Dear Rainbow:

I feel you need to reassess your writing process…seems you have gotten a bit overconfident in your abilities and forgotten that it is actually a good idea to go through many drafts before submitting to print (and, apparently, OWH will print anything).

Recently, you had two articles about closed businesses–each a month after the fact. If you want to get all weepy about a bakery (which I had never her of) that closed after five years or a vegan eatery, then do it BEFORE they close and there may be some new business that will give them a chance.

But recently, you’ve made social commentary that is only “according to Rainbow” without considering that you are only one person…but commenting on society. For example:
* If you haven’t seen these socially iconic movies, then sit down and watch them–consider it research for better articles. Just because your mom didn’t let you watch them in your youth doesn’t mean you can’t watch them now…but you need to put yourself in the right mindset–don’t watch a teen move as a 30 year old…imagine you are a teenager again.
* Quit criticizing other people’s wedding dresses–Kate Middleton’s look fabulous ON HER; probably wouldn’t look good on YOU.
* Sunday’s article about wedding movies was really out of your element–you are not the movie critic, Bob Fischbach is…even for those about weddings. But the kicker is that you contradicted yourself from the outset: you claimed not to have gone to many weddings and those you have gone to were nothing elaborate; well, that makes you NOT an expert about weddings. From then on you were basically rambling about a field (weddings or movies or both) on which you have no expertise (I have often wondered what your expertise is…it isn’t entertainment, it isn’t “Living” because you keep focusing on what you HAVEN’T done in your sheltered existence). As with the previous articles about movies you haven’t seen, you apparently haven’t seen an wide array of wedding movies. If you want to see the cake and all the regalia of weddings, watch “Wedding Crashers” or “The Wedding Singer”–multiple weddings, multiple cakes, etc. (but your mom probably wouldn’t let you). You see, wedding movies are not about weddings…they are about the people in them. If there was a movie JUST about a wedding, it wouldn’t be interesting–it would be as if the Super Bowl were just about the celebration at the end minus the story of getting there. “Steel Magnolias”–not about the wedding; “Four Weddings and a Funeral”–not about the weddings nor the funeral. These are great movies about people. By the way, “Monsoon Wedding” is a great movie but not about a wedding…the wedding takes up five minutes of the film; there is so much going on in that film I cannot see how you think it is all about the wedding. If you want a simpler version of that movie, watch “Father of the Bride” with Steve Martin–similar family conflicts and much more about the WEDDING.

Rainbow, think before you write. I’m sure that the OWH is enamored by your hometown girl mystique, but your craft is not very strong and growing more hackneyed. If you want to be taken seriously as a writer, take yourself more seriously as a writer rather than being “cute.” If you are going to write for the “social” section of the paper, tap in more closely to the social pulse…not according to Rainbow, but to society. IF there are movies you haven’t seen, see them before you fake your conversations (you admitted that). Quit being a fake.