The Recruiter

The other day, Tyler was talking about how his coworker's son is being recruited by college football coaches for his prowess on the field. We thought it was so exciting for him to be sought after for doing something that he loves.

This led to a discussion about how much fun it would be to be a recruiter! At first, I was thinking about this purely in terms of high school sports. And I wondered, what sport would I recruit for? Since I played tennis in high school, I thought this would be the natural choice for me (yes, I love to put myself in 'what if' situations...) but then I thought it would be fun to get a little creative.

What if you could recruit aspiring writers to be on your 'team'? How would you do it?

For me, it would not be in any typical fashion, like reading a writing sample or something boring like that. No, no, no. I would line up unsuspecting writers and hold up blank pages before them, not allowing them to write, in order see how long they lasted before they had a nervous breakdown. Longest time wins.

Soon after, I would test their ability to handle caffeine by force feeding them jolt and red bulls and see which loser throws up first. I might also test their typing skills in diverse weather conditions and varying levels of darkness. Blizzard. At dusk. GO!

The audio test would be a good one. See how much they could write while playing sound effects of screaming children, crowded coffee shops, highways and sirens.

Then. The ultimate test. I would scream, "Write 250 words. Stat!" While they furiously wrote, I would egg them on, shouting "What's your hook?! Hook me, b***es! Hook me in 250 words or less!" If they failed to hook me, this would result in paddling.

I also considered playing a broken record that said, "I'm sorry, I just didn't connect to the material as much as I had hoped" to see which sorry soul cracked first. But I thought that was pretty cruel.

Hey...wait a minute...

Photo credit: Brit