Day 8

I read somewhere that it takes 66 days to form a new habit. In the interest of getting into the habit of blogging regularly, I plan to publish one post a day for the next 66 days, finishing up on October 13, 2020. Content-wise, each day's post can include anything that crosses my mind and that I hope will spark something in yours, whether poetry, prose, art, or the occasional rant. Here's to 66 days of finding something to say :)

For Day 8, I'm switching things up from writing to art, specifically calligraphy. 

 

By way of introduction,I recently bought a set of calligraphy markers in all colors (a welcome change from the black ones I had before!) and I've been looking for any excuse to use them. And by way of yet more introduction, one of my all-time favorite artists is Ryan O'Neal, popularly known as Sleeping at Last. The ethereal beauty of his instrumentation, the poetry in his lyrics, the sheer perfection that is his Enneagram EP--I may be slightly obsessed. And as a pianist, it's SO validating to hear the piano being used prominently (or even exclusively!) in much of his instrumentation. (Seriously, anyone who relegates the piano to the role of sad-sidekick-filling-in-background-chords or--heaven forbid--PERCUSSION ONLY should have all their pianos forcibly removed and replaced with lil' 10-key melodicas instead since that's all they need. Oh, and charged with crimes against humanity because honestly, the audacity.)

Ok, coming off of that impassioned tangent; it turns out that my moving to an apartment for law school this past week led to the perfect excuse a great reason to make some calligraphy to decorate my space with. And of course, what better to feature in my work than Sleeping at Last lyrics? I got a little carried away and made more than I could use for display, but thankfully, my little corner of the internet is bound by no such limits of space and/or taste. (And tbh I feel *slightly* apologetic about the caffeine-fueled disaster of a poem that was last night's post, so here's trying to make it up to y'all.)

Phew, introductions are finally out of the way. Now onto the main shindig:

First, my enneagram type song. Proud 5w4 here.

 

The first of two attempts at the song "Taste". I didn't end up using this one, but I like the two-color styling and will definitely be trying it again in future.

So the three above are the ones I ended up framing and displaying. I think they work well together since all three songs deal with life, from the living of the present moment to the end of a life well-lived to the transience of life as a whole. The three different starting pronouns (I, you, we) also add a nice touch, I think. One of those little details that contributes a sense of completeness to the three songs as a unit. A final, minor consideration was that my room decor ended up being mostly blue and purple, so these three fit right in with everything else.

Finally, one more that I didn't end up using (but loved the results of), and three salty short quips that I wrote out just for fun. They do make great reaction-images when you need to shut down a mind-numbing discussion in any unfortunate group chat you may be part of. You're welcome in advance.

I love the connecting letters here. And I want to sing this song to my first-born child someday--definitely give it a listen. #sentiment

  

"all due respect" = could be none. Ya never know.

Me @ every political conversation this election season #2020 #everyonedeservestolose #makepoliticsirrelevantagain

 

I do intend to use this one sparingly, but sometimes ya just gotta do what ya gotta do.

And there you have it, folks. I hope this post had as much entertainment value for y'all reading it as it did for me writing it.

My space is classy and decorated and color-coordinated for the cheap cheap price of almost no money (I did have to spend ~$5 on frames, but I got the cheapo plastic kind). If you've ever wanted to get into calligraphy but doubted your abilities, consider this a sign to get started. I learned exclusively from how-to books on hand-lettering and from copying fonts and labels that I thought looked cool. Pretty sure my technique is way off (which might explain why I have so much trouble making the letters evenly sized and spaced), but calligraphy is so fun and therapeutic and requires little equipment for big results. Try it out and you won't regret it. 

 

 

Till tomorrow,

Clara