So this photo doesn’t have anything to do with my topic today. It’s the day we moved into 6401, July 2013. We were having a picnic dinner on the dining room floor. You can tell it was before Covid because we were eating out of salad bar containers from HyVee. It was four months before I finally convinced Jim to see a doctor about what was happening in his throat and his first cancer was found. We were young and blessedly ignorant of what was to come. Just happy to be back home in Lincoln!
I was just remarking to myself the other day about how much easier it has been to begin writing by talking into my phone instead of sitting with a blank piece of paper in front of me.
I very cleverly said to myself, that the insolence of the paper makes me intimidated. Which is true, it’s like its very blankness intimidates me. It’s as though the paper is sitting there saying “Write something very clever on me. I insist that you be clever. I will ridicule you ha, ha, ha, ha, if you are not! If you are not succinct, or if you are not brave, or if you are not, I don’t know, honest?” Or any of those other things I expect from a good writer. Include in that list, if you’re not grammatically correct.
When I’m talking into the Docs app, even now I am adding my own punctuation. It doesn’t seem as confining as a blank sheet of paper. I think that the process of spewing out my thoughts while they are swirling around in my head leaves an easier trail for me to follow when I am transcribing it later. I think that in transcribing it directly from the sometimes very inarticulate document I create by talking into my phone and editing it later gives me more freedom to begin in one place and end in another.
I wonder if part of that mindset isn’t what making me unable to put a pencil on a piece of paper. I make everything so precious when it doesn’t have to be. It can just be a mark on the paper. It can just be a doodle and it can be terrible. Brilliance is not required. I am going to change that to say brilliance is not expected. No, I have to change that again because I think in my mind brilliance is expected. My job then, as I see it, is to change my own expectations.
I have a lot of work to do.
I’m going to try to instill in myself, at least start working on finding more of a sense of play. Maybe I should change that too. I’m going to try to instill in my life, a sense of play and if that has an influence on any art I make I will be satisfied. What’s the worst thing that could happen? I throw shit away. That is not a terrible thing.
I need to lighten up.