Magazine Maladies

Written by Anika Henrikson

A collective sigh of relief spread through the office today. It was the usual “end-of-an-issue” sigh. You know, the kind of sigh accompanied by girlish laughter and a feeling that can only be described as “editorial euphoria.” Which will henceforth be known as Euphitorial (patent pending). Many of us in the office suffer from this condition.

“Suffer” might be the wrong word; Euphitorial is a double-edged sword. Your work is plastered on glossy pages for the world to see. It's nice; it's the creative culmination of those long nights and early mornings. It pays off big time. But there are symptoms which tend to make me believe it's not a harmless condition. Your mental capabilities are somewhat diminished and you prance around in a daze for a few hours—maybe even a day or two. You go from being so bombarded with copy, captions, and last-minute corrections to aimlessly wandering the halls and staring at your computer screen for hours wondering why NeoOffice doesn't recognize the word “uv.” Diagnosis: you are suffering from Euphitorial and, as a result, have whole-heartedly convinced yourself that “of” isn't the correct spelling.

What do you have to do today? you ask yourself. There are things you certainly could be doing...but attention spans have dwindled and you are easily distracted (Oooh, what's that shiny thing?). But that's only because your brain automatically shuts down for a bit to rest. You operate on a bare minimum of brain cells. I chalk it up to a coping mechanism. Kinda like childbirth. If your brain cataloged exactly how mentally (and sometimes physically) exhaustive those last three days of production were, you'd never want to do it again. You'd preemptively refuse to go through it...because during crunch time, another, more serious, ailment exists. It's known in these parts as Acute Press-Time Depression (APTD). Symptoms include gentle sobbing, inaudible mumbling, panicked screams, uncomfortable laughter, pacing, and a sudden craving for plastic pen caps.

On account of APTD, it seems my brain self-administers a mental epidural (thanks, Miles) once the magazine has officially left our hands, which results in Euphitorial. They're all connected you see. Someone should sell pills to combat these conditions. Or form a support group. But if there was a meeting near Press-Time, no one would show up!

The point of all this honest-to-god Euphitorial rambling is to both decompress and get charged up. The Cool Issue is being printed as I write this and we are quickly compiling another fantastic Kern Health issue to be printed in December. Perhaps one of the many doctors we talk with will have a cure for me. Seems like there has to be a treatment plan.

But, ya know what? I think I'd pass on the pills, group-counseling, and electroshock therapy (I assume they'd suggest it has a possible treatment). Because there's nothing that matches the high you get on a daily basis around this place. If we could figure out a way to bottle this stuff, I'd sell it to adrenaline junkies and make a killing...not that I condone that sort of thing.