Crisis and Creativity
So, I’ve noticed there is a connection in my life between crisis – of health, of emotion or intellect, – and my creative output.
This weekend, for instance, I had a dangerous allergic reaction to a new medication that, ironically, was meant to tone down the allergic reactions I’ve been having. The day I had the anaphalaxis, I was wiped out and tired. But the next day, I found a creative solution to the problems we’ve been having looking for a house. And the day after that, I wrote three new poems – after weeks of not much writing, they came to me easily. It reminded me about how I felt after I was hospitalized for pneumonia in California – despite being wiped out physically for months afterwards, creatively I became driven, focused, and energized.
This – along with a feature article someone sent me about the Fukushima area 1 year later and the cleanup effort brought to mind our whole world’s differing responses to crisis. How we survive by figuring out new ways to live. How Japan mobilized a ton of people to protest nuclear power and its government and company’s responses to the disaster, how Japan’s disaster may change the direction of not only Japan, but America’s commitment to safer energy sources.
There are several ways to respond to a threat – you can panic, which, as we know from Douglas Adams, is never the answer (and bring a clean towel,) you can give up, or you can figure out a way to adapt and respond in a way that will help you deal with the next problem you encounter. It also reminded me of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Katniss in the Hunger Games – when confronted with a new monster, or a new trap, every time, they had to continually improve.
Or maybe this is all the ramblings of a madwoman. Anyway, a couple of new poems, there’s some sunshine outside, and I may have found a permanent place to live for us in this cloudy mountain wetland (well, in six months or so, after it’s finished…)
Finally the wrist is feeling well enough to type a little more, so I’ll write this quick entry:
-I have officially signed on to teaching two weeks of middle school students in March 2008 and one week of high school students in June 2008 at Centrum as part of their Young Artists Program. I’m excited but also a little scared…I’ll be trying to squeeze an introduction to mythology, mythology connections in comic books, and creative writing exercises all into a week. On top of this, Centrum offers the folks who teach in the program an opportunity for a residency there in Port Townsend, which will be nice. My first ever independent, non-school-related residency.
Creating a whole new twisted generation of comic book poetry fans is a fun prospect. I haven’t worked with middle-school aged kids before, should be an interesting challenge (anyone with advice please leave comments!)
-I’ve had a chance to catch up on my reading (what with the tonisllitis and sprained wrist and all – this is the upside of downtime) – some mythology texts, a pretty decent anthology of prose poems, Atwood’s You are Happy. And I got to watch some episodes of Buffy season I, which I call “when Buffy was still fun,” which always makes me happy. Even wrote a couple of poems – three in two weeks, which is pretty good for me. I’m not the poem-a-day type, although I admire the effort others have been making this August.
-The new 41 cent Superhero stamps are out at the Post Office. Elektra and the X-Men make appeareances. I now have two sheets.
