The Beauty of the Rough Draft

Nothing comes out perfect the first time. You must embrace the rough draft. When I started this blog in 2007 the way I wrote was directly opposite that lesson. I would agonize over every word as I typed. Fretting about getting my point across and not sounding like a complete moron. No matter how hard I tired though I never got it right the first time. There was always a second draft. Typically a lot more than that.

Ideas have to get out of your head before they can be developed. You might be temped to think, as I am, that they are in there brewing and developing. To a certain degree that is true, but they will develop faster if they are on the page. Only then can you see them for what they really are. If you are anything like me it's crap with just a few nuggets of beauty.

Now I can appreciate the rough draft. There is something appealing about ideas in their original form. A purity that fades as they are polished for outside consumption. The first draft is discovery. I begin by writing in stream of consciousness toward an idea. I write like no one will ever see it because no one will. At times it is hard. At other times it is easy. Sometimes it feels like I am just throwing ideas at the page to see what clumps together. It must come out though because if I kept it in my head until it was perfect that is exactly where it would stay.

How Would I Face Death?

We are all going to die. It is an inevitability that most of us, myself included, do not contemplate very often. The inevitable has become the immediate for my friend Gary Devin. In late December doctors found a tumor setting between the two halves of his brain. He is already exhibiting advanced signs of the disease and the average life expectancy is fourteen months for the type of tumor he has. He hugged me the other day. It was the sweetest hug I've ever gotten.

I've never faced death head on. I've always looked at it around the corner. I've lost grandparents, people I've known in passing and friends of friends but no one that would shatter me. That may be why I've never been particularly scared of it and never really questioned death. I'm not one to scream at God demanding why he took someone so early. The sun rises in the east. People die. It just is.

Whatever trepidation I did have vanished when I became a Christian. Would that hold in the face of a terminal diagnosis? I like to think so, but I imagine I'd spend at least a few days under my desk in the fetal position gently rocking while I mumble no over and over again. Why though? I believe I am beyond time. That our souls existed before we entered this plane of existence and will exist after we leave it. So why be scared to walk through a door? Maybe because it is the ultimate unknown and the unknown scares us.

So I do not question the reason or timing of our deaths. I am more interested in how we live our lives in the face of our inevitable demise. I am not going to turn this blog into a live life to the fullest kind of thing though. I've already talked about that idea here.

All I'm saying is not to be scared. Death is only a door.

If you need me I'll be under my desk.  

Create vs Creative

Last week I said writing was the easiest thing for me to do in order to get my creative fix. I worded that wrong. It is the easiest thing to do to fulfill my very human desire to create. I use my creativity all the time in Architecture to solve problems, but I don't get to create much.

You can be creative in any number of contexts. Creativity doesn't have to be about the arts. The stay at home mom that figures out a better way to organize her diaper changing table so she can change her squirmy little boy as fast as possible is being creative. The structural engineer that designs a structure to hold up the artsy Architects weird design is being creative. To design a better mousetrap you have to be creative. It doesn't have to be about writing the great American novel.

When the Bible says we were created in God's image it is not talking about our physical form. Free will and our ability to create are what make us similar to God. That is why creating is one of our fundamental needs. To create is to reach down deep into yourself and pull something out. To bring form to the void. To make something from nothing. To fill the blank page or change the pile of wood into a cabinet. The act of creating reaches down into a fundamental part of ourselves and we need to express that in some form. Writing works me. What does for you?

What Would a Kick-Ass 2012 Look Like?

2011 was a really tough year for me and my family. My son Grayson changed from a stationary bundle of cuteness into a roving force of chaos. Adjusting to a mobile one year old boy consumed a lot of mental and physical energy. My daughter Mackenzie turned five and we decided she was not ready for kindergarten. In my opinion this was our first major parental decision, and it was a hard one. She still had to deal with a big adjustment in that we switched her preschool to where she will go to kindergarten next year. I went back to work after being laid off for seven months. As it always is they hired me three months after I was needed so the summer was a lot of hours at the office which is hard on all of us. Things are good though and I really have no complaints.

Another big thing that happened in 2011 was that I started listening to the Nerdist Podcast. This is significant because it reminded me that I am a creative person and in order to be mentally healthy I have to express that in some form. The Podcast also introduced me to another world of great and creative people on twitter.

So coming off a very challenging year and being inspired I really want to make 2012 a kick-ass year. There are a million things I'd like to improve in my life, but flossing more regularly and organizing my music don't necessarily make an awesome year. So what does a kick-ass 2012 look like for me?

Architecture

I've been working in architecture since 1998. While I could have been a licensed Architect years ago I never really felt I knew enough until the past couple of years. I won't be able to complete the licensing process this year because I just don't think I can get through all seven tests in one year. I am going to knock out four of them though. The one I failed last year and three new ones.

Writing

I think deep down I am a creative Renaissance man. I can see myself doing wood working, sculpting, writing and music at some point in the future. At this point in my life though the easiest thing to get my creative fix is to write. I've really come to enjoy writing even if what I write sucks at the end. At the very least I always enjoy typing words. I am going to focus my writing on this blog and put out a lot more content this year. That alone would be good but not kick-ass. So I am going to tackle some of the hard topics I have always meant to. Like the common misconceptions about Christianity and where my views fit on the political spectrum.

Fitness

If you saw me on the street you would not consider me overweight, but I am thirty pounds heavier than I want to be. So it would fantastic if I could drop those pounds and be fit enough to ride The Dam Loop. For those outside the Austin cycling community the Dam Loop is a 50 mile cycling route that goes by the dam that forms Lake Travis.

Travel

There are two vacations I have in my head and it would be awesome if we could take either one. The first is to visit my friend Tammy in Guatemala. She's there with her husband and family doing missionary work for the church. The second is to go out to Los Angeles. I have a couple friend's there and so much I want to do. Like go to the Wednesday night Meltdown show with one of the hosts of the Nerdist Podcast. See a show at the Disney Concert Hall which was designed by Frank Ghery. There is more to this goal than just taking a vacation though. We'll need a lot of money for either of these trips and that goes into a 2012 goal that I'm not going to discuss on the blog!

The Truck

A couple years ago my dad gave me the Dodge pick-up truck we drove when we moved from Potsdam, NY to Merkel, TX in 1981. I will fully restore it at some point. I know I wont' be able to do it all this year but I am going to do something on it. Just one thing. What is implied in this goal is cleaning the garage. The truck is buried in junk right now and it's going to take a bit to get where I can work on it.