Checing In

Greetings!

It's been a few months (MONTHS!) since I've updated my blog so I thought I'd stop by for a quick second to make sure it hadn't withered away into nothingness in the interim. Here's what happened! My unemployment status changed (considerably). Only a few days after my final post on here, I found myself heading off to multiple jobs and I've crazy busy ever since. It's funny how life can turn completely upside down on you all of a sudden like that...

So much has been different recently. I'm experiencing a high level of work and social fanaticism all rolled into one! I've also been working my butt off on applications and interviews for opportunities in my life that I'm really eager to pursue. Nuts-o.

Here's a bit of a sad thing, though: my creativity has taken a plunge. I try to squeeze it in as often as I can but obviously, when you go from no jobs to two part-time jobs (with a few extra jobs on the side), things have to change. Still, I try to play music as often as I can and I'm constantly sketching and writing at down time during one of my jobs. I read recently that creativity isn't something that will be able to just dawn on you whenever you want; you go through dry spells where you seem to have never even heard of the word and can't imagine what it is. Still, throughout all this, you have to push yourself to create, create, create! You are the creative vessel and if some of that creativity gets manufactured within you instead of beamed down from the cosmic divine, well...I say all the better!!

Anyhow, I'm off for a run and then a day of three jobs. Oy vey.

A Decisive Mind

Well! Suffice to say that the last week or so has been pretty busy. I've had to decide a lot about what I'm going to be doing for the next several months of my life. Big life choices call for much careful consideration and deliberation. Having been offered a job right before the weekend, I reflected on how my mother taught me to pick the very best one. With meditation, I was able to distance myself from that feeling of anxiety you get when you've gotten hold of a fierce feline by one of it's digits and must release it lest it wriggle right out of your grasp. By Sunday, I'd landed firmly on a decision and could finally relax with the knowledge that I'd made my choice (and also, the reassuring fact that y-o-u always spells 'you').

However, the past week or so has been one celebrated with a multitude of photography sessions! My trip up North presented me with plenty of opportunities for photographs and I tried to take advantage of them all! I also got pretty badly sunburned but that's nearly finished by now...

I've been kind of experimenting with a softer feel

to my photographs. I'm finding it pleasant!

Really though, the place we stayed (this beautiful lodge right outside of Frankfurt, Michigan on Crystal Lake) was fantastically beautiful. I've never seen such clear, clean water. The atmosphere around the water was one of restfulness and it was rather difficult to entertain the idea of actually leaving the cool sand underfoot. The first night that we arrived at the lodge, after eating at a nearby small restaurant, my sister and I walked down the hill from our lodge out to the beach. It had been rather dim when we'd originally arrived and there now, it was pretty dark so we weren't really able to take in how beautiful the water and surrounding areas were. However, the stars were vast and riddled with streaking flashes of light (we weren't entirely sure what these were...shooting stars? meteor shower?). We sat out on the beach just staring upwards for a while. I always forget the soothing surge of water breathing up over land. It's so constant and smooth and it manifests within your body, drawing visceral circles of natural connectivity. Anyway, it was beautiful and we thoroughly enjoyed our time there. It was sad to leave on Sunday and I definitely hope to return someday soon!

On that note, I take my leave of you. I'm having a theoretical argument with myself in my journal and have to reinforce one of my opinions to...myself...

The Hazzards of Knitting.

My music is randomly shuffling. This makes me quickly realize how many awful CD's I loaded onto there from working at the radio station! I need to clean iTunes up...

Let's kick this off with my newest comic! See if you can spot the Jack Nicholson reference!

Knit, knit, knit, knit, redrum.

I really have been doing a lot of knitting recently, though (although killing everyone in my immediate vicinity hasn't yet become my aim. Yet). I woke up about a week ago and realized that life was going to move slowly no matter what I did. My solution? Start working on an involved knitting project that would take me hours and hours of my life to go through before completion. It's working for me!

Things I'm looking forward to:

-An extended weekend trip with my sister that begins tomorrow! This includes swimming, music-playing, lots of reading, photography, yoga, kayaking, writing, goofing off with hermana numero dos, hiking all over sleeping bear dunes, and all other sisterly mayhem we can muster up (can anyone say dressing up like a hooker and visiting the library/video rental store/christmas choir performance? Yes. Yes we can).

-Packing for said trip (nearly as fun as leaving for the trip because it makes you realize all the fun stuff you'll be doing!).

-A nice morning run

tomorrow

, also with hermana numero dos.

-A new song to come onto iTunes; preferably one that doesn't make me want to wash all the dye out of every bright piece of clothing I own.

-The end of August, which is only 14 days away! It'll all be over before we know it!

-Finishing my current writing piece.

And on that subject, I have decided that my current writing project needs to be cut a bit shorter than I originally planned. I started taking it in this new, long-winded direction and it's just lost a lot of the luster that it used to have. I'm going to re-direct it and then cut out a lot of the boring stuff that was clogging up the middle parts. Hopefully this improves everything! Sometimes, you just need to face the facts and rip out a lot of stuff that really isn't working. For me, that's the whole middle part. But hey! That's just like when you're about to eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and you realize that all you want is the crust! Wait...

So, today, I went out to the Botanical Gardens and shot some photos. I was pretty happy to get out and capture some images again. I think it was a mostly successful trip, too! I'll post my favorites from the day so you can ogle my talent, basically.

Hopefully, my next update will include lots of stories from a successful and not rained-upon weekend trip!

Outside Art

This morning, I got up, shook off my sleep, and gathered materials for an interesting excision. I wasn't entirely sure what I'd need for this art experience. I do a lot of art and I'm usually relatively sure what I'll use during any given project but this was a first for me. Well (if not over) equipped, I set out for Wildwood park. I found some thick hiking boots from the trunk of my car*, laced them up, and hauled my needed equipment with me away from the parking lot. I walked till I found the perfect spot (also known as the distance I could carry the heavy easel in my right hand before I set it down and said "I don't care what the hell is in front of me, it's gonna be art!") and set everything up!

The easel I have is very old and rather rickety. It also doesn't have an instructions manual (this made for a fun three hours of aggravated splinters and uneven legs the night before as I tried to convince the damn thing to stand!). However, with only a few moments of muffled cursing, I was able to get it upright. Thus standing, I actually took a look at what was in front of me: an absurd amount of leaves.

"Great!" I thought. "I know how to draw a leaf!"

Yes, dear. But do you know how to draw 23,472,774 leaves?

I did a very light and general sketch of the landscape before me (which, like I said before, was mostly of the leafy nature) and then set down my pencil and picked up my brush. I do quite a bit of painting but never in my life have I attempted water color. I do have a rather shining memory from my youth of sitting on the back steps of my house hovered over a Cinderella "water color" book. I watched in amazement as I dipped my brush into water and as I spread it across the page, Cinderella's dress magically turned blue. In the back of my mind somewhere, the phrase "It can't be that different" popped up. Despite the joy I got out of this clearly talented endeavor from my youth, it did not really prepare me for honest water coloring. My first attempt drowned my paint block in water. I dipped my paintbrush in it and spread it meticulously across the page. The paper blushed with the light suggestion of blue. I squinted to see if I'd actually made a difference or if that was, in fact, some lucky shade that the rest of me wasn't getting.

"Okay, so it needs to be thicker, right?" I thought.

I dabbed my brush right in there, swirling it all over the water and the color block and brought it to the paper with panache. Bam! Everything was absurdly blue. Overkill! Thankfully, water color is the most forgiving process in art that I've seen yet. You just get your brush damp with clear water (but not soaking) and you spread that overkill of color out and it will honestly listen to you. Try telling regular paint to be less intensely paint-y (hint: you'll have no luck with this)!

In the end, I basically just dabbled in water color. I know that if I want to be actually good at it, I'll have to work on mixing the colors more intricately and working with a multitude of brushes to help me get the right depth. As it were, when I began to grow tired of the water color, it looked like a five year old had had a hand party all over my page. I wasn't that impressed. Neither were the people passing by me on the path and getting all judge-y over my first attempt at this wateriest of arts. It is rather nerve-wrecking doing art out in the open where anyone can come up to you and say something like, "Is that a leaf or a hand? No really..." When people are walking around in the park and they see someone working avidly over an easel, you have to admit that they probably think you must be somewhat good at art. If you go out and buy a nice easel, it probably means that the quality of your art deserves such representation. Therefore, when you pass by an artist whose work looks like some kind of epidemic of mold growing slowly over their canvas, it doesn't look so good. It was definitely time to step up my game.

Here's a hint: when you do art, unless you are some mystical genius at it, there's going to be a long portion of time where it looks like an utter mess of disgusting failure (I'm being generous here. You should hear me when I'm actually painting). If you give up at that point, you will amass a slew of grotesque paint arguments (or perhaps you'll give up after one or two of these endeavors!). The point is, when it looks like that, all awful and repulsive, you know you're onto something. You know that if you push it further, you're going to get something more appealing. That stretch where you're taking something from the maggot-infested stage to something that wouldn't make you throw up if you saw it leaning against your wall is when you're really improving as an artist. This is where you get to learn a bit more about your style as an artist and your true aesthetic.

I put away my water color tools (and poorly so-I still can't get my green out of the little bag I put it in...) and I pulled out the tool that I use the most in all my art; the pen. This is ironic for me. I think that I use ink in so much of my art because it also happens to be the tool of writers (although within the last few years, none of us can deny that the pen is being sorely replaced by the keys of our laptops...). Still, I've been an avid ink user for the last several years (Hi everyone. My name is Grace and I'm an inkahaulic...). Thus, I pulled off the cap and began to define shapes and pull out shade and color. It looked different than I expected but certainly better than where the piece had been before. After about two hours outside working on it, I packed up my equipment and headed home. I worked on the piece a little more at home and have some further plans for it but I figured I'd share the work in progress here now, even though it isn't fully finished, just so you get an image to go with the wad of a story I just threw at you.

Oh the leaves!!

In other news, I haven't quit drawing comics yet.

This is a life-changing comic about a life-changing thought.

In further news, I'm not having what I'd call a writing block but rather, a "good quality" writer's block. It's frustrating; I can get my word count done everyday but it's not impressive to me when this means that I hate every twist of the story I have just created. I need to get out of this funk!

Well, happy 10th of August to one and all!

*Current trunk inventory: one (1) large scratchy blanket, two (2) towels, two (2) pairs of boots, one (1) pair of old jeans, two (2) white shirts, one (1) shovel, one (1) ice scraper, one (1) wooden heart, one (1) michigan license plate, and approximately five (5) shards of glass. Just thought you might wanna know?

Newly-Discovered Hours Before 11:00am

I think my guitar playing skills are picking up a bit! This probably has a lot to do with the fact that I sit at home late at night and play music...

Anyhow, earlier on my blog I was giving out rave reviews of Fleet Foxes' new Cd "Helplessness Blues" and now, I've begun playing music off of it! Obviously, I cannot do justice to the wonderful sounds of their harmonies but I've enjoyed my tries at emulation. Hopefully my neighbors downstairs continue lending me the patience they always seem to extend with my attempts at music-making. They have been extraordinarily patient with me over the last few months. I tell you, it can be loud business getting over a break-up. I've heard no complaints from them, although I did see a decided look of concern a few months back when I brought my guitar amp past them and into the apartment. I try to keep things relatively quiet to appease us all, though. There is, after all, only so much of my own music that I can stand!

Comic-ing continues! Today, I drew the figures out before I knew what they were going to say (which I hardly ever do) and then, I just sat there for about a half hour yelling at them, "What are you guys talking about!" It was aggravating!

Say What??

It's odd to be posting this at noon on a Thursday. Yes, I'm not employed and do enjoy staying up late. Thus, it has been my habit throughout my life to take every opportunity to maximize my sleep time without cutting into my 'awake-in-the-middle-of-the-night' time. However, my sister and I got up for the second time this week to go for a run before she headed off to work. I'm no runner (or at least, not yet) but it is an exhilarating way to start the day. Plus, I've discovered breakfast, so that's good. Still, it's extraordinarily odd for me to have already finished a piece of art by noon!

Ugh...my computer is gross. Does anyone know a good way to clean a mac without frying it?

Three Down...

Well, it's going to be a long haul, folks. It's only been three days and I can tell that I'm going to struggle a bit with August. But not to worry! I'll claim the better part of it!

This is just a quick update to share with you my latest development in comic artistry! I've been looking at the styles of a lot of popular webcomics recently and trying to develop mine a little more. We'll see if this pays off. It's not easy work. And it's often very aggravating...

Wishful thinking!

Yesterday, I spent some interesting time reading the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam! It was so beautiful...I've already established with myself that poetry is written to be spoken out loud. With the Rubaiyat, I am hereby proclaiming it a crime punishable by literary death if it is not read aloud! The verses are so beautiful and the complementing imagery is authentic and moving. I was especially moved by the following two which I'll share below:

26.

"Oh, come with old Khayyam, and leave the wise

To talk; one thing is certain, that Life flies;

One thing is certain, and the Rest is Lies;

The flower that once has blown for ever dies."

28.

"With them the Seed of Wisdom did I sow,

And with my own hand labour'd it to grow.

And this was all the Harvest that I reap'd-

'I came like Water, and like Wind I go.'"

If you just read those out loud, my work here is done! Anyhow, it was time well spent yesterday. I suppose now I'd better go finish my writing quota for the day. My words need to start behaving for me once again! Grr...

Weekend's End

An eventful and fun weekend kept me from updating! So here I am, nearly to the end of Monday and I find it a good time to publish some musings.

This past friday was the retirement party for an ex-boss of mine, someone who I respected and enjoyed working for very much. It was a good turn out and by the time we all got to speeches, you couldn't help but understand that this man meant a great deal to us all. There was a large selection of individuals from the university staff and students where I'd worked for this man, which only exposed how much one person can reach out and make an impact on others. During his speech, he reiterated a positive fact that I've heard him make before about his life which gives me a large measure of inner peace. He said that he'd been at the university for many, many years and was still waiting for the work to begin. This very honestly characterizes my thoughts on him as a boss; he always approached every event and problem with a level of calmness and joy that I admired. He really does just enjoy his life, it seems, and that pleasure in living is contagious! You can't help smiling during a conversation with him.

Beyond enjoying my time expressing the thanks I had for this man and the job he'd given me, it was just great to see a lot of old friendly faces. I spent a great deal of time with the co-workers who were able to attend, catching up as though we hadn't all seen each other within the last three months. It was good to be around them again! It also allowed me to deepen friendships that already existed, an opportunity I always relish.

Earlier in the week, a dear friend of mine and I got together to celebrate our July birthdays. By the end of the evening, our combined creativity crafted something so marvelous! We sat down to a blank canvas, put on an old cartoon that I used to watch as a child (and by the way, this is a seriously odd film!), and went crazy with some paint! The result is extraordinary and shown below!

I have a distinct topic for my next blog, which I won't be getting into now, and I'm sure it will result in a much longer discussion than I will be posting today. For now, let me say that I feel as though this past weekend has taught me something rather significant about life. Perhaps the universe gives you clues, perhaps it doesn't. But if it does, I'm certainly picking something up on my internal radar (and yes, this does mean I am a Radar Detector as the fantastic band Darwin Deez would like you all to know). There are good things afoot. Perhaps this only lends itself to a few enjoyable nights gone by. But still, I will say that patience and inner cognition can really bring your spirits up in life!

Quick Note

A friend of mine wanted to point out his participation in my last painting. A certain Jeff Mossman was culprit as computer part hoarder. He also specializes in the collecting of old and new phones and has been known, on occasion, to get excited about skeleton keys with me. Gracias, amigo!

Music Appreciation

I wanted to start this entry with the question: why is it so expensive to go and see a fantastic band? Honestly, I know and appreciate the answer. CD and record sales suffer so much these days from pirated music that revenue has to come from somewhere else. Thus, merchandise and live performance become the main bread-winner for bands. Beyond me being annoyed at my reservations on spending nearly fifty dollars to see one of my favorite bands, I can respect the high price. Live music is such a fantastic experience and although in a Utopia, people would share it for free, we're living elsewhere and thus, we have to pay for the artist's lunches and new guitar strings. I can come to terms with this (although, not so much right now when I'm lacking full-time employment!) and I know that I will fully take advantage of the ability to enjoy wonderful music entertainment and put money toward a band that I love and appreciate.

Additionally, many bands are making their live performances more entertaining of a show than simply playing music. Not to say that we wouldn't be pleased by paying the fee and listening to our favorite bands play, but we can't possibly be disappointed if they also put on funny hats and dance around the stage! The last show I attended (and sadly, there are a rare few shows I've actually gone to-a problem I hope to remedy in the near future!) had a partial orchestra on the stage, costumes, many impressive guest performers, and a large screen overhead that played accompanying videos to the music. Although this did make me briefly think of the many churches who have now adopted jesus screens up front to direct their flocks a-signing (an epidemic that even I as a non-religious individual can't help but feel draws from the organic intentions of religion), I soon saw the merit of it. The theater was rather large (and I at the back of it!) and the screen acted as additional entertainment for those who weren't granted the joys of seeing the band's sweat stains.

On that note, I'd just like to brag a bit about the Fleet Foxes. I'm often an artist hoarder; we all know that classic problem where fantastically talented little-known bands grow in popularity and all of a sudden, their music fails to incite the same brilliant sounds that we used to hear. The difficulty with choosing a profession that thrives off the masses is that you have to keep appealing to them. Thus, many artists choose to change their unique style to gain more interest from a wider demographic and then, they lose their unique sound and my ear.

That stated, the other side holds an equally disappointing prospect for bands. If you discover an underground group and hoard them to you, they may never gain enough popularity to continue donating their time to creating the music you love! Then, they fall off the music scene and you collect their few songs to you, wondering what they may have become if they'd just had more time!!! Thus, I'm going to try to stop keeping my lips zipped about my favorite bands!

Luckily, I don't think that the Fleet Foxes really need much of my promoting. They already have good standing in many music communities and I think that their talent speaks for themselves. To me, they embody this wonderful feeling of frozen time. I don't know why, but recently I've been drawn to images and sounds that seem to be faux 70s stuck in present time. I understand that this makes no sense. I'm working on describing this phenomena but it's awfully difficult! Anyhow, the Fleet Foxes bring this feeling to life for me. Their harmonies are elegant, filling, classic, and brutally honest. I listen to them (and Radiohead) every day while I'm writing. This is a new habit, as up until now I've often felt like music distracted from my work. But recently, I've been using my enjoyment of these bands and others to induce creativity into my prose! I think it's working out well.

Back to the Fleet Foxes: I'd fallen in love with their music a while ago but when they released their newest cd, I felt a bit disappointed at first. I wasn't sure if I really liked it and I didn't spend a lot of time giving it a chance. This is an odd problem with me and music; I often judge a band a bit too quickly and then, years later, I'm crazy about them. For instance, I've had the Fleet Foxes on my computer and iPod for at least three years (and listened to them occasionally). It's only been within the last year that I've discovered that their music is so very, very wonderful. Perhaps this is just my taste changing and maturing. Still, I decided that I didn't like their new cd and now, I can't imagine why. It is very much up to par with their other music and most impressive.

Beyond their musical talents, I think they are fantastic lyricists. One song I can't stop listening to ("The Shrine/An Argument"-Helplessness Blues) has a line in it that says, "In the ocean, washing off my name from your throat." This is the kind of writing that I really appreciate because it makes you stop and truly consider it. This type of line doesn't pass you by, barely noticed. For me, you can't just sing to the Fleet Foxes, you have to think about it too. I can't help but be terribly curious about their music and what it means. This is a great frustration in my life! Whenever I'm attracted to music like this, I always have this desire to understand what exactly the song was written about, for whom or what, and what it means! Of course, the mystery of music is that with the greatest bands, they'll never tell you and that's what hooks you and keeps you interested.

Alright, I've probably spoken enough about the Fleet Foxes (is that a real sentence???). Just know that if I've talked you into listening to one of their songs by the end of this blog, I would suggest you start with "White Winter Hymnal." Not to say that you cannot handle "The Shrine/An Argument" because I'm sure you can, but it does have a rather odd ending (the only thing I actually dislike about the song-it's nearly two minutes of confused composition and it's rather uncommon for this band...). If you do want to give it a listen, watch out for this line: "Sunlight over me no matter what I do." It literally rocks you off your chair! It's just that good...

Also, so much for the "five minute rant" that I guaranteed myself...

Bookended

Greetings!

Things have been getting a bit busier for me recently, which then shoves my creativity into little corners at the turning of every hour. I'm not entirely pleased about it but what can we do! Lately, I've had the interesting experience of spending my afternoons first with an elderly lady, Kaye, and then a little girl, Tulia. It's fun to be bookended by age in this way; I like the change of pace these two give me each day. I can't help but feel that I'm learning a lot about life from these two, and in such a unique way. I'm not known for my ability to be overly firm with my intentions and these two are giving me quite a challenge with that. With Kaye, I have to work hard to express how my schedule will accommodate hers. Generally, when the time comes when I must leave to go and pick up Tulia, Kaye wants to tell me one more story or have me help her with one last task. It's never been easy to stand up for my own schedule like this so it does take a bit of urging within myself to tell her that no, I must leave now to get everywhere on time.

With Tulia, discipline and clear communication takes a completely different form. Tulia likes goofing around and doing little dances and talking about my hair when I'm trying to help her put on her leotard for her dance camp. For me, it's hard to tell her to stop and focus on the task at hand because I like her songs and her dances and I like talking to her about silly things (she has some very interesting thoughts about life...). With children, I think it's so important to encourage creativity and self-expression and I want her to be goofy and happy. But I know it's also important to set up clear guidelines of discipline. A balance between the two has to be developed but I find it tricky forming one when I have known her for such little time. Also, I have limited information on the type of discipline that her parents have established with her so I'm never sure exactly which route to take. When I think about this, I feel that my interaction with Tulia, however minimal, has a certain amount of gravity on her development. Obviously, when children are young, they are constantly learning from the people around them. They pick up so much more than I expect and thus, everything you do in front of them has the danger of being scooped up into their memory and applied later! This is just added inspiration to have a positive impact on her.

With the implementation of yoga into my life recently, I've been trying to practice the art of "letting go." Have you heard of it? It's this interesting tactic where you take something that is bothering you or pressing on your ability to be happy, and you just expel it from your mind. Revolutionary, right? Well...yes, for me. I tend to keep nagging ideas and thoughts inside of myself and they just fester there like ugly personality bugs! Today, I've been trying to notice every time they're crawling on me and when I do, I relax my body and take a deep breath, letting all the bad stuff out. It's not easy and doesn't always work but I think that actively doing this is the point for me right now. Hopefully, I'll get better with time and reach a place where I can just forget nagging thoughts and stop worrying about things out of my control.

In other news, I haven't killed this plant yet:

In fact, despite my negligible resume of plant care, it actually seems to be growing. Which reminds me that I need to water it today...

Although I've let my sketching fall to a weekly basis instead of daily, I've still been active in this recently. My newest sketch is one of my lovely headphones and I've shared it below for proof that I haven't given up on my artistic endeavors.

Better yet, I spent a few hours last night doing some painting that I'm rather pleased with. At my last job, my coworkers were in the habit of collecting random computer parts and hoarding them at different locations in the building where we worked. One of them had landed a few old keyboards and offered me one. Although I have no use for a non-functioning keyboard, I had much use for deconstructing it and using its parts in my artwork! I took it apart, washed the keys, and they've been waiting diligently in my art drawer for the day that they should be put to use. Last night was the night! Well, at least for thirteen of the keys.

There's a specific film that I've always been completely and utterly in love with. It's something of an inspiration to aspects of my creativity as well. Last night, I put it on, turned off the lights, lit a candle, and started painting. I like doing art in the dark because it takes away the voice of my inner art critic that tells me not to put a red on a canvas or that I've used too much pen in one area. With minimal light, I just go. I stop worrying about what it's going to look like and I just concentrate on how I love the feel and smell of painting. I can barely see what I'm doing so it moves into an exciting realm of anticipation; what will it look like when I turn on the light? And sometimes, I turn on the light and it's just a mumbled mess of awfulness and I paint over it. And sometimes, it's everything I want!

Last night, I turned on the lights and was pleased by what popped up on the canvas. I put finishing touches on it, glued on the keys, and spent quite some time ogling at it while I finished watching the movie. I think sometimes people don't do art because they're worried about it looking badly. I do art because it makes me feel happy and I like having my own style. It appeals to me (and perhaps only me) and that's fine because I'm not rushing off to try and sell it. But if you realize that you can do art just for yourself, that it doesn't have to look good by anyone's standards but your own (and sometimes, not even those!), perhaps more people would try it and find out its merits. Anyhow, below is my piece, which is now proudly displayed in my room where it will likely sit until I die!

Well, I'm off to do some more writing. I'm at a place in one of my book where the characters are arguing over some pretty deep ideas (at least, I like to think they are). I get very embroiled in their discussions and the work it takes to try to create valid points for both sides. It bends my mind into a shape more commonly described as 'pretzel'!

Happy Wednesday to one and all!

Food For Thought

Here's a secret: Chinese take-out is the official 'food for thought.' It's rich and secretive and likes to hide various layers of taste in different spots on your plate. When you try it in the comfort of your own home, go slowly, allowing it to unfold its spices and strike up foreign conversations with your taste buds. For greater enjoyment, be sure to save some of it for a small feast the following day. Like great cheese and expensive wines, it ages well and will wake up the next day feeling slightly refreshed and exceptionally delicious.

Oh, and always watch out for food poisoning.

I'm in the middle of urging myself to take my stitching project to the next level. I got the basic pattern for the outline from www.feelingstitchy.com and was excited by the results (shown below). But then, unsure of the next step, I set aside the piece of fabric and have been actively ignoring it ever since. In fact, I took it out today to take a photo of it and I think the floss looked genuinely excited to see me. I quickly snapped a photo and put it away again. No sense getting its hopes up. I probably won't actually attack it with creativity again for several days.

The photo is unnaturally annoying to me as, in my haste, I neglected to set the correct white balance which is why it appears so blue in color. But can you really blame me? I needed to avoid that feeling of guilty neglect that projects often throw your way when you see something you haven't worked on in a while. Ah well!

Coagulated Knees

So recently, I've been working on a comic strip called "Coagulated Knees." It's in a very early stage right now but I spent some time with a page today that I'm pretty pleased with. Given that I've only worked on comics for a short span of time and am quite the novice in this area of artistry, I think it's pretty decent. I've always been a big fan of creative web comics so perhaps one of these days, I'll get something going (although with all my endeavors, it doesn't seem like I'd ever have enough time to truly devote the detail I'd want to each strip). This page comes a bit out of context but I wasn't overly impressed by the preceding pages and I'm only posting this one! So here's to enjoying some snippet of a story that is fragmented but hopefully somewhat entertaining!

The hazard of day-dreaming at work.

Contesting the Existence of Mistakes

I was on my way home this evening and for some reason, my mind caught me in a loop discussion about mistakes. After some initial musings, I was surprised to find that part of me contested that there was, actually, no such thing as a mistake. Now, this statement does seem quite odd for me to be making because I have been feeling as though my life lately has been sitting on the brunt of several rather glaring mistakes. In fact, in the past few months I have felt as though I've been completely unaware of a series of repeating mistakes that I've been cycling through over the last several years. These mistakes seem to have become ingrained into my personality and I felt as though I kept making them without realizing the repetition but feeling unhappy by the recurring results. People often characterize negative parts of their lives as "being in a rut" and this was no exception. A friend of mine once gave the analogy of digging himself so deeply into a single, circular path that when he tried to drive over it again and keep to higher ground, he couldn't help but keep slipping back into the rut he'd formed for himself.

I like this because I think it's a good characterization of people's brilliant attempts to improve through often daunting pathways. I also think that it's an experience we can all understand as I think it's something we've all been through.

So lately, I've been feeling as though I got picked up by some magnificent zeppelin that is now allowing me to view myself from afar, catching all these negative habits and 'mistakes' and seeing how I fall into cycles of negative behavior. It's a really great experience; it helps me take in all these things and hone my skill at understanding where I can go with them, how I can improve those aspects of my self (and note, I'm speaking directly of the 'self', not misspelling!). Overall, it may be sometimes daunting to observe my flaws so bare, but it is a rewarding experience that I treasure right now in my life.

This brings me back to my questions about mistakes. I am gathering a lot of information about myself and who I want to be and spending a lot of time trying to incorporate that into my person, practicing better habits and hopefully, becoming a better me than I've ever been before. But I'm only here, in this state of self-observance and improvement, because of every single negative thing that has occurred up to this point.

I'm not the sort of person that believes that life is already set out before we enter it and that everything that happens was supposed to happen that way and at that time. I feel like your everyday actions have very strong impacts on not only your self but on the lives of those around you. I think this creates a precarious web between you and the lives of those you choose to touch. Looking at it that way, it demands a great deal of responsibility for the way you decide to interact and behave with friends and family. Thus, I honestly believe I've had my hand in every negative event that has happened to me recently, which is why I've been considering these things as 'mistakes' with such force lately.

My quandary lies in the fact that I do believe I've learned so much and grown considerably from dealing with these recent developments in my life. How can such an event that encourages a great stage of growth be termed a mistake, then? I know I wouldn't have learned every single interesting lesson recently if I hadn't been put in exactly the place I now find myself.

When I have these kind of discussions with myself where I contest the existence of something that seems so trivial and yet basic to human life, I tend to try and strip the facts to the core of the matter. I did so here and this is where I ended up. Choices are available to us in our daily life (and here, I'm not only necessarily terming a 'choice' as whether to go to a restaurant or stay home and cook but stretching it to cover all manner of sins; you choose to be in a good mood despite things that aggravate you, you choose to show affection to your significant other even if they are doing something that annoys you, etc.). Sometimes, these choices weigh in on a neutral scale; either choice affects you and those around you in the same way (wear blue or wear green, it doesn't matter just put on a shirt!). But when these choices have more importance on them, they start falling off into either a positive reaction or a negative one. These are the times when your significant other is excited about something from the book they're reading and wants to read it to you. You can choose to bask in their enthusiasm and their desire to share it with you, or you can become annoyed because you don't want to interrupt your reading to hear some antiquated discussion that will require your full attention and which won't make complete sense out of context.

Life is grayscale so there's no telling which choice is necessarily right or wrong but you're going to learn something no matter what you do. Choose to be positive, reap the benefits of people around you responding well to that positivity. Choose to be negative, reap the benefits of learning about the importance people play in your life and make sound realizations about their ability to choose to distance themselves from you.

What I'm basically trying to communicate is that situations are always going to be completely within your power if you decide to view them that way. If you choose to label your life as a series of mistakes, that can be beneficial to your growth but because life is up for personal interpretation, you are going to have to hold yourself responsible for attracting that kind of negativity. If you choose to see the world without mistakes, to level the playing field of choice and decide that events in life merely develop your understand of yourself, then you may give yourself a lot more positive power than you thought yourself capable of.

On the other hand, this argument is something that makes me relatively nervous; if you take out the existence of mistakes, you open a door to seeing yourself in an all-too perfect manner. There's a precarious line to dance between dissolving the idea of mistakes in order to simply have a peaceful mind about negative and positive reactions and lessons in life, and deciding that everything you do is right. This, like nearly all of my thoughts about life recently, leads down the road into a whole mind cramp I have about perception and how your mind comes careening into your life and can flip things upside down without your realizing it. But that's a whole different discussion.

Initial Musings

Hi all!

I created this blog to display my creative pursuits as they develop and discuss the progress of some of my personal projects. I have recently graduated from college and am trying to decide in which direction to point my life. So far, my interests stretch across a vast creative odometer of mostly income-less activities! I'm currently working on writing three different novels (having recently completed my third, finished novel), a habitual journaler, I am a flawed cartoonist, a daily sketcher, a seasoned musician (primarily viola and violin but also guitar and piano), a frequent photographer, a stubborn knitter/crocheter, an inspired stitcher, and a happy painter! Basically, if I find some kind of material, I like to see what I can do with it! Always fun, never paid...

I've been spending a lot of time thinking about life, recently (graduating from college seems to free up a lot brain space for constructive musings). I think that success in life (at least in employment and/or personal goals) takes two things. First, I think there's always a lot of luck involved in any endeavor. Sometimes, it's just about being in the right place at the right time, knowing the right people, or saying the right thing and making yourself heard. But the other factor that I believe is essential to success is extremely hard work. I've recently been living my life by the idea that if you want to be good at something, it is essential that you do it every day, at least for a little bit of your time. Now, if you want to be really good at something, that's when you start doing it for hours upon hours each day.

That's why at the end of the day, I'm always scrambling to get in my word count on whichever writing project I find myself most attracted to, trying to play some kind of instrument, and do some drawing. If you try to incorporate important hobbies in your life each day, you have no choice but to get better. The more time you spend with something, the easier it is to pin-point your flaws and begin to improve them. More importantly, it gives you a sense of accomplishment at the end of each day. No matter what happens, you've created something. It doesn't really matter if it's a piece of literary drivel or the most inspired writing you've ever created, it's still something you've done.

I'm not sure which book this is from, but sociologist Malcolm Gladwell writes (and this is vastly paraphrased so stick with me!) that every person who reaches the point of expertise in their field has spent at least 10,000 hours working on their selected skill or type of employment.

That's true dedication.

This resonates with my beliefs on success and reminds me of the thoughts of one of my favorite authors, Sara Douglas. I was reading her blog a few years ago and she discusses (once again, I'm paraphrasing) how annoyed she gets when individuals praise her for her "talent" at writing and express their desires at being born with such a "gift." She urges readers to understand that her skill at writing isn't something she was born with, as I'm sure many professionals would agree, but something at which she has spent years working. Of course, there are always highly-talented people who are born with natural gifts for certain things (Mozart anyone?) but the rest of us normal folks have to shut out distractions and hunker down to work, work, work.

Personally, I'm happy to have been born as the latter. I have spent a lot of time trying to learn the nature of discipline and I think all the work I've devoted to it has allowed me to establish good, creative habits to keep me motivated and continuously working.

Anyway, that's all for this evening. I hope you all have pleasant nights!