Notebooks, great and small.
Can a notebook be great? Of course it can. Girls will know of all those journals we bought when we were younger, just cause we liked ‘em, not that we were going to fill them up with something awesome. I rarely ever did, but when I did, it was amazing. And I do think the notebook has a lot to do with it.
The notebook of Hemingway …
Moleskine claims Hemingway used their notebook … he didn’t. I could get into the history and the source of their claims but it would be a bore. Moleskin as a company didn’t exist until much later. And the greats – Oscar Wilde, Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway, Henri Matisse and others – used nameless notebooks made by Parisian manufacturers. Rumor has it .. the construction wasn’t all that great and they were cheap and easy to carry around.
Moleskine is sort of like that except it’s not cheap. I really like the thinness. The cardboard cover leaves much to be desired, but the rounded edges and many sizes and types makes up for it. Moleskine as a brand is not the ideal, but the size and shape is. If anyone knows where I can find similar thin notebooks for cheaper, let me know. I don’t think Moleskine has any significant paper quality over the average drawing pad.
Most notebooks these days are way too big, and unless you spend your whole day at a desk, they are pointless. Inspiration strikes at random. My notebook is next to me most of my day. This means when I want to draw I can. When I hear a song lyric that makes me think, I can write it down. When I need to record something, I can. While most of these things can be done via smartphone now, I still think drawing is important enough to me that I should strive to have my notebook on me 100% of the day.
So, key points:
1. make it thin.
You’ll use them up faster but you’ll end up with a lovely collection this way. If you lose it, you only lose a bit of your thoughts and scribbles, yay!
2. small enough to be carried everywhere.
Pocket size is awesome. Also make sure it’s not too heavy, so a thick cover is a no-no.
3. Don’t stress over paper quality.
Make sure it doesn’t fall apart but the notebook is not a final product, so the materials don’t need to be top notch. If they’re top notch, you’re less likely to take it everywhere.
Lastly, have a pencil on you. If you prefer pens, I really like Space Pens. I got a Space Pen as a gift and it’s one of my favorite pens, but it’s so expensive I’m scared to carry it around everywhere. It’s on a necklace, but sometimes it comes loose. So, cheapness comes in handy. Don’t let the cumbersomeness of losing things get in the way of your notebook’s constant presence. If you lose it, let it go.
Rules are meant to be broken and things are meant to be lost.