It's been way too long since I've updated my blog, and I am going to be making an effort to doing so more regularly! Since last December, I've been working as an advertising copywriter at a new agency, so that's been keeping me very busy (and very happy, I looove my job).
Lately I've been revisiting my most recent publication, Helvetica. This was such a fun passion project that was a perfect final chapter to my Swiss years and all the weirdness/wonder of that era.
I was looking through my Helvetica folder, and found a few great examples of my writing process that I wanted to share! It's cool to see the evolution of how a poem is created from a bigger piece of writing.
Often, I start with free-writing, or journaling, and then go back and pull out themes and words that resonate, to arrange them into a prose-like format. There is obviously no science to this, cause it's very intuitive and creative, but I often spend more time editing than writing.
Original journal rant that became the poem, 'non-linear'
(written early 2022)
proof
It’s difficult to articulate how you can love someone deeply, yet know that you must set each other free. The constant struggle, the cognitive dissonance that accompanies such relationships is exhausting. I love you, but you are harming me. I love you, but I don’t really like you. I want the best for you, but I can’t carry you there.
I struggled with these thoughts for so long after the separation.
At the same time, I was feeling the same inner conflict with my feelings of national identity. I’m Canadian, but I feel very strongly Swiss. I love both countries. Switzerland means more to me than I can explain…. can I explain it? How can I honour both of these countries that have played such huge roles in my life?
How can I hold space for all the feelings, especially when they seem to be so contradictory?
Am I holding on too tight? To thoughts, to feelings, to ideas of how things should be?
There was no way I knew how to sit with everything, except to reinvent the way I was viewing my life story. It didn’t fit the linear narrative of how life is meant to unfold, so I was constantly trying to make sense of what that meant for me. My life was messy and confusing, and embarrassing. It was beautiful and broken. It was filled with adventure and life lessons.
And the truth is, I don’t want to forget any of it. All of this confusion, all of this pain, all of this despair. All of the tears, all of the shifts in perception. This beautiful mess of a chapter; my 6 years in Switzerland. Sometimes it hurt while it was happening, but I have proof that it was beautiful and worthwhile, too. I’ll take that back with me like a treasure chest.
Non-linear
You must set each other free
It was barely a whisper.
I can’t carry you there,
But the cognitive dissonance
Might keep you company.
And how many feelings
Must there be?
And why do they all seem so
Contradictory?
Don’t know how to sit with
This, but I can’t stand.
A linear narrative
Is not part of the plan.
Poem that got cut from the final manuscript, but I love it and I don't know why I didn't keep it. That's totally the way it works, right? I'm constantly second-guessing my writing, then loving it when I look back (the opposite also happens, hating words that I once loved). All part of the life. But this is cute. Up Here
Up here,
I feel somehow less far away
How many daydreams can I dream in one day?
I picture you watching me
Walking these trails
I breathe in so slowly
Then forget to exhale.
Another Word doc I found that has my playlist AND the original version of, 'Fingerprints'.
Here I lay with the phantom cathedrals
The ghost churches
Forgotten in the fog
Albums I hiked to:
Hiking the trails around Evilard/Macolin/Biel, I was always listening to music. These were some of my favorite albums during this era. I hiked, cried, and healed to these songs!
Noah Gundersen- Lover
Taylor Swift- Reputation
John Mayer- Sob Rock
Jets to Brazil- Orange Rhyming Dictionary
Ruston Kelly- Shape & Destroy
Jason Isbell & The 400 Unit- Reunions
Lord Huron- Long Lost
Flatland Cavalry- Homeland Insecurity
Turnpike Troubadours- Diamonds & Gasoline
<3