voice and other indefinable things*

anyone who blogs or reads blogs knows about voice. it's one of those indefinable things, but you know it when you see it. or read it. it's something that evolves as you find your feet in blogging and learn to define your space and your style. for me, it's the magic thing about the genre of blog. it is what you want it to be. it's chatting and friendly if you want that. it's confiding if you want that. it's informative. it's snarky. it's really whatever you want it to be. a space to experiment and find that elusive voice.  and some voices you relate to and some you don't.

some bloggy voices lose their resonance for you and like an old boyfriend, you wonder what you ever saw in them. and some you wonder what anyone sees in them in the first place what with all those netflix reviews and the truly awful hackneyed poetry or all that overblown cutesiness, pouty mouth posing and overuse of the word rad [shudders]. of course, the beauty of the blogosphere is that you can just avoid those places and go somewhere else where you feel inspired or challenged or where you laugh or cry or think or just gaze at the pretty pictures. because the blogosphere is pretty big. bigger than the pacific ocean, i think.

but even tho' it's huge, you find lots of people out there to connect with. and you learn something from them or you enjoy how they captured exactly what you'd been thinking, but said it so much more eloquently than you could have, right when you needed to hear it. and you wish you could hang out with them. and sometimes you do. but not as often as you'd like. so every morning or late at night, you open your reader and you go see what they had to say. and that's because you like their voice.

* anybody know what the picture has to do with this post? i'll send a handmade prize to the person who comes up with what i, based entirely on subjective, personal feelings, think is the best answer. (and yes, i admit that this is a draft post that i started ages ago and i no longer remember myself what it meant. there is a chance that i just liked it, but i'd like to assign it deeper meaning than that.)

interacting with inspiration

inspiration. sometimes, when i'm around someone who is truly, thoroughly creative, i am filled with the most unbelievable sense of longing. you might think it would be envy, but it's not really, it's more of a deep longing to be so original myself. envy, as i see it, would mean that i would wish for them to be less creative and fabulous, but i definitely don't wish that.  i always wish just a bit of it would rub off on me.

but although i do a lot of different creative things, i feel like my own creativity is all derivative in some sense...a little piece of something from one place, another bit from over here, and here, all put together in some crazy mish-mash that's just echoes of the creativity i admired. i really despair that i can ever have original creative thoughts and even more, create any original works. for me it's all about homage on my part to the things that inspire.

but i'm beginning to tell that although i am often by myself when i'm making things, i have a need for interaction and collaboration. freelancing and working on my own will mean that i have to get better at finding ways of getting that input that i need from others. of course, the blogosphere is one way, but i think i need to find ways of hanging out in person on a regular basis with like-minded creative individuals.

last winter, when i joined the local art association, i thought that's what i would be getting, but that couldn't be further from the truth. it seems mostly to be a mailing list for the woman who is the chairman to send bragging emails about her own art. there must be a way, even in the at-times closed society i've chosen to live in...but what is it? more dinner parties? setting up a place where creative people come and hang out? taking courses (i'm starting weaving in january and i hope to find a bit of the interaction i crave)? what else can i do?

maybe i could just have one long, eternal blog camp?

any ideas are much appreciated.