27 Haz If you discover my work after I die, I will haunt you as a ghost.
If you discover my work after I die, I will haunt you as a ghost.
(Yes, all of you. I’ll have eternity and zero social plans.)
If you discover my work after I die, don’t expect gratitude. I won’t be up in the clouds smiling down at you. I’ll be in your living room, as a ghost, sitting silently on your IKEA couch — judging your wall art, your book choices, and the fact that you waited until I was dead to finally care. Every time you say, “She was a genius,” I’ll knock over a plant. That’s your prize for being late.
I will haunt you. And not in a poetic Virginia Woolf kind of way.
You see, history is full of these people: writers, painters, poets, and accordion virtuosos who died thinking they were failures, until a PhD candidate who “found a dusty box in an attic.”
Van Gogh, who sold one painting in his lifetime. One. Probably because he had health problems or no marketing team. Now his “Starry Night” is printed on everything from tote bags to toothbrushes. If he knew this, he’d climb out of the grave and cut off the other ear just to make a point.
And let us not forget Emily Dickinson, wrote nearly 1,800 poems, published less than a dozen in her life. The rest were found in a drawer after she died. A drawer. That’s where they put her genius.
So, no! I will not be flattered if you “discover” me at my funeral. If you walk around saying, “Wow, she was really ahead of her time,” I will rearrange your furniture every night. I will whisper your Google search history into your boss’s ears. You will feel my presence every time you try to speak over a woman in a meeting.
Because here’s the truth: I am not a vintage bag. I am alive now.
Make your decision.
If you ignore me, your cat will stare at a corner for hours.
That corner will be me.
If you discover my work after I die, I will haunt you as a ghost. was originally published in Write A Catalyst on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.