I recently reorganized my home office desk and hung a spare 2′ x 3′ bulletin board on the wall directly over the desk. This wall used to feature posters advertising sketch comedy shows I’ve written and directed and while it’s inspirational to remember good friends, good times, and good writing from the past, I want to create a wall which lends itself to inspiring my present and future.
I planted my daily schedule for fall and spring semesters side-by-side, smackdab in the middle of the bulletin board. The top 4″ x 3′ is lined with production art postcards up from The Incredibles, one of my favorite films. In one corner, a favorite Far Side cartoon, near the bottom a “Life is Art” postcard from Fox Tax, a four-panel strip of photobooth snapshots of the fiancée and me, my season tickets to aforementioned fiancée’s roller derby bouts, and a wonderful postcard I picked up at AWP last year from the Poets.org table featuring Walt Whitman’s face depicted in a mosaic of letters spelling out “APRIL 2007 NATIONAL POETRY MONTH” over and over.
Surrounding the bulletin board, I have larger pieces of what (and who) I hope will inspire me: a preview handout (again from AWP) for Walter Mosley’s latest nonfiction work, This Year You Write Your Novel, two inspirational quote postcards (“What lies behind us and what lies before us are small matters compared to what lies within us.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson and “You are pure potential.” – improv guru Martin de Maat), a printed list of Elmore Leonard’s Ten Rules of Writing, and five 8.5″ x 11″ black-and-white printouts of five favorite writers: Kurt Vonnegut, Ernest Hemingway, Elmore Leonard, Neil Gaiman, and Walt Whitman. Here’s hoping what they say about the company you keep being true…
The bulletin board and surrounding wall space aren’t stuffed full of content, and I plan to keep it this way. Despite it having bits and bobs from all over, there’s a streamlined quality to the ensemble of papers and bright inks. I’m already finding myself typing away and looking up every once in a while to reset my eyes (and brain) and soaking in the wall I’ve created. Here’s to the present and the future.
-nm
[tags]bulletin board organization, writing inspiration, roller derby[/tags]