We

Mildred manages the express checkout lane. Her wig is gray, short and slightly too big for her head. Every day, her hair is exactly the same, as is her dialogue.

Mildred: How are We today?

We, Shoppers: Fine, thank you. How are You?

Mildred: We are Fan-tastic!

We are not pessimists. We like positive people, but we’ve been watching Mildred for years. We know Fantastic is not her daily truth—or ours—and what does she mean by We, anyway?

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We is the most welcoming and inclusive of pronouns (so much warmer than You). Writing ‘we’ is a way to practice empathy, to capture collective experiences and explore universal points of view. We is a way to offer concessions to those whose opinions are in opposition to our own, and concession is the most effective catalyst for change, but We can also be a thinly veiled You.

We don’t have milk today because We left the carton on the counter top to spoil overnight.

Nobody likes this kind of We, and We, when coined as an empty catchphrase, can make us feel similarly shamed. A catchphrase can feel like a finger wagging in our faces. Shame, the finger says. Shame on you for thinking anyone wants to hear the truth about Poor You and your Feelings—We Are All in this Together!—so, when someone asks about our day, we say Fine. Fan-tastic.

Rote responses and catchphrases threaten to silence the stories we need to tell and want to hear.

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Feeling is the most important ingredient to consider when crafting “Writing People Want to Read.” The hair on our arms doesn’t stand because it’s told to. It stands because we show it something it can feel.

And, yes. We do feel better when we think ours is not the only home on the block without electricity. We take comfort in the knowledge that everyone’s windows are dark. We doubt the power company would care enough to fix the outage if it were a problem for us alone, just as we may doubt our individual stories matter during a universal crisis.

But what if we couldn’t see the darkness in our neighbors’ windows? What if we couldn’t open our doors and hear the collective silence?

We are only ever all in it together when we share the views from our living rooms, when we invite others to look at our dust, our empty or full cupboards, our secret hopes and fears. Some days we really are feeling Fine or even Fantastic, and days like that are just as important to document as the days we are lying. Our personal stories validate universal truths—sparks of recognition that help us feel connected in a way that a catchphrase never could.

Choosing the first person plural “We” as the point of view for our stories does not, however, relegate them to a catchphrase. On the contrary, when we choose We as a way to expand our views, to enrich our dialogues with one another, our stories become an energy—a source of power to those waiting for word in the dark.

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Mildred evaluates our canned goods and advises us to buy the store brand next time. She holds up the line so we might return to the aisles to collect the two liter bottle of fizz that comes free with our frozen pizza purchases. She talks about someone called Hubby. About the type of cranberry sauce he likes. About the car he allows her to drive to work, and her glasses fog in the presence of a former football star buying pink roses and a greeting card. We study the tabloids when she refuses to ring items for those among us whose baskets contain more than twelve items, and we have stopped asking about her day, stopped putting her in a position to lie. We see her; we know how she feels, and our arm hairs stand in solidarity.