💜(10/24) the creativity for good friday five

1. In a Time of Mourning, Grief Stories Are a Lifeline (s.e. smith, originally in Catapult, reprinted for The Flytrap)

I’ve written thousands of words about grief over the past five years — up to and including Rules for Ghosing, to be honest — but it’s one of the topics that I think I could keep both writing and reading about every day for the rest of my life. I don’t say this to be depressing. Grief writing, for me, is a way of making memory into something tangible. It’s inherently connective in a way that so many other topics aren’t, because everyone, everywhere, knows what it means to grieve. This line from s.e. smith particularly stood out to me:

Grief connects us, impossibly yet irrevocably, to everyone who has ever lived, no matter how different their lives, their beliefs, their values. It’s helpful, sometimes, to remember that.

2. How Artists Are Keeping ‘The Lost Art’ of Neon Signs Alive (Jason Koebler for 404 Media)

As a creative, one of my absolute favorite things is learning about other creatives’ crafts — especially the ones I have absolutely no understanding of. Neon work is one of those arts that is so incredibly cool and so incredibly confusing to me, and this mini-documentary going into how it works and why people still do it is so worth watching. BRB, acquiring more neon signs for my office immediately.

3. The CDC Diaspora Fights Back (Jonathan Cohn for The Bulwark)

As a chronically ill person, the attacks on public health are some of the scariest things to come out of this clusterfuck of an administration. But what gives me hope right now is the sheer force of will that health care professionals and researchers are bringing to the work of keeping us safe, however they can. Creation, creativity, isn’t just about making art — it’s also about creating communities, creating networks, creating ripple effects that can, and quite often literally do, save lives.

Mr. Rogers told us to look for the helpers — well, my loves, there they are.

4. A Possible Future is Here (Jared Yates Sexton for Dispatches from a Collapsing State)

DON’T PANIC AT THE TITLE, I SWEAR THERE IS OPTIMISM HERE.

Or if there’s not necessarily optimism, there is, at least, hope. What I appreciate about Sexton’s writing is that he doesn’t sugarcoat reality, but he also insists, persistently, on a refusal to let things simply happen. Acceptance of what reality looks like in this moment, he reminds us, is not acceptance of the path we’re going down, or a decision to do nothing in response. Rather, he reminds us:

Conscious awareness is not the same inaction. We have agency here, no matter how much That Guy And His Fascist Buddies want us to believe otherwise. We can take action, however small. We can do something to make a difference.

5. Sewing as a Way to Shape the Future—and Survive the Present (Maddie Ballard for Literary Hub)

When I was ten, I took a sewing class at my local community center. Over the course of a few weeks, I learned the basics — using a sewing machine, understanding the structure of a pattern, introductory alterations, etc. Our “final project,” so to speak, was to make a garment from scratch. My dad had recently mentioned that his favorite old sweatshirt was starting to fray, so I decided to make him a new one.

It was the first time I’d ever made something for someone that wasn’t an elementary school art project, and I was so, so proud of myself when I was done. My dad was delighted. And that sweatshirt held up — fifteen years later, he still wears it.

Ballard’s article talks about her experience learning to sew during the early days of the pandemic, and how the skills she learned, and the way her identity shifted, still impacts her today. But this is what stood out to me the most:

I haven’t sewn anything in years — I don’t know if I really even remember how to use my sewing machine. But learning a new skill, especially one that takes something from idea to reality — sewing, baking, cooking, gardening, connection, community — can take us from stagnation to action. It’s powerful, meaningful stuff.