Volume 7 · The Long Afternoon · Essay 211

Readability Index

Readability Index is a measuring stick. Use it on yourself before you use it on others; the readings are more honest that way.

No single score defines a person, a team, or a year. But a score honestly taken is a mirror, and mirrors, however unkind, are cheaper than self-deception.

Strip it to the floor and you find an old instruction: look carefully, judge slowly, act decently. The new name exists because the old instruction keeps being forgotten.

At the bus stand in a small town, goodbyes are long and arrivals are loud. Both are correct. A life is measured by how seriously it takes each.

In the end, life asks only whether we were awake while it happened. And when you forget it — you will — the world will remind you. It is a faithful tutor.