When L.M. Montgomery was writing Anne of Green Gables she posted this magazine clipping with an image of a beautiful woman at her desk to keep her inspired. The face and pose was striking, and from that image some granule of an idea for Anne was born. The ironic part to this story is that Montgomery had unknowingly invested her creative energies in the Gibson Girl, a standard of turn-of-the-century beauty and a pretty notorious figure. Funny that Anne thought herself ugly for most of her childhood and grew up in the series to embody a sort of turn-of-the-century wholesomeness. But I digress.
The point is that I’ve been using this anecdote to justify to myself my recently acquired guilty pleasure of spending hours on Pinterest. I was never much into crafts (I swear, I’ve got extra thumbs or something) and not so much into makeup and fashion that I’d enjoy looking through pages and pages of what other people are wearing. What I am into, though, is looking up scans of other people’s drawings and composing stories in my head about their backstory and stuff.
That I can spend hours doing (and, unfortunately, do). To be perfectly honest, it’s how I got through the end of NaNo, even if I did wind up 5,000 words or so short.
I don’t think I could use anything other than illustrations to write. First, because I’ve got to marvel a little bit at how talented other people are for a while to get out of my own head (melodramatic as my inner monologue can be, going: I can’t do this. I can’t do this. I can’t do this.). Second, because of that anecdote about the Gibson girl. After I’d constructed a personality and life for the image in front of me, I’d feel a little bit betrayed if the real-life equivalent of who I’m writing about does not entirely meet those expectations. And a little bit creeped out that the figments of my imagination were walking around in the world somewhere. You know. It’s kind of uncanny and whatnot.
Now, if my finger slips and I accidentally end up looking at some complicated braid I’d never be able to begin to work, then that’s just an occupational hazard. You know. Comes with the whole “Pinterest” territory. But that’ll just have to be a sacrifice I’m willing to make.
–Marie-Irene
badpoetree 