I’m an artist, by nature and by disposition. With this constitution, I tend to see things from a creative angle, and I love the way words can paint a picture, and I enjoy how light hits wildflowers, and I get lost in how pretty everything is. My imagination is sharper than my reasoning abilities, and people who tend to be very literal can’t stand me for very long. I appreciate logic, and temperance, but sit with me for any length of time and there will be whimsy and woo-woo stuff.
In many ways, this experiment of writing, heavy with the knowingness that people other than myself will read it, is naturally performative. There’s an unavoidable awareness that sharing my personal stories, views, and opinions will doubtless encounter a reader who disagrees. That fact has been my most looming psychological threat— you may not like me.
And so there are a set of mental gymnastics I must work through to get to a place where my writing is not me, per se, but just an expression of the shared experience we’re all having on this rock floating through space in oblong circles for eternity until it ends in fire or ice or however the Earth does itself in. I’m just a messenger, maybe. Perhaps we all are just messengers of this existence, offering the talents we have in exchange for a sense of belonging. Maybe we’re all just performing, with the tools we have, to the end of time, trying to blend in or stand out just enough to survive.
Maybe it’s too early in the day to try and reconcile all of sociology and psychology and being-ness— so let’s circle back to why I’m writing.
I’m an artist, so I have to create or I implode. I don’t know if mathematicians have the same drive to make equations work lest they meet their demise— but I do know scientists are driven to insanity trying to solve chemical mysteries or biological anomalies. Maybe we all have that individual thing that makes us tick, like a timebomb, that must be addressed regularly or we collapse like the Death Star, weakened by design, done in by a sure shot that could have been prevented if we’d just given enough attention to the blueprints.
Let us pause and take a moment of appreciation for George Lucas, and the galaxy he created far, far away. What would the cultural fabric of the last 50 years look like without Star Wars?
That’s the power of art and storytelling, and that’s what keeps my brain lit up just before sleep, when all the stories want to come out. I wish I could harvest that energy, bottle it, and use it around 3pm every day.
Until I can capture that phenomenon, I’ll keep looking for the opportunities in the daylight, finding inspiration in people and nature (and aren’t they really the same?). Even if all art is performative, it does not make it any less important.
Thank you, as ever, for being here. And I hope you have an inspired week.
I'm currently obsessed with using Portrait setting on my iPhone to photograph orchids and wildflowers, not to mention people.