Rec | SHITTY NOTEBOOKS

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I always feel pressured to fill beautiful journals with beautiful thoughts, and sometimes my thoughts are all shitty
So i go out and buy a cheap little shitbook. And i feel better

@boote

Feb 11, 2024

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@marisapaullgorst

This reminded me of something I read about back in, like, 2008 when Apple was coming out with yet another shiny new toy, that there was some school of thought (from Germany?) back in, like, the early 1900s or even 1800s (why didn't I bookmark or write any of this down?) about how if one's tools were beautiful, one's work could not be, that just the value we would place on a beautiful tool would erode the forces from within and without that allow us to create beautiful, meaningful things -- in my mind I related it to how sometimes you can get so obsessed about what you're going to wear to a certain event that you pour yourself into perfecting that, and then when you're finally there at the event looking perfect, it can all be great and better than great, and yet somehow you feel like it's already over . . . I wish I could remember what that principle/theory/school of thought was called, because I think about it a lot and am in constant tension with it: WHAT PART OF THIS AM I TRYING TO MAKE BEAUTIFUL and IS IT THE RIGHT ONE

Feb 11, 2024

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