Erik Lokensgard, Author at Writing in the Stream – Page 63 of 73

The Notebook

Don’t let Da Vinci intimidate you. The notebook can hold everything, even your shopping list. Your dreams, your doodles, your diary. It doesn’t have to look like perfectly calibrated depictions of metatarsals, gear ratios, or written in the Vicar of Nibbleswicke’s script. It can have flaws and it can be your source of inspiration during dry seasons. Write anything you feel like writing, no matter how trivial. It gets you in the habit of writing down your ideas.

(Source: talk with creator of Zits comic strip.)

Reverence for Your Tools

Have you ever noticed that masters of their craft have a reverence for their tools?

Maybe it’s the bike mechanic who takes really good care of her bike — lubing the chain, keeping the derailer’s high-lows lined up perfectly, etc. Maybe it’s a landscaper carefully oiling the hedge trimmer before/after use, stepping away from a giant shrubbery depiction of… Winged Victory. Maybe it’s a grandfather, carefully putting back his tools in their proper, outlined places. Maybe it’s a chef, always keeping the knife sharp enough to cut portals between worlds (like Will Parry’s in The Subtle Knife).

On Wednesday, I met the cartoonist of one of my favorite comics, Zits. His primary tool was the brush. When he described the brush, I couldn’t help but think of the wand dealer in J. K. Rowling’s Diagon Alley. The brush was made from hairs of the tail of a sable living in Siberia. The sable’s adaptation to the cold winters had made the hairs strong yet flexible. The brush costs $50. It lasts, if treated well, for one month, maybe two if you stretch it. No ordinary brush.

On top of that, the cartoonist mixed his own ink, from a thick ink with a thinner one, to get the viscosity he desired.

NB: Sometimes people make the mistake in believing that good tools/gear equates with being dedicated to your craft. Not so. Just because you have the best tool doesn’t mean you’ll know how to use it to best advantage. Yet, a dedication to your craft eventually leads you to seek good tools and materials, and sometimes, as with the hairs of the brush, the stories behind them.

Ideas

The nice thing about sharing ideas is that you tend to remember them better. Some of the most creatively energetic moments are ones in which ideas are shared freely in a big stew, without caring so much about who threw in which ingredient or stirred when and with what rotation. This kind of synthesis can happen at the level of an exchange between two people, the chavruta. Or mutual support/inspiration can happen at the level of a small team or group, like the Inklings, which included “Tollers” and “Jack,” who you may have heard of by the names of J. R. R. Tolkien or C. S. Lewis, respectively. Or, of course, we now have the grand scale of the internet for sharing ideas.

And sometimes it’s a lottery, like this: http://thelistserve.com/. The lottery is completely hit or miss, but the idea is what’s important. What would you say in 600 words or less to 20,000 people if you had the chance? How would you say it? How do you fit what you say into a meaningful context for the random medley of readers instead of launching into something so random that even the spontaneous people who have signed up won’t be receptive? I might have read a recent story more favorably if:

1.) It didn’t seem like an intensional tease to manipulate me into asking for more.
2.) There were a more graceful transition into the story itself, telling me directly why it mattered enough to the author to share it.

The introduction certainly read like a promotion. What is common amongst the Listserve? It’s hard to say. An attraction to having a large number of readers, certainly. And a tolerance for surprises, at least enough to give it a try.

The thing is, the internet already provides the service of the listserve. And you can reach a more targeted audience, people that are already interested in what you have to offer. Nevertheless, there is a sort of foragers’ allure in opening a message without knowing whether it will be something that stinks or something that opens up your world.

Thanks to Homeslice for tipping me off about chavruta, Jedi for the Inklings, and Bouton for The Listserve.