Organisms as Mentors & Everyday Mystery

The On Being podcast is BACK and I am loving it!

These two episodes were amazing.

Janine Benyus Biomimicry, an Operating Manual for Earthlings on natural organisms as mentors and peers… learning from them rather than about them.

And Rick Rubin Magic, Everyday Mystery, and Getting Creative. I have SO MANY quotes from this one because I listened while parked in the car while Davy napped:

  • “The real practice of the artist is a way of being in the world.”

  • “It’s hard for me to finish projects because I always see the possibilities of what else we could try and I want to try everything…”

  • “What I came to realize is that there is a time for this open play. And it’s in those first two parts of the process, the seed phase… and experimenting.”

  • “By working with sensitive artists, we resonate together in that we’re feeling things that not everybody else is feeling.”

  • “There is no connection between the amount of time invested and how good something is.”

  • “The sustainable part of the practice is: start with things that are easy to do.”

Root

My Word of the Year for 2022.

It still has a lot to teach me.

WoT & Grishaverse

A couple months ago I finally finished my massive re-read of The Wheel of Time.

Since then I’ve been binge reading the Grishaverse series by Leigh Bardugo. It’s darker than I usually read, but I love her characters. As the cast grows I really relate to so many neurodivergent traits. So that has kept me reading even when the circumstances are grim.

*Content warning, although most of the darkness is not explicit. If you’re a sensitive reader you may want to check out content warnings for each book on Storygraph.

You can get a taste of it via the Netflix series which is rated TV-14.

The storybook Language of Thorns was absolutely gorgeous, and used a clever illustrative style where the images slowly developed over each page. But some of the stories were so traumatic* I left mine in a Little Free Library and I’m not sure if I regret it or not.

*as are many traditional fairy tales to be fair.

Golden Age of Television

These have been two excellent months for television.

I am (of course) watching Rings of Power. It's designed by Weta Workshop so its visually stunning, but I'm also impressed at how this show is taking its time. As a hobbit at heart I really love the Harfoots (even if they may be taking liberties with the Middle Earth timeline.)

The casting is perfect. And I am in love with the costume design for Numenor - just look at that Art Nouveau / Pre-Raphaelite inspiration. 😍

And I appreciate the representation.

Years ago, I was horrified to realize the only people of color in the Peter Jackson film’s were orcs. 😳

(Check out this video of every line spoken by a POC which only adds up to 0:46 seconds total.)

We’ve also started watching Star Trek Strange New Worlds and… it is SO GOOD.

It is by far the best Star Trek show out there and captures everything about what makes Star Trek worth watching.

The heart of Star Trek is about respect and collaboration among people from different cultures as well as exploring contemporary ethical issues with some metaphorical distance from real life. It’s amazing how different issues look when they are separated from their well worn context. This is (one reason) I love sci fi and fantasy.

Growing up Star Trek was only vague a cultural touchstone for me (even as a kid I related to Data), but as nerdlyweds Nathan & I watched through every series (…except The Original Series. Captain Kirk felt deeply misogynistic for me and I just couldn’t stomach it.)

While I have a special place in my heart for Captains Picard and Janeway, I really love Pike and hope this series will have many seasons to come.

Dominoes

One morning when I was desparate to put something low key on the TV we stumbled upon this dominoes video. It’s such a wonderful visual and auditory stim. Davy was mesmerized and watched the whole 20 minutes.

It was so fun we bought out own dominoes kit to play with. We lucked into a wooden HAPE set which is 50% off right now and comes lots of fun pieces like a set of stairs and whirligigs.

Davy doesn’t have the patience for anything elaborate, but we have had fun making short lines and its great for hand eye coordination, gentle touch, and patience. Seriously, this is the best $20 I’ve spent in months.

Faces are just lines.

It’s pretty amazing isn’t it?

If you stop to look at an illustrated face (particularly a stylized one like those below) each of the individual lines are actually pretty simple.

It’s the way they’re all arranged that give the faces expression and character.

A few weeks ago I woke up and started writing a children's book. Just typing lines into my Notes app. We read picture books all the time so perhaps this was inevitable. 😂

I've decided to tackle my fear of drawing faces to see if I could perhaps illustrate it too.

I pulled down a stack of children’s books off our shelf and copying faces in lots of different styles. (See above.)

I obviously wouldn’t copy these in my own work, but I did this to study the lines used and see if I “could” draw stylized faces. For a first go I think I’ve done pretty well so now it’s down to practicing and developing my own style.

I started two courses for drawing people by Bardot Brush (it’s free!) and Lila Rogers (which I caught on half price.) They are both great at breaking the face down and make it all feel do-able.

Then I had another go using a minimalist approach with dots for eyes and simple mouths.

Then I added skin tones and white to the eyes.

This wasn’t an assignment, just me playing. I noticed a lot of Davy’s books illustrated the white of eyes in this way, which is very different than outlining.

I’m still not sure if I will end up illustrating this book, but it’s fun to learn something new.

It’s hard to let yourself be a beginner sometimes, but we always have the capacity to learn something new if we can keep our ego out of the way.

Sourdough Starter

Davy & I started two more sourdough starters (white flour and locally milled rye) right before we all caught the crud. This has happened literally every time I make a sourdough starter. Right when its getting all bubbly and magical we get sick.

But now that we won't have a constant influx of school germs I am hoping we can stay well enough to finish these off. Right now they are languishing in the back of the fridge until I can revive them.