Why Are So Many of My Story Titles Questions?

And are these real questions?

Why are so many of my story photos selfies?

How do you choose a good title? Laughing at myself here. I can’t stop asking rhetorical questions. Why? Laughing again.

I would like to think that when I ask a question in a title that it is a “real” question and not one that I already know “the answer” to. I write because I am curious about the big issues: race, climate change, politics, among others. I use my essays to explore the edges of my own knowledge and to challenge my own unexamined beliefs about a topic.

In real life I am a middle school teacher, and the discussions I value most with my students are the ones where there is not one single answer to the topic being discussed. This is how we grow as a community, by encountering a real question and working together to come to a consensus or new collective understanding. Those are the best questions. It might be why I like asking a question in the title. The worst questions in school are when I ask a question that only has one correct answer, and I’m trying to get my students to guess what is in my head. I try to catch myself if that is the type of essay I am writing.

When I was in college, I took a trip to Florida with three friends. One of my friends was very perceptive, and she noticed that I would phrase my own settled opinion/wish…