Labels

Talked for way longer than I'm comfortable admitting at work today about where the dividing line is between a Novel, a Novella and a Short Story. How many pages constitute which? The Old Man and The Sea is technically a short story they say, though it's longer than some novellas I've read. Where's the magic line of demarcation (the Mendoza Line for you baseball fans) between these different literary forms? And who put it there? And who cares? Does it make any difference what you call a given work? A better question might be, "Is it worth reading?"

This just reinforces my growing conviction that labels are almost completely worthless. If I'm a person (and I am) then deal with me on that basis. Getting hung up on labels like Post-Modern (as if we're all the same) or Christian (whatever that means) or Liberal (ditto) or Visionary or White Guy or Slob seems like a lazy, arrogant excuse to avoid getting to know me and talking about things that are real.

Stop labeling. Read the damn thing.