elbow room
in which my comic diary takes charge
Yesterday, I sewed four new signatures onto my comic diary. Not exactly earth shattering — and yet for me a ridiculously big deal.
Always before as I’ve neared the end of a book I’ve begun to plan the next. What paper? What size? Should it be bigger? Smaller? What do I have on hand? What about the cover — hard? soft? front? back? no cover at all? Will I be traveling—shoving it in bags to be pulled out at odd moments—or will it sit on my drawing table for most of its existence.
Not that actually constructing each book isn’t a delight— because it is. Folding and tearing, piling and poking, waxing the the thread and stitching creamy paper— I mean yum.1 The first drawing though, is a different story— a bit nerve-wracking, like a date with someone vaguely familiar, someone you think you will like even as you fear a mismatch in conversational style.
And even if it’s love at first drawing, a familiar size with familiar paper, there is still a learning curve. In switching from landscape to portrait format I fret about finding a way to move through time, indicate travel or a long backstop warp. And going the other way, from portrait to landscape, I have to watch that I don’t cut off the tops of my tapestry looms or endlessly draw myself sitting or lying down so I can “fit in.” Cross-legged me can only appear so often or my knees hurt. And honestly, I don’t spend that much time in the sauna.
When Dan was first diagnosed, I abruptly started making very small books — in the range of 2” or 2.5” x 3”. At the time it made sense because I wanted to be sure I could easily bring a drawing kit with me for all the hours in waiting rooms, hospital recovery and such, and it turned out out to be a sensible choice.
Small pages are not too demanding, and there were days when low expectations were a really great idea —one tiny drawing an enormous accomplishment—the mere existence of lines and colors an indication that I was still coping, even if the drawing itself indicated otherwise.
In retrospect, it also seems that perhaps I was hoping the life-shattering thing that had scooped us out of our quiet creative days might somehow be made manageable if tucked tightly into a tiny format. Either way though, I learned a lot from the eensy books —how much can I say with a few lines and shapes? And given a choice of moments, would I draw the hard thing, or the moment of pleasure?
It pleases me now that often as not I noticed and chose the latter.
Recently though, the books have been growing — each slightly larger than the last— the one I’m working in now an almost overwhelming 6” x 4.5”. Even three months in it feels like an enormous amount of space— practically a waste of paper after the efficiency of the tiny ones. Do I really need to fill the pages? Do I want to? How much detail can my style even handle? How much actual storytelling am I up for? Sometimes it feels a little bossy.
Indeed on February 1, Hourly Comics Day (which is just what it sounds like: a designated day on which cartoonists around the globe draw a comic every hour they are awake), I felt kind of smug when I managed to fit several hours onto each page. Like I’d pulled one over on the white space. But then I wondered why. What was I proving by being small and efficient? And isn't the white space restful for eye and brain? Over the day, then, I challenged myself to expand—to “waste” more paper and leave a little elbow room for surprises.
Low impact as I try to be in most things, perhaps there was space on these pages to spread out just a little more— no need, now, to squeeze ideas and days—or myself— into as small and simple a shorthand as possible. Truly, here was a chance not only to reassure myself that I’m capable of staying on top of things and bliss out with a hot fire, a loom, and the Great British Baking Show.
By the end of the day, indeed, I began to feel that it might be ok — even delicious—to fill an entire page with my goofy evening self having one last twirl of the spindle before bed.
Because honestly, isn't that the point of this-- drawing not so much as a reminder to my future self (who is apparently a very judgmental creature), of how well I'm coping, how industrious or practical or sensible or hard working I have been. Nothing wrong with the odd internal pat on the back for paying bills or scrubbing the toilet, but when I actually think about it, I'd much rather revel for as long as possible in the inadvertent joyous, the ridiculous, and the bliss, as Katherine May talks about in her wonderful new book,2 of being unexpectedly enchanted in the moment.
And lo and behold, it turns out you don’t just have to choose one emotion for the day. It turns out, indeed, that there is room to simultaneously delight in my utter engagement, laugh at my feeble attempts to capture the magic of light with a phone, remind myself to sink into that light and this bowl and the glowing strands of milkweed cordage for their own sakes, and all the while prolong—and even enhance—all that pleasure by giving it over to pencil, ink and paint.
It’s not fancy, or nicely erased, or anatomically correct (and my foreshortening leaves much to be desired), but a bit like noticing my Wild Twin in her sieve last week, I can always use an in-the-moment reminder that it’s being here that counts—for the noticing, the feeling and the drawing, for staying in the mystery and magic of an unexpected ordinary moment on a dead tree in a scruffy park on a bitter March morning for as long as possible
Or, indeed, the minute or five while my coffee grows cold on a pile of books beside my unmade bed in a corner of the studio.
Contradictions, it turns out, are my favorite.
Because even as it takes a crazy amount of practice for me to get into shape to notice it, ordinary delight keeps showing up—be it the shaft of light, a blast of color, or an absurd second when I’m grumpy and buoyant at the same time—and somehow the very ordinariness makes each even more worth a few lines of ink, a dab of color and a bit of attention, the actual doing potentially transforming the enormous weirdness of life the universe and everything into a knowable bit of the every day.
All of which is to say —back here in practical land —that when I realized it was time for a new diary and I only had enough paper for four signatures and didn't want to take the puppy I was looking after to the store—and then found a solution— it felt simultaneously like a ridiculously big deal and the most obvious solution ever.
So I stitched those those twenty folios onto the end of book #34 (which happily did not have a back cover) and now it is tall and wide, and over two inches thick and by my side even as a type, many miles from home. This book and I do not have the same conversational style, and I’m not sure we ever will, but there are still things it has to teach me and I’m glad to have a little bit longer for our chat.
My chat with you, however, will have to continue next week as I have gone on quite enough today and once again Substack is telling me that this post is too long for email and I much appreciate you clicking your way to the end. Next time, for sure, I’ll go for brevity. Ha!
For more on the particulars, feel free to check out some old blog posts which go into lots of detail Manipulated by Paper, The Perfect Paper, and Library of Days are just a few.
Here is as link to a post in Katherine's Substack where she talks about this marvelous book
Wonderful read and enjoyed your sketches of life.
Loving your comics. Makes me smile!!