Writer's Block: Arts v. smarts
Feb. 21st, 2010 12:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wakeiseiyo[Error: unknown template qotd]
This is an interesting question, and while I agree wholeheartedly with Naamah's answer on the subject (one does not preclude the other, etc), I also think I'd like to be the smartypants, rather than the artypants, only because quite selfishly, the most aggravating feeling in the world for me is to know that something SHOULD make intelligent sense but DOESN'T. (I'm feeling that a LOT at work right now with so many new procedures and protocols to absorb it's enough to make me curl up and sob in a corner.) I really, really, really hate that sensation of feeling dumb.
Artsy endeavors, on the other hand, are purely personal farting around for me - I don't really want my creative pursuits on display*, and the only time I actually play piano or draw or write these days is when I'm home alone with the doors locked. Even better if it's raining outside and there's hot cocoa or coffee to be had. [If I need a creative fix and can't get the house to myself, I dig out a fantasy novel from the overflowing bookshelves and lock myself in my room - someone else wrote it, so if Mom wants to know what it is, someone else's pride can handle the criticism.] And none of my art-ing is especially good by any standard, but it's all engaging and amusing and scratches a particular itch that needs scratching now and then; of course, I wholeheartedly accept that I'm a pretty average schmuck whose strengths are largely clerical and job-related organization at this point. I mean really, my latest pet project is getting caught up on my filing at home. Ah, the joy of chronologically sorted, easily-accessible bank statements. I spent 4 hours yesterday working on my office/craft room; I can actually access most of it, now, save for a stockpile of absolutely ancient floppy disks, etc (from when it was Dad's office) that really need to either be run past an electromagnet or their contents copied to disk somewhere, and that's going to be a week-long undertaking at the least. I suspect 80% of them will be discard-able, but some of them contain the PageMaker layouts and content from the old Family Reports he did for all the extended cousins, etc and I'd like to consolidate those, perhaps to PDF and burn to disc(s) for posterity. Which will be another nerd-tastic project. Go figure.
* One sticking point in the argument for breaking up several relationships ago was that he resented the fact I wouldn't share my writing. It's not for sharing, dammit. It's for ME. That's why it's locked up on my hard drive and not out on fanfiction.net!
This is an interesting question, and while I agree wholeheartedly with Naamah's answer on the subject (one does not preclude the other, etc), I also think I'd like to be the smartypants, rather than the artypants, only because quite selfishly, the most aggravating feeling in the world for me is to know that something SHOULD make intelligent sense but DOESN'T. (I'm feeling that a LOT at work right now with so many new procedures and protocols to absorb it's enough to make me curl up and sob in a corner.) I really, really, really hate that sensation of feeling dumb.
Artsy endeavors, on the other hand, are purely personal farting around for me - I don't really want my creative pursuits on display*, and the only time I actually play piano or draw or write these days is when I'm home alone with the doors locked. Even better if it's raining outside and there's hot cocoa or coffee to be had. [If I need a creative fix and can't get the house to myself, I dig out a fantasy novel from the overflowing bookshelves and lock myself in my room - someone else wrote it, so if Mom wants to know what it is, someone else's pride can handle the criticism.] And none of my art-ing is especially good by any standard, but it's all engaging and amusing and scratches a particular itch that needs scratching now and then; of course, I wholeheartedly accept that I'm a pretty average schmuck whose strengths are largely clerical and job-related organization at this point. I mean really, my latest pet project is getting caught up on my filing at home. Ah, the joy of chronologically sorted, easily-accessible bank statements. I spent 4 hours yesterday working on my office/craft room; I can actually access most of it, now, save for a stockpile of absolutely ancient floppy disks, etc (from when it was Dad's office) that really need to either be run past an electromagnet or their contents copied to disk somewhere, and that's going to be a week-long undertaking at the least. I suspect 80% of them will be discard-able, but some of them contain the PageMaker layouts and content from the old Family Reports he did for all the extended cousins, etc and I'd like to consolidate those, perhaps to PDF and burn to disc(s) for posterity. Which will be another nerd-tastic project. Go figure.
* One sticking point in the argument for breaking up several relationships ago was that he resented the fact I wouldn't share my writing. It's not for sharing, dammit. It's for ME. That's why it's locked up on my hard drive and not out on fanfiction.net!
