Creativity

Out with the Old, In with the … Older?

~ Tom ~ Leave a comment

I’VE BLOGGED OFF and on for more than 22 years, most recently here at Dadlibbing, whose theme has been “Writing, Reading, Creativity, and Life Amidst Dadhood and a Day Job.” The idea was to explore how to be a creative while engaging with my children as a dedicated father and doing reasonably responsible full-time work.

The tl;dr of that years-long experiment is that I did okay with fatherhood and employment, and not so okay with creating. In those 22-plus years, I wrote (but never published) two novels and am maybe three quarters of the way through a third, and I made a handful of truly atrocious paintings. After a strong start, blogging – which I consider a creative activity – fell to haphazard at best. 

I could blame the whole work-and-parenting thing – a couple of my jobs have involved lengthy commutes, and I volunteered for my kids’ activities as well as doing the hands-on day-to-day stuff – but the truth is that I could have and should have had a greater creative output over the last quarter century. Even as an engaged parent and a productive knowledge worker, I had the time to write and paint and blog. I just chose to do other things with that time.

Why post about that now? I think Dadlibbing has gone as far as it could go. One daughter is well out of college and working at her first real job; the other is halfway through her first year of college. Fatherhood remains something I am deeply invested in, but in a much different way: in general, longer-term and bigger-picture as opposed to deep in the weeds and grinding through the granular details.

And so now, perhaps, it’s time to go back to the future. Among the many stops and starts on this blogging journey was a Tumblr site called T|W|D, themed “Thinking, Writing, and Dreaming in the 215” (Get it? TWD!) and not so cleverly drawn from my initials. (Also get it? TWD!) I’m heading back there for who knows how long. I hope it’s a while, that 2026 sees me embracing my creative side in ways that I never have, finishing this third (and, I think, my best) novel, painting more, blogging regularly, reading with vigor. These are all things that I love, that fill my bucket, that sustain me emotionally. Maybe – hopefully – doing them with verve and abandon instead of worrying about how I’ll get to all of these wonderful things I want to do will have a cascading effect, inspiring less thought and more doing, less wheel-spinning and more traction.

Let’s find out, shall we? See you on the other side/site. | DL

Creative Biting, or How Meeting with Some College Students Sparked Something

~ Tom ~ Leave a comment

REGULAR READERS of these missives — all three of you — will recall an almost 15-year history of on-again, off-again blogging. There have been fertile periods, the occasional collaboration, new focuses and themes, and — no small point — friendships made. Blogging has been a rewarding endeavor.

When I mentioned this history to the director of the writing center at the university where I work, he asked if I would meet with some of the student staff who were interested in relaunching its blog as an additional way of helping their peers. I dropped by the other day and had a delightful conversation with eight or so students and the director, a faculty member in the English department. We talked about editorial calendars and engaging content, about guest posters and tips of the week, about posting regularly and tags and categories, about writing with a genuine voice and encouraging the kind of back and forth that made the whole thing so much fun once upon a time.

When I left there were the expected thanks for my time and thoughts. The gratitude, though, went both ways.

My efforts here have been admittedly spotty. I could make all kinds of excuses about being busy, but as has been pointed out, we all get the same 168 hours a week. It’s up to us to determine how we spend them. The ones who create make the choice to spend it creating, just as I make the choice to spend it dicking around on Twitter.

In sharing my experiences and perspective, I could feel the urge returning. The urge to create and share. The urge to make the world better — YES, I KNOW THAT’S CORNY AND I DON’T REALLY CARE BECAUSE IT’S TRUE DON’T @ ME — through the creative work I believe myself capable of.

That urge was fueled by the curiosity of those students, and by the counsel I offered in return. It was if there were a giant neon sign blazing in front of my eyes: “TAKE YOUR OWN ADVICE, BOYO.”

So that’s what I’m going to try to do. Thanks to a group of interesting, funny, smart students who — and this part is important — want to use their talents to help their peers. To make the world better. | DL

Creative Righting, or How an Irreverent Marketing Campaign May Inspire Me to Reorient the Ship

~ Tom ~ Leave a comment

kkaprod2_largeWHIT HILER WAS not the presenter I expected to be the one to deliver my annual March jolt of “Get off your ass and create.” That shock of inspiration inevitably happens at CUPRAP’s spring conference, typically courtesy a gifted writer or determined peer. Hiler, though, is not only an agency guy but also a partner in a side project called Kentucky for Kentucky, whose goals include rebranding the Bluegrass State with the tagline “Kentucky Kicks Ass.”

Yeah.

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Hershey Bliss, or How a Work Conference Is About So Much More Than Work

~ Tom ~ Leave a comment

IN A FEW weeks I’ll head to Hershey, Pennsylvania, for the annual meeting of a professional organization on whose board I serve. As I’ve written about previously (and previously), this meeting never fails to inspire me. The attendees are talented, creative people not only applying their skills in the field in which I work, but also chipping away at their own personal callings. Talking with writers, artists, photographers and designers between sessions and during the social events has inevitably refilled my creative cup and compelled a vow to renew my own artistic efforts. I don’t imagine this year will be any different.

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A Smack in the Face About the Need to Be Creative

~ Tom ~ 1 Comment

THE THREE gifted storytellers spoke with passion, eloquence, good humor, and conviction about how they do what they do, and why it matters, and when they were done–no, even before they were done–I was reminded of why it’s so damned important for me to find the time to tell my own stories.

I’m in Hershey for the annual conference of a professional organization I’m fortunate to be part of, and the same thing happened at last year’s gathering. I had encountered a couple of folks who work in my field and chatted with them about the struggle of creative work outside the office. The conversation had turned to blogging, and one of my new friends confessed a desire to return to it:

Like me, she wants to write beyond her job; like me, she’s had it fall by the wayside of late. And so we exchanged contact info and pledged together to get back on the horse.

I can’t say it happened for me. Too many other things have gotten in the way–the job, the commute, the house, the family–but the truth is that one needs to make the time for these things if they are that important.

And they are, at least to me.

Yesterday, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, a college communications director and freelance writer, and an alumni magazine editor addressed more than a hundred people rapt with attention in a crowded meeting room. Their topic was “Telling Your Story: Good Writing Is Still Good Writing in Any Media” and was meant to inspire us to be as creative as possible whether in a tweet, a 2,000-word feature, or anything in between.

Inspire it did. (Search for “#CUPRAP14” on Twitter and bask in the accolades.) For me, though, it did more than that.

Hearing this diverse trio talk of telling your story, no matter who’s listening, no matter who’s telling you not to bother; hearing them exhort us to write with honesty and fearlessness; hearing them urge us to find truth in the universal as well as the minute; hearing all of this and so much more was a smack in the face that got me thinking about my own calling. Not my job, but what I consider my calling.

My gift is the ability to tell stories–I have no doubt of this. Stories can be told in many ways, to many audiences, across many platforms, and I am doing it to a small degree, but not nearly enough. I have no doubt of that, either. I have more stories to tell–my own stories, in my own way.

I need to start telling them. Not want. Need. | DL

‘A Voice That Was All Rage and Envy’

~ Tom ~ Leave a comment

thumbsdownNOT LONG after I became a dad, contemporary, grown-up pop culture began fading from my radar. And so year-end best-of lists (movies, TV shows, songs, books, etc.) of the kind published over the last week hold much less sway with me these days. It’s hard to get excited over such things when you have lots of conversations that begin with “Remember that episode of Victorious when … ?”

Though I no longer read the content of such pieces, I have noticed that alongside the best-of lists, papers and magazines are running worst-ofs. This stinks.

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