Simulacra: Fragment Necklace

Outside my Window

Day 2: Le Grand Chapiteau, originally uploaded by kaitschott.

If there’s anyone who doesn’t already know, (I feel like I talk about nothing else lately!) Cirque de Soleil is setting up right outside my window. Like a little kid, I am super excited! We’ve been taking some time lapse films of the tents going up, which you can see at Flickr. Yay!

1,2,3…GO!

Ritual.  Habit.  Hard Work.  Twyla Tharp’s outlook on creativity is pretty simple in it’s essence.  It’s a perspective that appeals to me greatly.  Motivation?  Ideas?  Not a problem.   Buckling down and being productive?  Well…maybe, once I figure out which exciting thing to do among the zillions swirling around my head and then once I figure out why I didn’t already do it, and then maybe after I wash the dishes, ’cause I need to do that to clear my head too.  Oh, yeah, and I need a coffee, since I worked really hard at the day job, and I had to get up early so I’m tired, and I deserve it, and hmmm, I probably need to have some lunch too ’cause I’m feeling  a little light-headed and….

“Turning something into a ritual eliminates the question, Why am I doing this?…The ritual erases the question of whether or not I like it.  It’s also a friendly reminder that I’m doing the right thing. (I’ve done it before.  It was good.  I’ll do it again.)…In the end, there is no one ideal condition for creativity.  What works for one person is useless for another.  The only criterion is this: Make it easy on yourself.”

“Make it easy on yourself.”!!!  If there’s anything I need to be reminded of, it’s that.  I’m not sure if it’s so much that I’m a procrastinator, or more that I’m an over-thinker.  Maybe over-thinker is just a specific sub-species of procrastinator.  Either way, I am highly skilled at doing everything but the work and yet convincing myself that it is absolutely vital that I do x,y, and z, in order to get that creative work done.  Got to clear out email. Got to read blogs.  Got to upload to Flickr.  Got to update Facebook.  Good lord!  That stuff may be worth while, and vital to other important things, like maintaining friendships and gathering inspiration, but it’s not vital that I do it before I can make something.  I need some short cuts.  I need to stop thinking about why I don’t get things done, pare my actions down to the briefest list necessary, and get going.  I need a trigger.  1..2..3…GO!!!

P.S.  I will say one thing about blogging as a prod to making stuff.  If you’re someone who thinks that posts work better with pictures, and you’ve got nothing to take pictures of…well, you’ve got to make something, don’t you?

Flickr Favorites

I may not have been getting into that white room too much lately, but I’ve been chucking inspiring things in through the window, as it were.  These are actually from a while ago, but when I started looking to update them, I decided they were just too good not to share.  For some more great stuff I’ve found since, check out my favorites here, for instance this and this and this….

1. close up, 2. OAW #1 – Liked the back much better, 3. Masdevallia constricta, 4. Cavansita, 5. Flowers in the shadehouse, 6. Remote Possibility, 7. Diamond Teardrops, 8. Sealing howtodoit 5., 9. pirites, 10. Campo Ligure in winter, 11. middenvingerconstructie, 12. OAW Final piece – Rachelle, 13. From the side, 14. Untitled, 15. Frames 2, 16. IMG_0653, 17. Frank Gould and wife at Helen’s wed. (LOC), 18. Untitled, 19. Bright Glass Collection – Spring / Summer 2008, 20. Lichens for a new piece, 21. via rail, 22. Sun Printing, 23. Bright Glass Collection – Spring / Summer 2008, 24. “Geek Bling”, 25. Untitled, 26. Top Of The Hat Rack, 27. armreifen – bangles, 28. ., 29. The Parlament from the “Halász Bástya”, 30. dust, 31. damascus with agate, 32. “…de sangre”, 33. Ghostly Gown, 34. Untitled, 35. brrr, 36. * i got tiny tools, too

Not everything else is junk

In the interest of clarity, I might say that I don’t think that everything which is not directly related to jewelry making is junk getting in the way.    I’ve never been that kind of obsessive.  I’m more of a ‘looking-for-balance” type than a “got-to-get-rid-of-all-else” type.  My white room isn’t really empty, but I need to be conscious and deliberate about what I want to put in the room, what to line the path to the door with, what to keep in view from the windows, as it were.

Plants and gardening get a fair amount of time lately.  Growing food, digging in the dirt, getting outside, slowing down to the speed of plants, doing the constant work of weeding.  All this feeds my brain, or perhaps empties it.  The wordlessness of it is clearly rejuvenating and focusing.

I might need to be by myself in the room, but the path to the door is lined with friends.  I am constantly inspired and prodded on by the creative process and work of others, many of who I know only thanks to this lovely thing we call the internet.  One of my latest finds is Pretty Good Things, the blog of Mary P., who makes amazing prints and hats and other fancy things for your head.  (Did you notice my hat obsession has been re-kindled of late?)  She’s funny and generous, and is doing monthly give-aways.  And I won this lovely little trio of cephalopods.  And I love sea critters, yes I do.  Pay her a visit, why don’t you?

There’s clearly a bookshelf right outside my white room and a comfy chair.  If I don’t park myself in that chair and get lost in a book on a regular basis, the door to the white room is stubborn and hard to open.  Sometimes I’m reading something which touches directly on jewelry or craft, and sometimes less.  Shop Class as Soulcraft was purchased and devoured in about a week.  There was an essay in the NYT a few weeks ago, as well as an earlier version in the The New Atlantis.  I highly recommend you get your hands on the book itself if the essays at all intrigue you.  Mr. Crawford makes an argument which is relevant to anyone who feels drawn to do work with their hands and resists the pressure to inhabit a cubicle.  I think that might be a few of us, no?

getting back to the white room

I walk into a white room….

So begins Twyla Tharp in The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life.  For Tharp, a dancer and choreographer, the room is a practice room, but every artist has a white room. For the writer, it’s the blank page; for the painter, the empty canvas;  the musician, the instrument not yet played.  For many people, the not-yet-begun is the biggest hurdle, the idealized thing which can’t fall short as long as it is just in our heads.  For me the problem frequently seems to be there’s too much stuff piled outside the door of that white room.  That I’m not allowed to get in the room and play until all my junk is cleared away.  And do I have junk….head junk, time junk, physical junk, piles and piles of junk.

Must clear junk away.

For now, The Creative Habit is my trusty shovel.

Slowly….but gaining speed

Things inch along, non-verbally for the most part.  But a sense of gaining speed.  Spring in full swing now, new growth, gaining momentum, rising sap and building change.  Solid progress on resolutions #1 & #4, steeling myself to tackle #5.

Lately

Working on resolutions #1 & #4.

Resolving at last….again

I have always resisted the pressure to have New Years resolutions etched in stone before midnight on Jan 31st.  It used to be that there was just too much going on in December, but now, I must admit, I think it’s because I like to spend January plotting and planning and looking ahead.  Well, as it turns out, this year, it didn’t take much planning.  In thinking about last years resolutions, I realized that I never gave them a fair chance.  But they were good resolutions.  So…. I decided to just re-cycle them for this year.

Seems like either a cop out or asking to fail again, doesn’t it?  Well, it could be either.  But the thing is, they get at ways that I do want my life to change, although perhaps not always very precisely.  I think I didn’t work on them more deliberately because I’d either misstated what I really wanted, or I’d failed to realize that some other changes were necessary first.  And some of those necessary changes did happen.  So perhaps I’m not re-using last years, so much as re-stating and re-newing them.  So here they are:

1. Work on Reading List:

2008:  I didn’t read a single  book from the list.  Ouch!  But I did read a few other things.

2009:  Accept that my reading priorities change over time.  Keep updated list on goodreads.  Watch less t.v.  Read more.

2. Work on Books to Purchase List:

2008:  This list never even got published.  I got bummed out about not having more spending money.  But I did save up enough to invest in this fabulous and inspirational book!

2009:  Money is tight these days.  But books are important.  I still want this one from the Corning Museum of Glass. And this, too, which is at the top of my to-read list.  After that, we’ll see.

3. Work through The Creative Habit by Twyla Tharp and blog about it when something interesting comes up:

2008:  This also got no time last year.  But it deserves it, so…

2009:  I’d like to try to post on this at least once a month, either an exercise that she suggests, or something I’ve already put into practice, or whatever.  I think this would help me buckle down and be productive.

4. “Coffee time” at least once (eventually twice) per week:

2008:  Again, I never even did the follow up post.  In a nutshell, it was about dedicating some alone time each week to reading, drawing, and planning. Realizing that I never had either the time or the mental energy to do this motivated me to make a change at work in August. Now I have more time and am less drained by the day job, but less money, so spending “quality” time in a coffee shop still doesn’t happen very often.  So….

2009: I realized that it can’t be about whether or not I’m sitting in that perfect, most comfortable corner of my favorite cafe, with the perfect latte, made by my preferred barrista.  I had a host of excuses for why I wasn’t dedicating the time and doing the work.  While certain routines and rituals may have worked really well in the past, I have to work with the circumstances at hand now.  And it’s the work and the dedication that’s important.  Not the old rituals.  I might have to find new rituals.

5. Open an Etsy shop:

2008:  Well, I did do some work on this, but it too, didn’t come to fruition.

2009:  Now that I’m settled in to the new job, and in a frame of mind to buckle down, I think this can happen.  Heaven knows, some extra income would be fantastic.

In many ways these are small things.  And there are larger changes I want to make.  But why make big resolutions, if I can’t even get the little ones together?  And sometimes small things make the big things easier.  So, hopefully, 2009 will be about buckling down, getting the mental space I need to make change, and focusing on doing instead of wishing.

taking credit

It seems like a lot of folks shy away from having resolutions, because it’s all too easy to dwell on the things we didn’t do, the things we didn’t accomplish, the ways in which we failed.  So, in the spirit of refusing to look at things in terms of failures, I want to acknowledge some things I did accomplish this past year.  Things that I never could’ve predicted.  The resolutions I’d have made if I’d had a crystal ball.  The gold stars for the fridge.

-The One-a-Week Project:  The single most satisfying creative thing I’ve done this year.

-Keeping in touch:  I’m doing a better job of staying in touch with folks.  Still need a lot of work on this, and some folks are still getting neglected, but I’m doing better.  I even joined Facebook.

-lunch with Dad:  I’ve had lunch with my Dad once a month since my birthday last May.  This might not seem like much to some people, but for me it’s huge.  He’s been great at being supportive and helping me be more forward thinking.  Thanks Dad!

-job change:  Though I still work for the same employer, I’ve moved to another department and cut back my hours.  The fewer hours is a mixed blessing, since it means less money, but I’m really trying to make the most of the free time I gained.  As for the switch of departments, lets just say that I went from a soul-crushing situation to one that challenges me without stressing me out.

-cut down on input/stimulus:  This is also still something I’m working on, but progress was made.  I’m down to only 75 feeds I follow in bloglines, and I’m watching less t.v. when I’m just plain tired.  This one has been hard, because I’m curious and interested in many things, but as a continual goal to work on, well worth it.  I’m just better with less buzz in my head.

-improved photography:  Through specific projects like the One-a-Week challenges and What I Wore Today, as well as just plain screwing around, I’ve gotten much more comfortable with my camera this year.  I’m much more able to produce photos I’m happy with that require little or no doctoring.

-holidays/winter outlook:  Last holiday season was pretty hard for me.  It was the first year we were too broke for gift giving, and it really bummed me out.  This year, the economy being what it is, was about the same, but my perspective on it was better.  Because I didn’t expect myself to spend a bunch of money, it wasn’t so hard.  I’ve put real effort into enjoying the season and I think my efforts are paying off.  My x-mas tree (our only splurge) is even coming back to life!

next on the docket:  those resolutions (at last!) and a round up of what’s going on with One-a-Week.