Just a quick note at work, I realize this last year that I have very sadly let this blog go downhill. (What can I say motherhood has kicked my artistic ASS). But on the plus side, my amazing illustrator is making progress on our children’s book, I have a youtube series in the work and I’m finely writing poetry again. So please bare with me as I slowly work my way back to artistic glory or at least. And until that way, enjoy a progress sketch of Monster’s Don’t Hugs.
Peace n Love,
Rach
Don’t tell people you are taking time off to raise a baby (a whooping month btw then I’m back tutoring English and teaching three courses at a technical college.) because the first thing they will say, if they know you are a writer is, “Oh that’s so great for you, when are you going to write the next great American novel?”
Then, they will stand there, starring at the circles under you eyes as you shake from the caffeine that you have been dumping into your body, waiting for a response: a chapter or two you have written or a detailed outline of your next great work.
No I haven’t had time to craft a great novel.
Actually I now spend most of my time bathing in baby vomit and desperately trying to stay awake. Oh and then do those little things like eat in the hour or so of sleep my baby does before she screams 🙂
I have though had time to do some shorter project, such as starting a crafting store with my friend, specializing in our geeky love of comic. We are selling our work at Kokomo Con this year. It should be a fun experiment in self-marketing and promotion, something I hope to take over to my own independent writing.
I’m also seeing progress on my Children’s book (look for upcoming info on it.), I’m very excited for this project.
On a sad note, which I will blog about later, I lost the illustrator for my Comic on Nikola Tesla, so now I am back to looking for an artist (if you know of anyone comment below or email me at reestanf @ gmail.com). I plan on launching a Kickstarted campaign for it as soon as all of my ducks are in a row.
So buzzfeed had an article, “If the Disney Princess went to your high school,” which was hilarious and also shines a light on the faults of the princesses. It’s tongue in cheek for sure, but is the perfect article for people like me who grew up with a love/hate relationship with Disney and the Princesses as well (minus Belle, I will get my library god dang it.).
Disney stories are entertaining, but let’s face it, most of them are awful morals for women and young girls. And frankly most of the princess could use a little consoling!
What do you think? Ideas you would add? Any assessments you disagree with?
Be an artist. Paint. Write. Play the banjo. Sing in the shower. Whittle figures out of soap. Write lyrics in bathroom stalls. Do anything and everything that connects you with your creative potential.
Any day is a day for a play
Imagine. Explore. Dream.
Don’t be angry if your parents or teachers try to discourage you. They are worried, worried for you. Money rules the world in so many way and bleeds into our fears for the one that they love. Adults try to pretend this fear doesn’t exist. But it does.
But they don’t understand. They don’t know what it is like for words to course through your veins and swell your body until a pen realizes it. They haven’t found salvation in a dingy light club with a sweaty rock and roll man screaming as the crowd swells against you. Or spent all day staring at clouds. Or spent six hours trying to find the right shade of red. They simply are just not wired like you,do not thirst art like water, do not breathe it in like air.
Realize that this beauty is more powerful than any dollar amount, and may never bring you any money. Realize that the late nights and long hours are worth what you are doing for nothing more than the finishing line of a poem. That fame and success do not add to your work. You do not have to be Picasso. My art, your art, our art will have a rippling effect that no one will fully comprehend. One speck of paint can bring the heavens to weep.
Creation. Taking nothing, taking parts and making a whole is contained within itself, a wonder that mimics the heavens.
Be an artist because the world tells you to become an investment banker but just as the word needs financiers, scientists and doctors, the world needs a soul.
Be an artist because the world sucks. In the darkness, we need your light of hope. We need a voice that screams, “I feel how you feel. You are not alone.” And in the light we need the darkness, an everlasting reminder of the yin and yang of life.
And never apologize for it. Be who you are. And love what you do. Those who understand will never chastise you. And those who don’t, will never understand.
One lost day of wages (vacation day taken)….-$80-120
Snacks and gas to drive to Peoria (an hour away)….-$20
The chance to teach 100 plus kids about being a playwright….priceless
….well maybe not priceless but at least worth the 120 bucks.
Today was the day! I taught four hour-long workshops on play-writing for kids (k-10th grade) for Cornstock theatre.
I was a hobbit of sorts, a misplaced author in a dank and dreary basement (the storage room for the theatre’s props).
Armed with my crude notes, nerves, paper and pens, I prepared to take on one of the greatest challenges of my life… teaching 30+ children……
I’d be lying if I said I was able to hold all of the children’s attention for the entire hour, but overall, the day went pretty well.
A quick introduction from myself and a lecture on the basics of play-writing and the kids were off….
The kids spent twenty minutes writing a short play. Noisy chaos ensured.
(Side note: I was surprised how many of the children, especially the older grades had little to no experience with creative writing, only a handful had ever written a play. If you are an artist, please take it upon yourself to educate our youth, it’s the only way they will be exposed to art….)
After they finished, the kids had the chance to act each others’ plays out.
And then it was light’s out.
Hopefully, this experience will inspire at least a few of them to take up this art! This was one of the best experiences of my life, hopefully I will have many more opportunities to teach our future.
If you haven’t yet figured out, I have a preoccupation with childhood and art. It is my believe that most of us are naturally artists but as we grow, we are conditioned to lose this.
I stumbled upon an article about fourth grade poets that you should read on the topic.
Let it inspire you. Forget what you know or what you are taught and write, write, write.
I learned a trick from Lynda Barry, about the process of unlearning for art. (This is a short explanation of the writing process, check out her work for a much better explained and more detailed process)
Its amazing what comes of it.
We are all artist, don’t let society teach you otherwise!
Street of Dreams 