Quickie today, but I made another zine!
This one, Of Unreal Identities, is more about the pictures than the words. It’s a selection of self-portraits, loosely defined, interspersed with a few comments on identity, some mine and some others’. It’s also a quarter of an 8.5 x 11 sheet in size rather than a half, as the others have been.
This is because I’m hoping to participate in a zine fair—sounds like I get to hang out at a booth trying to sell zines for six hours, which might be exhausting but might be really fun in parts. This is the first year this organization has done one, so who knows how it will be attended and what’ll be sold, but I’m excited.
In the meantime, I just went to a long, loud rock (actually alt country, apparently, but my grasp on pop culture is slight) concert. It was great, because I got to see relatives I see at most once a year—but I don’t think long, loud rock concerts are my thing (surprise, surprise).
Still, watching the crowd made me think that, for some people, pop music is many of the things poetry aspires to be, and maybe fills some of the cultural role that poetry has filled in previous centuries. It’s cathartic, it captures and colors memories, it lives in listeners’ heads long after they’ve heard it. Its stars are revered.
Certainly, and unfortunately, I seem to be with pop music the way I am with poetry, only more so—picky and illogical. I get stuck on individual songs, have little awareness of genre, and find the majority dull and unpleasant, even major hits, and even when I appreciate its virtues intellectually.
Of Elsewhere 