9 Comments

Hi Tammy, congrats on reaching this century of days, I have enjoyed reading your curations. All the very best with your next project during the year about to be born. Peace, M.aurice

Expand full comment
author

Thank you! I am so happy you were here along the way! I love to read about your reading and books too.

Expand full comment

Well Tammy, Although I don't get involved with a lot of writers I read, other than on Notes, I recognize good stuff .... Apropos, did you know the Arabic word for "good" is "tammam."..... Peace, Maurice

Expand full comment
author

Awww! Thank you ! And you taught me a new word! Love it!

Expand full comment

Sits you tho.... Tammamy, lol !!

Expand full comment

"I DID IT MY WAY"

An 'accidental' art memory.

I've just recently entered double digits as far as age goes, and I'm on a school field trip in a pine forest in South Africa in the 80s. The smell of pine resin is strong. It's a wonderful smell that makes me think of all things yellow and sunny. I'm sneezing a lot, but I don't mind. The crunch of pine needles underfoot and the occasional thunk of a pine cone falling to the ground are the only sounds of nature we can hear.

Our task is to fill a small glass bottle with layers of colorful sand. It's a competition to see who can make the prettiest bottle of wavy sand. I knock my bottle over during one of my sneezing fits and am about to throw it away when I notice something amazing. The wavy horizontal lines I created up to the halfway mark are now vertical. It's like magic! I decide to go with the flow, tilting my bottle this way and that until I'd filled it to the brim. I screwed the lid on tight and wrote my name as neatly as possible. Nobody else figured out how to make their lines go vertical like mine. I won the challenge.

Now, the exhilaration I felt in creating a unique piece of art wasn't because I won the challenge, but because I was open to making mistakes and letting the accident influence the art. I made a mistake that I thought was going to ruin the art I was trying to make. But that beautiful mistake showed me that I could make art in my own way. I could enjoy the process of making art as much as the finished product.

That one powerful memory is the core of what I believe art is about for me: the process of creation is as important as the product created, however ephemeral or permanent it may be. I am endlessly fascinated by how artists make their art, how writers write their writings, how composers and choreographers compose and choreograph their work.

Expand full comment

Agreed Quentin, without mistakes there is little or no progress. Peace, Bro, Maurice

Expand full comment

Thanks, Maurice! Peace to you. May 2024 be filled with mistakes and progress. :-)

Expand full comment