but hadn’t. As I took mental notes during Carol’s tutorial, I had a flash of that little sign in Miriam’s kitchen that said, “We grow too soon old and too late smart.” Carol’s smackdown hurt, but I wanted to be smart while I was still young. Also, I wanted to prove her wrong.  

A few weeks later, I asked Carol for another chance to edit and she indulged me. I was slightly jittery when she called me in to review my work, but I had improved enough so that she began to feed me more articles for editing. Soon, she promoted me from staff writer to assistant editor.

Journalism is a tough field where no one lasts long if they require coddling. Many professional fields are the same way. So, when a young, aspiring writer messaged me via LinkedIn to ask me if I knew of any writing jobs, with no introduction about her experience or goals and employing texting-style spelling shortcuts, I gave her some truth serum. I told her bluntly that I could hardly be expected to want to help her when she presented herself so carelessly, especially in a field where attention to detail is crucial. She replied defensively that I had “hurt her feelings.” I replied that I was demonstrating respect for her by speaking to her like an adult. She didn’t seem to buy any of it.   

Maybe Carol’s harsh verdict on my first try at editing was a form of tough love. Maybe, like a demanding coach, she was pushing me as hard as she thought she could, knowing I had a hardy enough skin to find inspiration within the criticism. She was right, because this insult was one of the best career-builders I ever had.

Judy Gruen’s latest book is “The Skeptic and the Rabbi: Falling in Love with Faith.”