I swear some stuff you just see better from far away

At various times and for various reasons, other people (friends, acquaintances, socially inept passerby) have accused me of being creative. At various times and for various reasons, I've consistently argued against them, with very little success, mostly because people tend to confuse creativity with any kind of moderate skill with a charcoal stick.

To me, creativity is the love for a blank canvas, a thrill of excitement at the sight of empty lines on a clean sheet of paper. Creative people work best (I have Webster and some psychologists backing me up on this) when there are no limits; they don't want guidelines to tell them what they can and can't do (if they wanted that, they would have stayed home with their exasperated conservative parents). Creative people need nothing but their own freaky little minds and agile little hands to make something ingenious out of thin (though turpentine-fume heavy) air.

When faced with a blank canvas, I get agoraphobia. Confronted with an indefinite expanse of options, I freeze like a squirrel in traffic, paralyzed by indecision coupled with an uncontrollable fear at my loss of direction. I rely far too much on lists, road maps, instructions, encouragement, and evaluation to ever be truly creative in my own right.

Case in point, I feel, is the life crisis I'm currently experiencing when it comes to my future occupation. Though I hate math, cubicles, and green visors, lately I've been wistfully looking at my accounting major friends, with their clear career paths and solid financial futures. Career counselors and other well-intentioned adults assure me that an English degree is a quality asset: it can lead to practically any career! It doesn't pigeonhole me! The world is my proverbial, well-articulated oyster! For a lover of blank canvases, this would be a dream, not a headache.

And if you're not yet convinced, consider the creative value of the solution I've cooked up to alleviate my post-graduation crisis: More school.