I can’t go anywhere or read anything without coming across a misspelled word.  Is it the English teacher in me that seems to have an eagle eye for errors?  I never won a spelling bee or made perfect grades on spelling tests every week as a child, but the misspelled words present themselves at every turn.  Every day, I drive by a fast food restaurant that wants me to indulge in its burritos.  But the sign outside of their establishment reads Chessy burritos.   I laugh every morning.  I know that I am odd.  I take pictures of spelling errors on state park signs.  I clip plastic wrappers from baked chicken that misspell its as it’s.  My eyes are immediately drawn to these egregious errors.  

I wish the attraction was as strong in my own writing.  Unfortunately, I fail to notice my own errors, which I find so irritating.  Why is it so easy to find errors in others’ writing and miss my own?   What is a flagrant error in others’ writing becomes invisible when I pen my own work.  

I wonder if people in other professions have similar issues?  Do decorators walk into someone’s home and think, “How could they put those colors together?”  I’m not sure.  But what I can say is that I am grateful to those who have proofed my progress reports, articles, term papers, and the like.  They have helped me see what I could not.

Now, let’s hope this post has no errors!  That would be irony at its best!