Ruby Silvious paints watercolors on used tea bags. Art is everywhere and anything is a canvas. Czech out her Instagram for regular updates.
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Here’s to a bright New Year and a fond farewell to the old; here’s to the things that are yet to come, and to the memories that we hold ...
May the New Year bless you with health, wealth, and happiness 🥳
NEW YEAR’S EVE NEWS YOU CAN USE: In Pics!
I’ve shared this observation from Ira Glass about the gap between having good taste and doing good creative work before, but I ran across it the other day and thought it was worth highlighting again. Here’s a partial transcript (courtesy of James Clear):
Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, and I really wish somebody had told this to me.
All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But it’s like there is this gap. For the first couple years that you’re making stuff, what you’re making isn’t so good. It’s not that great. It’s trying to be good, it has ambition to be good, but it’s not that good.
But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is good enough that you can tell that what you’re making is kind of a disappointment to you. A lot of people never get past that phase. They quit.
Everybody I know who does interesting, creative work they went through years where they had really good taste and they could tell that what they were making wasn’t as good as they wanted it to be. They knew it fell short. Everybody goes through that.
And if you are just starting out or if you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Do a huge volume of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week or every month you know you’re going to finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you’re going to catch up and close that gap. And the work you’re making will be as good as your ambitions.
The full interview from which the video above is excerpted can be found here. Notably, Glass’s advice matches that of this parable from Art & Fear.
Twenty-Twenty
I will not wish my life away,
But Twenty-Twenty I can say,
Was the worst I can recall,
Not just for me, but for us all.
Who would have thought something unseen,
Could stalk the world, like Covid Nineteen?
A million dead. How many more?
Loyal employees shown the door.
Seeking the old, both rich and poor.
The White House and the girl next door.
Mighty airlines brought to their knees.
Thousands of cruisers no longer at sea.
Quarantine haunting those who might meet,
No social gatherings in the street,
Theatres and concerts in despair,
Football matches in empty air.
Hospitals, nursing homes, isolation,
Families in desolation.
Millions left bereft in mourning,
Looking to the New Year dawning.
My New Year wish for everyone,
Is that Twenty-Twenty-One,
Will earn its place in history,
As the year of the Vaccine Victory.
Happy New Year.
Irish Book Reviews Dublin Review of Books. Anthony L was disappointed that no one was interested in a fine article on nihilism yesterday. Maybe the one-word title was too spare.
Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, The flying cloud, the frosty light: The year is dying in the night; Ring out, wild bells, and let him die. Ring out the old, ring in the new, Ring, happy bells, across the snow: The year is going, let him go; Ring out the false, ring in the true. Ring out the grief that saps the mind For those that here we see no more; Ring out the feud of rich and poor, Ring in redress to all mankind. Ring out a slowly dying cause, And ancient forms of party strife; Ring in the nobler modes of life, With sweeter manners, purer laws. Ring out the want, the care, the sin, The faithless coldness of the times; Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes But ring the fuller minstrel in. Ring out false pride in place and blood, The civic slander and the spite; Ring in the love of truth and right, Ring in the common love of good. Ring out old shapes of foul disease; Ring out the narrowing lust of gold; Ring out the thousand wars of old, Ring in the thousand years of peace. Ring in the valiant man and free, The larger heart, the kindlier hand; Ring out the darkness of the land, Ring in the Christ that is to be.