The First Page part 2

I was languidly thumbing through a copy of our company policy manual one day when I came across something that gave me pause, Section 2.4 titled: Intentionally Left Blank. There were other sections just like that all throughout the manual as well, and while it did catch me off guard at the time, I haven't given it much thought until recently. It just didn't make sense to me to have a page that's sole purpose is to say that is was meant to be blank. So I did a little research, and found it to be quite a common practice when an author wants to assure a reader that they are aware that a page is blank and it was intentional, not a printing mistake. It also can serve as a placeholder of sorts, leaving room for something in the future.

But something still bothered me. It wasn't blank. The phase's very existence on the page made sure of that. So I dug a little deeper and found that what I had come across was called a meta-reference, something that is aware of what it is. An example would be an actor looking into the camera and saying or doing something that lets you know that they are aware that they are in a movie. So the presence of my phrase tells me that it knows it's a document and it knows that it is blank and it's telling me so I know that it was meant to be that way.

So I suppose that for my first post on this blog, I'm imploring this technique, letting you know that I intentionally intended for it to be blank and there was no mistake. It turns out that "Intentionally Left Blank" is quite a handy tool, I only lament I didn't know about it in school. It prevents me from having to write an introduction, the hardest part for me to write. I'm just using it as a placeholder, maybe for a rainy day, maybe for a post to end all posts, or maybe for nothing at all. What a brilliant concept. Who knew casual blogging could be so educational.