Do y’all wanna see one of the most autistic things about me? Behold, my collection of security envelope patterns.
About two years ago, I saw a photo from a fellow memorykeeper who’d used a security envelope pattern as the cover page for a mini album (I can’t find any photos of the project to link to, sorry) and thought, What a creative idea! With the unfulfilled intention of using them in my own memorykeeping projects, I’ve been collecting security envelopes ever since.
It’s a slow-going process. I don’t receive much mail that arrives in a security envelope, and the mail that I do is mostly from the same few places, which use mostly the same few patterns. Two years in, I have only about 40 patterns in my collection.
(This number is lower if you don’t count different colors, scales, and weights of the same pattern as distinct patterns. For example, I count the three “brick” patterns in the photo below (second, third, and fifth from the right) as three distinct patterns; while the scale of each is the same, the color and weight are not. Similarly, I count the fourth pattern from the right in the photo above and the fourth pattern from the right in the photo below as two distinct patterns; while the scale and color of both are the same, the weight is not.)
Most of the envelopes in my collection are from mail I’ve received directly. Some of them are from mail other people have received and then—knowing I collect them—mailed to me. Two of them, I found on the ground while out walking.
Ever the amateur archivist, in an effort to build a record of circulation for each pattern (or to contribute to an existing one that I don’t know about), I keep track of when I receive or find each envelope and, when known, who sent it.
Slow-going as it is, the passive collecting of these envelopes has been one of my all-time favorite projects. Every time mail arrives, I’m excited to see if I’ve been blessed with a new pattern; when I am, it feels like Christmas morning.
Two years in, I have two main takeaways: (1) many of the patterns in my collection that I find most interesting are printed on envelopes sent by state or federal government entities, and (2) there is a serious and worrisome decline in the appreciation and prioritization of ephemeral art and design that is very obvious when looking through larger collections that include envelopes from earlier decades. You just don’t see branded (or colorful) patterns very often anymore. When I tell you I almost completely lost my shit when this branded Capital One security envelope arrived a few weeks ago. You would’ve thought I was an actual child on actual Christmas morning pulling a rare Pokemon card.
Despite my original intention, I’ve not yet done a damn thing with these envelopes. I do have a handful of project ideas. Before I attempt any of those ideas, I’m going to scan each deconstructed envelope.
Want to donate your security envelopes to my collection? Who am I to refuse. Please get in touch (kelseyetcetera @ gmail dot com).
This project is still going strong and also I’m looking forward to ending—or, some might say, sunsetting (heh)—it at the end of the year.
May 27, 2025, through June 30, 2025.
The sun rises about an hour and a half later these days than it did during the height of summer. Most mornings, this time doesn’t overlap with a natural stopping/breaking point in my workout. There have been more times during this stretch of photos than I’d like to admit that I’ve completely forgotten to take a photo until my workout’s over and I’m walking to my car. One morning, I’d already gotten in my car and was about to drive away before I remembered to take a photo. Oops. The good news is, there are no rules for this project. Forgetting to take a photo (or multiple photos) wouldn’t have been the end of the world. Or the project.
July 1, 2025, through August 7, 2025.
Surprisingly, winter offered more dramatic sunrises than did spring or summer. I thought for sure the sunnier months would’ve offered more stunning sunrises, in terms of both frequency and intensity. Maybe I just missed them. Or maybe not? Given how cloudy many spring and summers mornings were, I’m not convinced I did.
August 11, 2025, through September 15, 2025.
If everything goes as planned, there will be 56 more gym parking lot sunrises between now and the end of the year.
My year of crafting has come to a premature end. In April, my financial situation changed unexpectedly, which moved all of the crafty things I have even a modicum of interest in trying very firmly outside my new budget. Also, I wasn’t enjoying the project. I like the idea of being a crafty person. I do not enjoy doing crafts.
I did take on two creative endeavors over the summer: a letterpress workshop and a mysterious and important project that I’ll share more about later.
The letterpress workshop was a two-day workshop that I was able to afford only because I received an unexpected check for my birthday and rationalized I was “allowed” to spend it on something “frivolous” instead of putting it toward something “worthwhile.” I wish I hadn’t. Or at least, I wish I hadn’t spent it on the workshop. It wasn’t what I expected or wanted.
After the workshop ended, I went back and re-read the description for it. It accurately described what the weekend would entail. The problem was, I understood that only in retrospect. Going into it, I didn’t know enough about letterpress to understand that I actually didn’t understand the workshop description and that the things I want to letterpress print (Project Life cards, gift tags) require polymer plates, which weren’t part of the curriculum. The entire two-day workshop was dedicated to typesetting and printing a single line of text. I didn’t enjoy it and, unfortunately, I do feel it was a poor use of money, time, and spoons. You live and you learn.
I’m extremely excited about my other summertime creative endeavor. I’m not sure it’ll turn out quite like I envision (I can’t afford the options I prefer). Still, I’m very proud of it and excited to share it once I can afford to finish bringing it to life (soon, I hope!).
On Tuesday, December 3, 2024, I took a photo of the sunrise while standing in the parking lot of my gym before getting in my car and driving home. It was the clearest and most colorful sky I’d seen in a long time, and the silhouette of Mt. Hood in the distance (which is very difficult to see in these tiny photos) was breathtaking. I did it again on Thursday, the next day I was at the gym, and then again on Friday. And then I kept doing it every day that I went to the gym, regardless of how clear and colorful the sky was or wasn’t.
December 3, 2024 – January 2, 2025.
By Friday, just three days in, I’d decided to keep taking one of these photos for a full year. Or until I forget. Or until I don’t want to anymore.
January 3, 2025 – February 4, 2025.
This morning, I took the 100th (!) gym parking lot sunrise photo. When I started taking these photos, the sunrise coincided with the time I was leaving the gym, around 7:20 am. Now, the sun is rising right around the time I finish the first exercise of the day’s programming, around 5:20 am. Soon, for a stretch, it’ll be even earlier than that.
February 6, 2025 – March 14, 2025.
So far, I’ve not missed one. If I eventually do, that’s okay. Despite what my brain keeps insisting, the project doesn’t have to end because of it.
March 17, 2025 – April 18, 2025.
This project was completely unplanned and I’m still not sure if something physical will come from it (a photo album? a poster? a secret third thing that hasn’t revealed itself to me yet?), or how long it’ll last. That’s okay. I don’t need to know right now.
April 21, 2025 – May 23, 2025.
I’ve enjoyed taking these photos, even on the cloudy and foggy and dark and dreary and rainy mornings, and I enjoy having them, even if nothing more than this post comes from them. It’s been such a fun way to track the Pacific Northwest morning sky over the last several months.
In early January, I decided I wanted to try one new crafty thing each month this year. Here’s how the first four months of this endeavor went.
January
Starting off strong with no new crafty thing this month! Look. When I got the idea to do this year-long project, I immediately began making a list of crafty ideas. I couldn’t get past five ideas. My brain had manufactured too much pressure to think beyond those five things because it couldn’t let go of the belief that I needed to have every single crafty thing for every single month very clearly and thoroughly planned out in advance. Intellectually, I knew that wasn’t true. It took till mid-February for me to accept it on an emotional level, and to just start and focus on the craft at hand without worrying (too much) about what would come next. If only it were as simple for me to apply this to other areas of my life.
* * *
February
In February, I crocheted a basket. I followed this very detailed and beginner-friendly tutorial, adding an extra row each of black and white because I had enough yarn to do so and figured I could use the practice. I used the same brand and colors of yarn used in the video: Lion Brand Hue + Me in salt, werewolf, and saffron. I ordered two skeins of the white/salt and one skein each of the black/werewolf and saffron; this was the perfect amount. I also ordered this 8mm/L crochet hook.
I ordered the yarn directly from the brand’s website because it was on sale there and it wasn’t on sale anywhere else. And then it took FOREVER to ship—well beyond the timeframe stated in the order confirmation—and all of my emails asking for confirmation my order was actually received and being processed and would eventually ship went unacknowledged. Not a great start!
Not a great finish, either, sadly. The basket itself turned out fine, especially for a first-ever attempt at crochet, and wasn’t difficult to make (the most difficult part was remembering to not count the first stitch of each round—I ended up unraveling and restarting the bottom of the basket probably 12 times). The thing is, try as I might, I just don’t enjoy using my hands this way. On the plus side, this craft taught me that I do!!! not!!! like the look or feel of yarn when it’s actually in front of my eyes or in my hands v. something I’m looking at on a screen—a great thing to know about myself going forward.
As much as I didn’t care for the process of this project and don’t like the result of it, I did really enjoy the tutorial I followed. It was well-organized and well-paced, and everything was explained and shown very clearly. Because my brain has a hard time flipping images around, I deeply appreciate a true POV camera angle, which is what you get with this tutorial. If you’re new to crocheting, I recommend checking out The Turtle Trunk channel on YouTube.
I also appreciate how few supplies were needed for this project, how affordable they were, and how little of my time it took.
Total cost: $32.91.
Total time: about 8 hours between two sittings over two consecutive days.
Would I do it again: maybe. In the very distant future. For now, I have no interest in crocheting again.
* * *
March
Technically, my March craft is neither a craft, strictly speaking, nor a new endeavor for me. I’m counting it—a 500-piece puzzle printed from a photo I took of a mural a few years ago—anyway. I’ve done a lot of puzzles. I’ve never done one made from a photo I took. That’s new enough to count for this project.
I had the puzzle printed locally by Portland Puzzle Company. They’re not the most affordable option for having a custom puzzle made, and they don’t have a 1,000-piece option (my preference). I was impatient and wanted the puzzle RIGHT NOW so I went with them. I was impressed by the quick turnaround time (I placed the order on a Sunday evening and it was ready for pick up Wednesday around lunch) and how vibrant the colors turned out.
I was less impressed with the quality of the pieces and packaging. The pieces don’t fit together very snugly (the tiniest movement to the board undoes a fair amount of work, and you can’t move a little chunk of connected pieces without the whole thing falling apart), the base of the box isn’t very sturdy, and the box design is not attractive. I also don’t like the color of the backs of the pieces (which shouldn’t bother me as much as it does given they’re the backs of the pieces). I’ve never done a puzzle by this brand before so I’m not sure if the backs of the pieces are always this color, of if they’re color-“matched” to complement the colors on the fronts of the pieces.
Gripes aside, of the three crafty things on this list, this is the one I most enjoyed doing, and I really like how my cropped photo turned out as a puzzle. I wasn’t sure that it would translate. I’m happy that it did.
Total cost: $36.99 (barely two months later, a 500-piece custom puzzle from Portland Puzzle Company now costs $46.99, yikes!!).
Total time: a few hours. Probably around three? I wasn’t keeping track! After picking it up, I was too excited to just get started.
Would I do it again: absolutely, yes. I’ve already spent way too much time scrolling through my photos, trying to find another that would make a good puzzle.
* * *
April
April’s craft was the Desert Daydream paint-by-numbers for grown-ups from Pink Picasso, which will be a housewarming gift for my 20-something and her boyfriend, who live in a place that looks a lot like this (El Paso).
Of the three crafts I’ve done so far this year, I was most excited about this one. I was also the most frustrated by this one. I checked the measurements of the piece before ordering it and even pulled out a measuring tape to better visualize its size and still I was surprised when it arrived by how small it is overall and I was intimidated and annoyed by how teeny tiny so many of the spaces are.
I was also annoyed that despite what they say on their website, the four brushes that come with the kit are not suitablefor completing this project. You will need to buy better brushes, especially for the smaller spaces. This is frustrating because a huge part of the appeal of buying a kit is that you pay once for everything you need (and you get everything you need at one time).
I started by painting the sky and the sun, then moved onto the desert floor before attempting smaller spaces. After one sitting I gave up on the brushes that came with the kit, put the project away for nearly two weeks, then pulled it back out and took it to a local art supply store to find better brushes. The ones that come with the kit are way too soft and fan out too much when trying to paint the narrow spaces.
I brought the brushes that came with the kit with me to the art supply store—taped to the canvas with painter’s tape—so that I could better explain to (show) the customer service rep, who I knew would be more knowledgable about paint brushes than I am, the problem I was experiencing. And it worked! When I showed them the issue I was having by “painting” on the canvas with the kit brushes, they immediately understood what I was looking for and pointed me to the various sections of brushes that held better options. I tested about 30 different brushes directly on the canvas to find ones that were stiff enough to paint the narrow spaces. Three Princeton Select brushes were the winners (from left to right in the photo below): Spotter Petite 20/0, Lunar Blender 1/8″, and Spotter 5/0.
These three new brushes made several worlds of difference; the project became much, much less frustrating. I wish I’d bought them sooner, ideally before I ever began painting. I think that if I’d started with these brushes rather than the ones that came with the kit, the project would’ve turned out better—more enjoyable and with more even paint coverage, especially on the desert floor. How would I have known if I hadn’t first tried? You live and you learn.
I’m mostly happy with how this craft turned out. The one thing I’m still stuck on is the streakiness of one of the greens. I feel like it’s not supposed to look the way it does, and I also could not figure out how to get it to look less streaky and more like the color on the reference card (two photos up), which is a very solid green. Oh well. I’ve decided it’s part of what gives the finished piece its charm.
Even with the better brushes, this craft is a challenge. If you’re a perfectionist with unreliable fine motor skills and/or have a difficult time intently focusing your eyes without going cross-eyed or your vision blurring, I would not bank on this being an enjoyable or relaxing or rewarding activity.
Total cost: $58.30, including $40.30 for the kit (canvas, paints, four terrible brushes, a page of instructions and tips, and a postcard-sized reference image) and $18.00 for the three Princeton Select brushes.
Total time: about 23 hours between eight sessions over three and a half weeks, plus the hour it took to drive to the art supply store, test a bunch of different brushes, stand in line to pay, and drive home with the winning brushes.
Would I do it again: probably—just not with the kit brushes.
* * *
What’s on deck for the next four months? Don’t know! We’re already halfway through May and thanks to some sudden and unforeseen financial stress, I don’t have a clue what this month’s (or any other month’s) project will be. All of the things I had on my list are now firmly out of my budget. Which: annoying. And also: a chance to think more creatively. We’ll see how things shake out for the next four crafts come late August or September.
In addition to continuing with my regular memorykeeping practice, I’m hoping to make more things and go on more small adventures this year. Here are seven creative projects and small adventures I’d like to take on in 2025:
1. Build a website from scratch
For what? I don’t know yet. Maybe one of the many iPhone photography projects I’ve got going on. Maybe for something I haven’t thought of yet. Back in the day when personal blogs were a thing, many of us learned basic HTML and CSS so we could customize our blog’s look and feel to our liking (who else remembers Katrina’s incredible labor of love Pugly Pixel? Or Elise‘s very beginner-friendly HTML e-courses and workshops?). It’s been about a decade since I’ve put any of what I once knew to use. I’d like to try. And I’d like to learn more than I did before.
2. Disposable camera
I’ve been wanting to do a film photography project for a while. I don’t have a film camera, nor can I afford one, and anyway I don’t know enough about photography to shoot on good film using a real camera and to get it developed. Not with these prices in this economy. What I do have are three 27-exposure disposable cameras, and what I do know is how to use them, and what I can afford-ish is to develop one (1) of them.
These cameras are only (“only”) a few years old—I bought them in 2020 with the intention of using them to document the NINE coast-to-coast drives I made between DC-ish and Portland in 2020 and 2021—so I think the film’s still okay (?). We’ll see!
3. Photobooth photos
I love photobooths. Like, LOVE. Especially ones that still print black and white photos on film, which, sadly, seem to be nearing extinction. Still, whenever I see a photobooth, regardless of whether it prints in black and white or in color, or on film or is digital, I have to sit for a strip of photos. I don’t get the chance as often as I’d like—most photobooths here in the city are in bars and restaurants, two places that aren’t my scene. This year, I’d like to find some of the photobooths in the city that aren’t in bars and restaurants and sit for a strip of photos in each.
I know about the ones at Cargo (one of my favorite stores in Portland) and the Ace Hotel downtown. The one at Cargo hasn’t been there for quite some time (RIP)—more than a year, at least. The one at the Ace still prints in black and white, which I appreciate. Unfortunately, it’s no longer film, the color is different, the dimensions are a little weird, and it went up in price (though you do get two strips (different photos on each strip) instead of one now). Here’s a side-by-side of strips printed by the old Ace photobooth and the new one.
4. Portable scanner
Last summer I saw this tweet of a New Yorker taking a portable scanner around the city. This type of project is extremely my shit. I think it’d be fun to do something similar.
5. Portland Movie Theater Project
About six weeks ago, I, a person who cannot sit through a movie to save a life, decided I wanted to watch a movie in each of Portland’s historic or independently-owned movie theaters (there are 16 by my count). Initially, I planned to start in January. And then I changed my mind.
I got started that week (Thanksgiving week) and knocked out four movies at four theaters before Sunday (Conclave was the first (and Sam Irby’s Instagram review of it made me laugh)). And then, in the weeks that followed, I saw two more movies at two different theaters. Six down, 10 to go.
6. Reread my favorite books from my youth
This was something I’d intended to do in 2024. Life had other plans. In the meantime, I’ve managed to get my hands on four of the five books on this list that I remember the titles of (I’m certain there are more than five books I loved while growing up, I just don’t remember them (it’s the trauma)). Once I have the brain space for this project, I just need to pick one up and start.
7. Sidewalk Joy Map
Portland has tons of Little Free Library-style installations, galleries, dioramas, and exchanges for all sorts of things: books, of course, and also handmade ceramics, keychains, mini art galleries, plants and seeds, puzzles, toys and trinkets, VHS tapes, yarn and other fiber arts supplies, etc., etc., etc. A bunch of them—more than 100 at the time of writing—are catalogued by the PDX Sidewalk Joy project. Once the weather is warmer and drier, I’d like to use the Sidewalk Joy Map and accompanying PDF, which includes descriptions of each of the locations on the map, to visit as many as I can this year, ideally by walking and biking around the city. (This is such an incredible project—a huge thank you to Rachel and Grant, the people who started it and keep it going.)
At the start of 2024, I wrote about three creative projects I wanted to work on throughout the year: I wanted to make a candle from the leftover wax of bunch of other candles of the same scent, I wanted to finish transcribing a 101-year-old diary I found a few years ago at a local vintage mall, and I wanted to do something fun with vintage photos I’ve been buying at various vintage stores and stalls and malls around town over the last several years.
I made the candle (and did not enjoy it), I finished transcribing the diary (and absolutely loved it, as well as all the rabbit holes and field trips the project took me on along the way), and, in a true Christmas miracle, I’ve done something fun with the vintage photos I’ve been buying at various vintage stores and stalls and malls around town over the last several years. I present to you, the inaugural (and perhaps only-ever) set of @tindertisements postcards.
On the front of each postcard, a digitized vintage photo. On the back, a short dating app bio—or portion of one—that I thought was fun and/or funny and/or clever. Most bios are exactly as I found them; some have been lightly edited for capitalization and punctuation.
This project started almost four years ago on Instagram. I named it @tindertisements—the vast majority of the bios are from Tinder, and dating app profiles are the modern iteration of the hundreds-of-years-old personal advertisement. The Instagram approach quickly fizzled out; I don’t spend a lot of time on the platform, and I wanted to do something with this project that I could hold in my hands. I’m a big fan of both snail mail and quality paper-crafted goods (and also one-of-a-kind items). Postcards just made sense.
A closer look at a few of the pairings:
Brett, 27. Send me drunk texts at 2 am so I know it’s real.Katya, 28. My wife says I should fuck more goth boys.Jonathan, 26. Recently on new anti-depressants so we both have the pleasure of meeting the new me!Sarah, 39. I think many things can be improved with a spreadsheet.Hayden, 31. I’m into poetry and struggle to understand art theory. Please don’t sit on my bed with your outside clothes.
While I haven’t counted how many bios and photos I have in my collection, I’m pretty certain I have at least 100 of each. Part of my collection lives in an old cigar box (another vintage mall find) on one of my bookshelves.
Not all of the photos and bios are paired. Pairing old photos of people from many decades ago with contemporary names and personalities and matching the ages as best you can is a humbling art that takes a ton of time and patience and practice to get good at (I’m still learning). (It’s also quite challenging, it turns out, to find vintage photos of men wearing something other than a military uniform, of people in poses other than standing straight in front of the camera or sat in portrait mode, and of people who aren’t white.) Of the photos and bios that are paired, not all of them became postcards—many of the photos simply aren’t the right dimension. Many more of the not-yet-paired photos will suffer the same fate for the same sad reason. RIP.
There are 33 postcards in the set. I ordered two sets. In one set, the photos are as they were scanned in, have the same font size and placement on the back of every postcard in the set, and are all linen postcards. With the other set, I played around with different levels of contrast with the photos, different font sizes and placements on the back (which you can see in the five examples above), and different paper finishes (matte, pearl, etc.). I made a spreadsheet to keep track of all the different combinations so if I end up ordering any given postcard again, I can make sure I’m using the contrast level, font size and placement, and paper finish that I like best.
Many of these postcards became gifts. I sent a chonky stack of them to my friend and former roommate, who’s been along for the ride since the very start of this project (we lived together during the first year of this project—she joined me on several of my photo-hunting shopping trips and still helps me decide on pairings I’m stuck on, and she’s who’s sent me the glass I used for the candle I made). Like me, she also loves snail mail, quality paper-crafted goods, and one-of-a-kind items. I know she’ll enjoy sending these postcards to folks in her life (or saving them for herself). A few more will go to other faraway friends to whom I’ve sent a few pieces of random happy mail throughout the year each year since the start of the pandemic. The rest will continue to hangout at home with me and their siblings—my greeting card collection—until I have reason to send or gift them.
* * *
This project was hugely inspired by Minor Phrases, an old Tumblr project that has also found a home on Instagram, and much of Sophie Calle‘s work, especially her 2020 piece On the Hunt (an archived version of the original article on the piece, which features more images of the actual work, is here).
Additional related reading: 15 amazing personal ads from the ’90s, a Longreads essay on the evolution (through the mid-2010s) of the personal ad, and one editor’s favoriteLondon Review of Books’ personal ads.
I don’t make new year’s resolutions. Instead, I make a new year’s to-do list comprised of a single, massive undertaking. Then, I break the overall undertaking into smaller and smaller groups of tasks, order them hierarchically, and work away at it all, bit by bit, until the project is done (or I give up).
My 2024 to-do was “get my affairs in order.” You know, estate planning. I have neither an estate to speak of nor plans nor a desire to become incapacitated or die any time soon. Even so, I’m a single parent with no family and few friends (and none who know me well enough or live close enough to take over if I were to become incapacitated or die any time soon) and a history of mental illness. Plus, there’s the ongoing COVID pandemic, the likely incoming bird flu pandemic, and climate collapse. So, even though I don’t have plans or a desire to become incapacitated or die any time soon, I recognize that these things are not, ultimately, in my control, and I made it my mission this year to plan as best I could for the inevitable.
This was a deeply uncomfortable undertaking. It was also an important and necessary one. After a year of difficult work—I had to stop and take weeks-long breaks several times throughout the year because thinking about these things often triggered my OCD (existential subtype) and derealization, and the administrative aspect of estate planning is not compatible with my autistic executive dysfunction—I managed to check this to-do off my list at the eleventh hour (yesterday!). Thank fuck.
In 2025, I want to tackle my digital photo and video organization and storage. Like 2024’s to-do, this will be a massive undertaking. I anticipate it will also be massively frustrating at most points and massively rewarding and helpful once it’s complete. (I’ve been trying (“trying”) to tackle this task since, like, 2018 as part of a larger digital decluttering project I’ve been very slowly chipping away at. It has always felt too overwhelming. Getting my affairs in order also felt incredibly overwhelming and I managed to do it anyway. I’m hoping the sense of achievement and ability that crossing that to-do off my list gave me helps me finally get to the finish line with this project, too.)
I’m not yet sure how I’ll approach this thing because I haven’t yet completely mapped out the project. I do know that my first steps will be to figure out where all my digital media is, and then, before I start fucking around with it, back it all up.
Completing these two steps will be challenging considering several of my memory cards are missing or lost (RIP), a not insignificant amount of media (about eight years’ worth) is saved locally on an old laptop that I don’t currently have physical access to (it’s in a co-parent’s garage, thousands of miles away) and may not actually even work anymore, my old Dropbox account isn’t downloading/exporting files correctly (and their support team can’t figure out why), and I have a bevy of photos that now exist only online with photo storage services I don’t remember the names of and maybe don’t exist anymore. And then there’s the headache of the media that I do currently have access to, which, at roughly 130,000 photos and videos, is beyond overwhelming.
Eventually, this undertaking will also involve distinguishing iPhone media from GoPro media from “real” camera media (this is something that is important to me right now; it may not be once I get going with this project); going through all my screenshots and probably deleting most of them; figuring out offline backup solutions; and drafting a README document that explains where everything is and how it’s organized so that when the time comes my kids can easily find what they’re looking for.
The end result of this project doesn’t need to be perfect. It just needs to work better than what I’m doing now: Whatever the solution, it should be able to adapt to changes (as best as can be anticipated) in technology, our access to it (I am deeply concerned about the future of the internet), and how we use it; it should be able to adapt to my needs; it should include both on- and offline redundancy; and it should be easy and economical to use, maintain, and back up. Data privacy and security, especially in regard to (1) citizen surveillance and (2) customer data being used to train AI, is also very important to me. Unfortunately, both of these things seem ultimately unavoidable.
Because this to-do overlaps so heavily with the types of things I’ve shared so far here on the blog—memorykeeping, other creative and creative-ish projects, small adventures I take (or find) myself on—I’m sharing about it here on the blog, too. Partly to help myself stay focused on this monumental task, and partly in case it’s the push someone else needs to get going—or pick back up—with their own similar effort. Progress report to come.
This summer, I went for a lot of walks. I took tons of photos during those walks, including of the various sidewalk smiley faces I spotted. And then I made a mini zine of some of them 🙂
This was my first-ever attempt at making a zine and I’m both pleased and surprised to report that I’m happy with how it turned out (a miracle). I used a single sheet of paper and followed this tutorial from Austin Kleon on how to fold and cut it (he rips his, I cut mine).
Before I started printing, I used an unfolded one-page zine from my collection to sketch a little diagram on a post-it note to make sure I ordered and oriented my pages correctly. Then, I made a template in Photoshop Elements. Because my regular-degular printer doesn’t do full-bleed printing, I fucked around a bit with the sizing and spacing of each page/rectangle layer in Photoshop to try to get the white border as uniform as possible on all sides of each page. Because I have zero actual art skills—I can’t sketch or draw or paint to save my life (sad!)—the front of the zine is a scan of the front of a greeting card from my collection that happens to very perfectly fit the smiley face theme.
I printed the front panel in color and the rest in black and white. The smiley faces in the last spread are a little hard to see in the accompanying photo—the one on the left is jack-o’-lantern-esque, the one on the right is in line with the cracks in the concrete. My favorite smilies are—in order—the one on the right side of the second spread (third pic below) and the one on the left side of the first spread (second pic below).
Originally this mini zine was going to be an edition of one—it was going to be a gift for only my former roommate, to whom I texted all these photos in real time as I found them and who always enjoyed them so much. I decided to print a copy for another friend in New York after a recent long phone call that helped encouraged me to start making and memorykeeping and blogging again. And then I decided to also print copies for each of my three kids. For the two who aren’t currently here with me, I bought these fun smiley face greeting cards at Powell’s to send the zines in. So cute!
I have a lot of ideas for creative projects that I don’t follow through on for one reason or another. Mostly because I have no confidence. And also because I often lack the knowledge, technical skills, and/or network (and requisite networking skills) needed to produce the projects I’ve dreamt up. This is one of those projects.
I call it Things Like That Don’t Happen Here. It’s the beginning of a collection of photos of places at which I’ve been raped and otherwise sexually assaulted—all very normal, regular, everyday places where “things like that,” people like to say and think and believe, don’t happen. Below are the first four photos I took for the project. (Unfortunately, and likely unsurprising to many, I’ve been raped and otherwise sexually assaulted at far more than these four places.)
I was inspired to create this project almost a decade ago (!!) by the touring art exhibit What Were You Wearing, which displays different outfits—all very normal, regular, everyday outfits—that people were wearing when they were sexually assaulted. “The exhibit is meant to challenge the idea that provocative clothing is the cause of the sexual assault, a stereotype used for victim blaming.” I wanted this project to do something similar. I still want that.
My vision is for this project to be ongoing and community-sourced—an always-accessible, online collection of photos (and maybe accompanying vignettes?) contributed (anonymously, of course) by anyone who wants to share the story of their own sexual assault(s) in this way. I have no idea how to organize or curate or fund such a project. Here’s hoping that publishing this post will help jump start the momentum/motivate me to figure it the hell out.
