Category: creativity
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records worth returning to
I’ve been playing Death Cab For Cutie’s Asphalt Meadows on repeat since it came out last fall. The fact the band released an acoustic version of the entire record has helped reinforce some of the songs in my consciousness, but more than anything, I’ve been struck how this record feels…
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run the other direction
One of my favorite things about My Chemical Romance: they established their look early. They found what they were doing and branded it: black suits, red ties, peacoats, pinstripes. It was dark. It was edgy. It was cool…at least, thirteen year old me thought so. Flashforward five years and a…
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“do your early stuff”
I’ve been writing stories since I was a little kid. It’s a popular myth in my family that at six-years-old, after seeing a behind-the-scenes special about James Cameron, I decided to make my own version of Titanic. I made storyboards, asked my dad to be the camera man, and shot…
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when I think about my death
I’ve always wanted to die on a morning in June. I’ll lay in a comfortable bed, facing a window. Outside, the sun will dapple leaves with shades of green and gold. And I’ll smile and say a prayer of gratitude for the life I got to live, the people I…
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fascination with adaptation
I’m currently enraptured listening to Andy Serkis narrate JRR Tolkien’s The Fellowship of The Ring. It’s my first time through The Lord of The Rings and also my first foray into audiobooks. While my thoughts on the act of listening to a book is a separate blog post, the biggest…
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juxtaposition
I don’t write here nearly as often as I used to. There for a while, I had a solid little streak going. But these days, I find myself lately in a creative rut. Despite hacking my way through a novel and putting finishing touches on a screenplay , I’m often…
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Ben Gibbard on taste and identity
In his recent appearance on the podcast, Broken Record, Ben Gibbard spoke with Justin Richmond about a variety of subjects: writing the Postal Service’s Give Up and Death Cab for Cutie’s Transatlanticism, the best iteration of a song not necessarily being the recorded version, and breaking down other people’s music…
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on being your own archivist
Some part of me is deluded enough to think people will care when I’m gone. They’ll riffle through my desk drawers and file cabinets and papers and books. They’ll wonder how I spent my days and pore over my mad scribblings and doodles and insane notes in an attempt to…
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lessons learned from houseplants
Early in the pandemic, I started collecting plants in my living room. Surrounding myself with green things helped provide peace of mind during a period of so much upheaval and tumult. Here was something I could control, something I could care for. All I needed was a little potting soil…
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cut your teeth
Malcolm Gladwell’s Principle of 10,000 hours is well documented, but for those of you who aren’t familiar, the idea goes like this: achieving mastery of a specific skill require an estimated ten-thousand hours of practice. Backed by research studies and social experiments, Gladwell asserts that “ten thousand hours is the…
joshua chamberlain 