Thursday, August 15, 2013

Words Are Harder Than Images

This past weekend, I went to see an artist I admire greatly perform. It was a spur-of-the-moment, oh-shit-this-is-happening-tonight?! sort of decision and I rushed through my evening parental duties and drove across the city and sat in the backroom of a bar and listened.

The music this artist creates, the sound poems or stories or the intricate weaving of noises, are meditative. Someone once told me that it's "not the most accessible" music, and I was very quietly surprised. It's not what you hear on the radio, any radio, no matter how indie, but I find it instantly accessible because of that meditative quality. The sound wraps you up and engages the attention-paying parts of your brain; I sink into it like a sensory deprivation tank, and suddenly images come into the other parts of my brain, unbidden, uncontrollable. I find the music instantly accessible in ways that most of what I hear is not.

What happened when I sat in the back of that bar with 30 or so other people paying rapt attention was this:

I had a conversation in my head with this artist that I admire greatly. And he asked me why I hadn't been writing.

And, in my head, I said to him, "I've been taking a lot of pictures lately, I've been focusing on that, I guess."

And, in my head, he looked at me quizzically, expectantly. "But you're better with words than images," he said to me in my head.

And without thinking about it, in my head, I made this confession to him:

"Words are harder than images. I've been too lazy for words."

So here I am. Pushing past the laziness. Telling stories in words.

1 comment:

  1. I hope you keep writing. Good/great writing "sounds" good and imho you have the "ear" that it takes.

    If this is helpful, great, if not, sorry for wasting your time. With primaries coming up, lots of people running (or considering it) will want to issue press releases, or otherwise need writing/editing skills. Unfortunately, few will be able to compensate you fairly in cash. They'll probably want to you to write "begging letters," and get involved in fundraising/public relations/advertising/media/messaging....

    If not enough money comes in from the begging letter, (and it's never enough) it's the fault of the author of the begging letter. Some may have something to barter. If you catch a few breaks, however, maybe you get hired by someone running in the general, when you won't be underpaid quite as badly.

    Jane Hamsher had hopes that less expensive internet advertising would compete with more expensive direct mail. As I understand it, internet ads can be targeted by zip code (not sure if that includes the four-digit extension).

    As you probably know, writing a quality press release has its own set of very specific rules.

    http://my.firedoglake.com/johnwob/2012/05/30/occupy-supply-skill-share-how-to-write-a-press-release/

    With paywalls springing up over the innertubes, there may be more of a market for your writing/editing skills at places such as Blogging Blue, Cog_Dis,....

    ReplyDelete