Breaks are supposed to clear your head. Mine just rearranged the clutter.
We just got back from a long-awaited cruise—Southampton to Rome, with stops in France, Portugal, and Spain. I sketched in Seville, ebiked in Barcelona, stared up at the Tower of Pisa, and saw Michelangelo’s David in Florence. It was our first real getaway in a while, and exactly the kind of unstructured time I didn’t know I needed.
I didn’t spend it working (unless you count mentally redesigning half my projects while staring at the sea). I read. I walked. I watched people dance badly on cruise decks.
It was wonderful.
One of my favorite stops was Seville. I found a quiet corner, pulled out my sketchbook, and tried to capture the light. It wasn’t a perfect drawing, but it felt like mine. I’ll post it below if you’d like to see.
Coming home, the clutter is still here—creative projects waiting, ideas stacked like unwashed dishes—but something did shift. On the plane back, I started thinking about how I’m using my online spaces and some changes I want to make.
Rethinking Substack: A Zine Model for Creators
Several months ago, I started using Substack with high hopes. After a few months of feeding it like a blog, I realized I didn’t like it.
Lately, I’ve been wondering if that’s because Substack isn’t a blog at all. Maybe it’s a zine. A space for short, strange, reflective, or playful pieces. Creative fragments. Little sparks. Not polished essays—just glimpses into the mess and the meaning.
It makes me itch for pen and paper.
The challenge: can I make the digital Substack experience feel like a handmade zine?
Let’s find out.
Using WordPress as a Creative Process Journal
This space is where I document the process. What I’m trying, what’s working (or not), and how things unfold over time. A quieter logbook for those who like to peek behind the curtain—or maybe for myself, so I remember how the curtain was made in the first place.
That split—zine vs. lab notebook—feels like something I can sustain. One space to share the story. One to track the storyteller.
I don’t think much will change here. But I do want to use this space more effectively.
How Artists Can Navigate AI Without Losing Their Voice
On the way home, I was catching up on posts from some of my favorite creators and noticed a pattern: worry, frustration, even despair about how AI is reshaping the creative world. Not just in art and writing, but in how algorithms, platforms, and search results are being molded around it.
I get the anxiety. But I also remember a time before digital tools were part of everyday artmaking.
Back then, your options were a camera, a copier, and a sketchbook. Cameras were expensive—and film had to be developed. Copiers were for school use; Kinko’s didn’t exist yet. If you wanted to share your work, you made physical prints, hung things on gallery walls, or mailed zines by hand.
There was no social media. No YouTube. No Etsy. You learned to be resourceful. Patient.
So when I hear people now complaining that “everything is changing,” it sometimes feels like watching kids throw a tantrum because their favorite candy changed its wrapper. Yes, it’s unfamiliar. But the candy’s still sweet. And you don’t have to eat what’s handed to you. You can make your own.
True creators adapt. They always have. They find the cracks in the new system and make something real in the space between. They’re resourceful. Patient. And in it for the long run.
Takeaway Thought
I don’t need to “come back strong” or prove I used my break well. I just need to keep going—with voice, with curiosity, with the weird little ideas that show up when I’m not trying.
I’m back. The sketchbook’s open. The next experiment is underway.
