How Do We Find Our Way In?
January 13, 2010 by Janice
Drawings and Journals, Janice Cartier, January 2010
Are journals a writer’s sketchbook? Are sketches, an artist’s journal? Does a software coder have a personal file somewhere where they work out the elegance of codes? Where do we begin our explorations?
I was in the map and staging room on the Pelican one afternoon at Chandeleur Island, and every scientist, biologist, even the fish guys, even the mappers in sync with the NASA satellite had some kind of notebook or field journal to match my sketchbooks. They all looked a bit different, some graphed, others not, some well worn, others fresh and new, but there I was with my sketchbooks and my field notes looking around the room finding that we all had to have that kind of place, that kind of thing in our daily work. Of course now we might have an iphone, or a droid or hint hint some sleek new tablet rumored to be coming out.
I prefer paper though. And a pencil or a pen. And if I am writing in one of my journals, I like to use the same pen throughout the whole journal.
And I like certain journals, certain kinds of sketchbooks, certain sizes, and certain brands.
Inside the galley on the Pelican on one trip, there was a hand typed manuscript that I was asked to read, the original words for the Walter Anderson book, Pelicans. His daughter was putting it together to be released. After all, we were on his grandson’s boat. Reading a primary document like that, from an artist I admired, was like handling original sketches or watercolors from say Winslow Homer or John Singer Sargeant, or John Marin. I have done that too. Goose bump moments those.
And if I could collect one scrap of a note from Steinbeck in his own hand, I would treasure it like a sketch from Alexander Calder.
Notes. These are ways in. Beginnings. Traces of thought. Drawings of what if’s and how is that? Of I wonder, or look at this.
All good ways in.
Show me the sketches for a piece of finished art and I am almost as happy as seeing the finished piece. These bits are as close as we can get to the original impulse.
A friend of mine edited Jack Kerouac’s journals, coffee stains and all.
I was in awe.
He did Reagan’s too.
And Kerry’s.
Primary documents. Held in his hands.
Context to a larger thing.
Moments of capturing.
On file, in the Library of Congress, there is a simple line drawing of a cowboy on a bucking horse in a letter….that bucking horse and its rider is now in everyone’s cultural memory bank just about. And it was the drawing in that letter that became the powerful bronze. One of Remington’s signature pieces of sculpture. You know Remington was on San Juan Hill with Roosevelt and the “Rough Riders”, right?
These bits of things are called ephemera…
But to those who make them,
They are our way in.
Into something bigger. Something we’ll refine, or play with, or toss out.
Beginnings. Starts.
Over and over again.
Fundamental practices we hone,
These are access to the flow.
All part of finding the path that speaks to us most.
Finding our way in,
We tend to leave a trail.
How about you? Do you have a favorite notebook, or journal, sketchbook or catch-all for your starts? Is it paper or virtual for you?
Comments
5 Responses to “How Do We Find Our Way In?”
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Jan, “finding our way in” so beautifully described that process where the seed of inspiration is planted. I find my way in through pen and paper. There are times when I may bang it out on the computer when the thoughts rush in daring me to capture them quickly lest they be lost but it never matches my pen and paper. My journals are a map to where I’ve been and where I’m going. They contain scribbles, missives, sights, sounds, memories, essays, one liners, and jumbled words that make sense only to me. Way in…like that..opening the door…
Karen,
That feel of pen and paper, that tactile quality, has a way of helping us to feel the way in I think. You’ve made me want to remember to put more sounds in now. LOL. When i read your words, I briefly saw a door in that Matisse-like colorful room in that dream you had..opening up..:)
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So interesting… the stories we tell through the ephemera… you’ve got my creative juices going on this one all right!
Joanna,
I printed out your “The Return of the Light” poem yesterday to cut out and tape into my current journal… little bits we find along the way…ephemera, touchstones…sketches, poems….lots to love in all of those…and what they can become.
Collections of them…are like estuaries to me.
I am glad it stirred the juices for you.