My first unfettered day of summer took me to a new coffee shop in my neighborhood. It's was peppered w duos of women post-yoga class, mothers chatting about their summer plans with and without their kids, a few office dwellers in their summer suits working on laptops, and this girl sitting across from me. She was working very carefully in a plain notebook, drawing frames & arrows to and around thoughts, and making certain words dark and bold with her fine line pen. (Yes, I was staring...but it was reeaallly close quarters :) It may seem irrelevant to most people, but to me...her intensity & focus on not only her writing, but on the act of putting it down on a piece of paper...made me so happy I had to catch a shot of her. She spun the book as needed to get just the right angle for each line, it was great. Putting her words down on paper was obviously a crucial part of her creative process. It was facinating to watch & made me think about my own. We all have a process that we need to go thru when creating, but with the influence of technology, sometimes the simplicity of it gets blurred & cocked up with mindless surfing and distractions. I think, or rather know this is why I always carry a journal so I can write or draw ideas at any given time. It gives them permanence, shape, form & a little more ooomph. They are tangible, they exist and they breathe a little deeper by being birthed from the co-mingling of pen and paper...au natural as neither are reliant on a power source. I hope I run into her again & get a glimpse at her next entry...and maybe get her autograph ahead of time.
