Reviewing

How online reviewing changed my life

       I reviewed my first online product several months ago.  It was for a tennis elbow brace.  I used the phrase, “Surprising support,” and gave it four out of five stars.

       It was really a lark, at first.  I got an email asking if I wanted to review the tennis elbow brace.  It seemed just as easy to do it as not to do it.

       The next product I reviewed was a pack of moldable erasers.  “Game changer!” I wrote.  Then I reviewed a book, “Starry Messenger,” by Neil deGrasse Tyson.  “Impressive,” I wrote.  “The author has his head in the stars but his feet planted firmly on the ground.  Tyson rules!”

       Soon I was hooked.  I reviewed, in short order, a portable guitar amp (“Pound for pound, packs a punch!”), a packet of energy patches (“I feel 16 again!”) and replacement spools for a weed-whacker (“These babies do the trick!”).

       I reviewed earache relief (“Finally done with Q-Tips!”), a pack of Sculpey (“I finally get the whole Michelangelo thing!”), a Leigh Montville book about Manute Bol (“A fine book as big as its subject!”) and a pickleball net (“The yellow piping sets it apart from other nets in this price range”).

After several dozen reviews, the online shopping outfit inquired whether I might like to be paid for my efforts.  I had to laugh at the small amount being offered, but, as before, it was more a matter of “Why not?”  As long as I was writing the reviews anyway.

       I didn’t think the pittance I was receiving would affect my reviews, but a little incentive is a funny thing.  I was already writing several reviews a day.  I dug into my past purchases, reaching back a number of years, and started reviewing those.  I reviewed shoelaces (“Can’t wait to go hiking again!”), a clip-on bike rearview mirror (“How did I ever ride a bike before!”), a Hebrew prayer book (“I have a whole new connection to the Sh’ma!”).  I reviewed green kitchen sponges (“The environmental factor is matched only by the sheer dish-scraping quality,”), a compass (“Pythagorus couldn’t have wished for more perfect circles!”), and “Meditations” by Marcus Aurelius (“Jerry Seinfeld was right!  The best way to start the day!”).

       I kept reviewing, and the money got bigger. 

       I quit my job.  I really didn’t have time for it, and besides, the money I was making for my online reviews was tripling what the law office was able to fork over.  They gave me a little send-off party, with cake, and I read a few of my reviews out loud (“A gallon of school glue—all the glue you’re likely to need!”), to general acclaim.

       I had been, in my time, a songwriter, a working actor, a postal clerk, a best-selling author (#16 on the Portuguese non-fiction chart), a paralegal, a university associate professor, and a professional table-tennis player (#7 on the money list for the Northwest United States).  But nothing I had ever done could match what I was making for these 2-or-3-line summations.  And, I have to say, nothing has given me more satisfaction than my current labors of love.

       A replacement stylus for a turntable:  “Crisp sound!”  Jimmy Connors’ autobiography:  “We’ve heard so much from MeEnroe.  This balances the ledger!”  A wide sneaker:  “My feet have been pinched for years.  No more!”  Hair growth gel: “My hairline crept forward overnight!”

       As I go down the street, in and out of the shops, about my day, I carry myself with a new confidence.  Not just knowing that I am able to summarize, in a few words, a wide variety of products.  Not just knowing that before they buy, many may stop to read my responses, and make more informed decisions than if I hadn’t bothered to put my thoughts into digital form.

       It’s also this: once the flow--what I like to call the “faucet”--of reviewing is unleashed, it’s hard to turn it off.  Thus do I skip through my day with a precise, newly-focussed inner monologue.

       For instance: “That oak tree provides shade like none other on this street.  Essential!” 

       Or: “For rinsing off sticky fingers—tap water!”

       Or: “Ignore dark clouds at your peril!”

Or: “For an itchy nose, scratching does it every time!”

       It’s a way of life, and it’s mine, and it feels great.

       And let me get a jump on this: “Dan Bern’s first Substack piece does it!  Bang on!”