Radical Transparency

(in case the other blogs need a friend)

Not So Asleep

How Ben Franklin cultivated creativity, as described by Rivka Galchen:

He'd deprive himself of sleep, then, exhausted, sit in an uncomfortable chair while holding a heavy metal ball in each hand so that when he'd nod off a hand would go limp and its ball would fall, making a sound that would wake him from his dreams. That was how he came up with his best ideas for inventions, basically asleep -- just not so asleep that he couldn't take down a few notes.

We all need tricks like that.

Thank you, John Gordon.

Thunderous Trains of Air (and Other Forms of Inspiration)

Back in Ancient Rome, they had these little creativity gnomes that lived in studio wall cracks.  They'd pop out from time to time and bounce and sing and kiss and inspire.

Nowadays, if an artist ever sees a gnome, he tries to catch it and swallow it.  Which turns the gnome into an uncooperative lunatic heartache.  But, apparently, it's crazy to release a good gnome.  I mean what if it never comes back?

That's what Elizabeth Gilbert just told me.  In a TED Talk that's worth watching (even if you categorically deny gnomes' existence) for Gilbert's description of Ruth Stone's poetical process...

Gnomes or no gnomes, I think she makes an important observation about culture, creativity, and self-fulfilling prophesies:

Somehow we've completely internalized and accepted collectively this notion that creativity and suffering are somehow inherently linked and that artistry, in the end, will always, ultimately, lead to anguish.

And I think she takes that observation in exactly the right direction:

Better if we encourage our great creative minds to live.

Ideas, Insanity, and Pooping

There's a bathroom in my uncle's house that's definitely haunted.  By a friendly and fictional ghost.  Which is another discussion for another day.

Today's point is that the last time I was in there, I had a few memorable thoughts; I started wondering if that bathroom might be a particularly good place for ideas; and I decided it probably was.

And that's my first place like that, my first place to go to think or get creative, my first geographical muse.

And I realize that a non-trivial percentage of idea places belong to crazy people.  But I also realize that a not even close to trivial percentage of crazy people, at least by my definition, are easily as cool as they are crazy, if you pay attention.

So, yeah, I have an idea place now.  Or I'll be testing one out anyway.  Testing it out next time I'm visiting my uncle and cousins and have to poop.

Uneven

The creative life is uneven. You have a few short bursts of genius now and then, the rest of the time you're trying SOMEHOW to get the magic back again, mostly without success. It's exhausting. I am exhausted, often.

Hugh MacLeod wrote that the other day.  On his blog, which is awesome.  And in a post that's pretty heavily religious, which I didn't expect but kind of dig.  Because I didn't expect it.  If that makes sense.

Anyway, I like the observation.  Makes me wonder how many of us not quite artists can be said to be living the creative life.

A Life of Modest Magic

Jon, who has accepted my challenge, wrote an extraordinarily metaphor rich review last night of Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea, the latest Silver Jews album.

I know very little Silver Jews, very little Pavement, very little Stephen Malkmus, and very little David Berman, so reading the review didn't give me much to say about the music.  But the metaphors caught my attention, and, when I found this little thought, my mind really started racing:

Berman seems to have the wisdom of a train-hopping hobo you may bump into while spending a night in a jail cell after drinking a dozen whiskeys and tossing your date into oncoming traffic. He sings of a lifestyle filled with backwoods romance, seafaring parties, delicious jail cells, neglected jukeboxes, and all sorts of modest magic.

I left Jon a comment:

I've been thinking a lot about life behind the camera lately. For photographers and writers and musicians. For all kinds of storytellers. And I think the stories that burn hardest for escape are stories in which we participate, stories in which we're characters. Those are the ones that I feel most intensely anyway.

So, my question is: Do you think Berman lives his life of "modest magic?" Does he fall into backwoods romance, crash seafaring parties, sleep in delicious jail cells, and dance to neglected jukeboxes? Is he Ishmael (Melville's, not Quinn's)? Is he Hunter S. Thompson? Or is he Capote? Or Sebastian Junger? Or Mark Knopfler singing history in Sailing to Philadelphia?

I guess these questions are just an expression of my curiosity about our imaginations and how much adventure we need to feed them. My feeling is that we need to feed them a lot, but, at the same time, I think adventure is the most abundant resource we have. It's everywhere every day. Just a matter of paying attention to it. And even those little adventures can parallel fantastically close to jail cells, jukeboxes, and love in the woods.

Everybody's creative process is different.  I think it'd be awesome if David Berman actually did sleep in boxcars while writing that album.  If, of course, boxcars still exist and continue to welcome the nomadically homeless.