Six Words, Six Months to Come up with Them

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


How lovely. Six word memoirs.

I know. Me, too.

Had to be a crappy ad gimmick or college drinking game, but it’s not. It’s addictive and sadly beautiful when not slyly sexy or funny or enigmatic. The good kind of enigmatic, not the annoying kind usually meant just to show off.

From SMITH magazine, bathroom reading that may spoil us all for the dreck we usually settle for in…you know…there. No one can resist the challenge. Check this and this and this and this….

I’ll never sleep again until I pull this off. And realize I’m depressed by the truth I’ve managed to tell on myself. Here’s a taste (from Ron Rosenbaum’s site, above):

Explained Hitler, Shakespeare. Couldn’t explain self.

But there were so many efforts I admired more, ranging from the humorous:

Maybe you had to be there.

—Roy Blount Jr.

to the meditatively profound (I think):

Melancholy marvel at how everything connects

—Lawrence Wechsler

to the sly and sexy:

Catholic girl. Jersey. It’s all true.

—Mary Elizabeth Williams

to the shamelessly smug:

I always suffered fools fairly well.

—Richard Ford

to the sadly romantic:

I waste time looking for love

—Sean Gannett

to the rueful:

Left Aruba for Maryland. Pretty dumb.

—Barbara Phillpis-Seitz

to the self effacing:

Well, I thought it was funny.

—Stephen Colbert

Fact:

Mother Jones was founded as a nonprofit in 1976 because we knew corporations and billionaires wouldn't fund the type of hard-hitting journalism we set out to do.

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2022 demands.

payment methods

Fact:

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2022 demands.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate