I have a smidge of envy for those people who doodle. You know the ones. They doodle while they’re on the phone or on their napkin at a restaurant. They doodle in the margins of their class notes when the lecture is dry.
They’re no great artists, that’s not really the endeavor here. It’s more about expending extra energy, I’d say. It comes out in spirals and squiggles. In flowers, cross hatching, vines, stick figures and googly eyes. So, in the end, you get this collage of arbitrary images that mean very little. But they’re kinda pretty.
I was never a doodler. Despite my heavy investment in the education of arts, and my competent endeavors in the fine arts production since I was in high school, Art, was never really a calling. I have a great love for it and can’t possibly bear to be parted from the subject for too long, but not so much as a participant. I like bearing witness more. My form of inexhaustible expression was always in words. I've fulfilled all the clichés about writing on napkins and on the back of a business card. I've done the pulling over while I'm driving and the turning on the laptop at 4 am. Words are my vice. And as much as I do have a certain aesthetic appreciation for how they are formed, be they in terms of format, composition, or even visually (beautiful writing sends me!) They are not really the stuff of decoration.
I’ll admit, now, that I have been known to do some writing in the margins of my lecture notes. Usually it involves commentary on the information being noted. Usually it means there’s something there I'm not buying. I make sarcastic remarks or blatant contradictions. I even go so far as to comment on the lecturer’s level of quack-hood depending on how much my patience has been tested and how soon I've discarded his or her credibility.
Or I can be particularly swept away by the information and make notes to follow up on this or the other, or I put little exclamation points near something that I find fascinating or lovely. But doodles? No, I've never been a doodler.
I've actually tried to doodle. I try to think of something pretty to draw. Or I approach it like my writing and just put something down, in the hopes that it will take on a life of its own and take me somewhere. Usually I just end up with a few wavy lines and some spirals for lack of inspiration. Nothing there.
That’s why this week’s image had me intrigued. What caught my attention was the drawing. Clearly, a doodle gone steroidal. But the instant I saw the writing on the same page, the tree lost all hopes of keeping my attention. I pressed my nose up against the monitor in the vain hope of reading whatever is there. It irks me to no end to not be able to decipher it. I want to know.
For me, words will always win.
They’re no great artists, that’s not really the endeavor here. It’s more about expending extra energy, I’d say. It comes out in spirals and squiggles. In flowers, cross hatching, vines, stick figures and googly eyes. So, in the end, you get this collage of arbitrary images that mean very little. But they’re kinda pretty.
I was never a doodler. Despite my heavy investment in the education of arts, and my competent endeavors in the fine arts production since I was in high school, Art, was never really a calling. I have a great love for it and can’t possibly bear to be parted from the subject for too long, but not so much as a participant. I like bearing witness more. My form of inexhaustible expression was always in words. I've fulfilled all the clichés about writing on napkins and on the back of a business card. I've done the pulling over while I'm driving and the turning on the laptop at 4 am. Words are my vice. And as much as I do have a certain aesthetic appreciation for how they are formed, be they in terms of format, composition, or even visually (beautiful writing sends me!) They are not really the stuff of decoration.
I’ll admit, now, that I have been known to do some writing in the margins of my lecture notes. Usually it involves commentary on the information being noted. Usually it means there’s something there I'm not buying. I make sarcastic remarks or blatant contradictions. I even go so far as to comment on the lecturer’s level of quack-hood depending on how much my patience has been tested and how soon I've discarded his or her credibility.
Or I can be particularly swept away by the information and make notes to follow up on this or the other, or I put little exclamation points near something that I find fascinating or lovely. But doodles? No, I've never been a doodler.
I've actually tried to doodle. I try to think of something pretty to draw. Or I approach it like my writing and just put something down, in the hopes that it will take on a life of its own and take me somewhere. Usually I just end up with a few wavy lines and some spirals for lack of inspiration. Nothing there.
That’s why this week’s image had me intrigued. What caught my attention was the drawing. Clearly, a doodle gone steroidal. But the instant I saw the writing on the same page, the tree lost all hopes of keeping my attention. I pressed my nose up against the monitor in the vain hope of reading whatever is there. It irks me to no end to not be able to decipher it. I want to know.
For me, words will always win.
Hi Geek,
ReplyDeleteI'm an incorrigible doodler, some of it's scribble, some of it is drawing. Grass and flowers get drawn a lot, or animals like dogs (collies and goldens) or giraffes or elephants or somesuch. A lot is just, well, it's hard to describe, sort of a maze-like design of arcs that intersect each other.
It can be especially so at work; I filled an entire 8x11 page with maze-work at a meeting where I didn't need to take notes. The down side is people think I'm not paying attention, unless I can prove otherwise. And maybe not even then. And it's hardest during phone interviews where you have to be so locked into what the other person is saying so you don't miss something. At times like those I will actually make sure the pen is out of my hands unless I am writing a note.
That tree is way more than a doodle on steroids, that tree is DRAWN.
How wonderful to hear from a doodler! See? As you describe your tiny masterpieces, I can practically visualize them. I'm always fascinated by what it is that moves your hands. And it had never occurred to me to assume any doodler wasn't paying attention. I have no doubt that, if anything, it helps from distracting, contradictory though it may seem.
ReplyDeleteYes, that tree is most certainly drawn and not doodled. I just used it for the subject that it sparked in me.