Why I Write Here

This is a placeholder essay — replace it with your own. It exists so you can see how the drop cap, headings, table of contents, and block quotes look once real writing goes in.

The first thing to notice

Sub-headings look like this. Use them if the essay actually has parts; skip them if it doesn't. Once an essay has three or more of them, a table of contents appears automatically above the text — nothing to configure, it just reads the headings on the page.

A quoted line looks like this — useful for a line you're responding to, or one you want to sit apart from the rest of the paragraph.

The second thing

The thin bar at the very top of the page fills in as you scroll, so a reader always has a sense of how much is left — useful once a piece runs past a couple of thousand words, which is exactly the length this whole layout is built for.

The last thing

Delete this file once you've got your first real essay ready, or just overwrite it. The reading time above updates itself based on an actual word count, so you never have to edit it by hand.

A note on math

If an essay needs it, you can write LaTeX directly in the text — inline, like $y = mx + c$, or as its own block:

$$\sum_{i=1}^{n} x_i = x_1 + x_2 + \cdots + x_n$$

It renders automatically on any essay page that includes the MathJax script tags at the bottom of the file. If a piece has no math in it, just leave those two script tags out — nothing else changes.