Is That The Best You Can Do?

Before you read my thoughts, read Jesse Pinkman's (Breaking Bad)

Jesse Pinkman: I took this vo-tech class in high school, woodworking. I took a lot of vo-tech classes, because it was just big jerk-off, but this one time I had this teacher by the name of... Mr... Mr. Pike. I guess he was like a Marine or something before he got old. He was hard hearing. My project for his class was to make this wooden box. You know, like a small, just like a... like a box, you know, to put stuff in. So I wanted to get the thing done as fast as possible. I figured I could cut classes for the rest of the semester and he couldn't flunk me as long as I, you know, made the thing. So I finished it in a couple days. And it looked pretty lame, but it worked. You know, for putting in or whatnot. So when I showed it to Mr. Pike for my grade, he looked at it and said: "Is that the best you can do?" At first I thought to myself "Hell yeah, bitch. Now give me a D and shut up so I can go blaze one with my boys." I don't know. Maybe it was the way he said it, but... it was like he wasn't exactly saying it sucked. He was just asking me honestly, "Is that all you got?" And for some reason, I thought to myself: "Yeah, man, I can do better." So I started from scratch. I made another, then another. And by the end of the semester, by like box number five, I had built this thing. You should have seen it. It was insane. I mean, I built it out of Peruvian walnut with inlaid zebrawood. It was fitted with pegs, no screws. I sanded it for days, until it was smooth as glass. Then I rubbed all the wood with tung oil so it was rich and dark. It even smelled good. You know, you put nose in it and breathed in, it was... it was perfect.

Creatively, I am immature. Am all clandestine fumblings in a movie theatre with the boy I like who I haven't told that I'm still a virgin at 17. Faking the moans and writhing because that's how I've seen them do it in the partially sexy movies that I've seen. I grope at my art and switch perceived gender roles at some point to become the boy who has now heard the word "virgin" and decided that "she" (my art) is too much work. I was planning to be in and out (pun intended).

Yesterday, after being wholly unsatisfied with a pen sketch of Angelina Jolie that ended up looking more like her world weary Aunt who imbibed far too much...I decided to tackle the attempt again. I asked myself the very thing that Jesse's teacher asked of him, "Is that the best you can do?". Certainly it can't be. I know better. The people who have been encouraging me know better. They also know me well enough not to tell me that. So, with no one but myself to answer to, I walk away from failed attempts and never look back.

In my days of spoken word, I PRIDED myself on stepping onto the Love Jones stage with a new piece EVERY SINGLE WEEK. I scoffed at the thought of doing the same poem twice. Why? I've got plenty of shit to say...and I wrote it down...and I want them to hear it...and I'm too young at this to be stagnant. Renea Moss told me, "Yes, but, wait until you hear how you deliver a piece once you KNOWWWWWWWWWW it. When you have committed it to memory and can revisit the space you were in when you wrote it...it's going to take on a life of its own." (Those weren't her exact words, but that was the gist of her advice). I did what she said. She was right. I learned to say "Hello" (from the other siiiiiiiiiiiiiiide...I'm sorry, I tried not to - I didn't) pieces that I said "Goodbye" to without ever looking back. That taught me that my first recital of any piece was rarely "THE BEST THAT I COULD DO."

These pen sketches are an exercise in trusting myself creatively/artistically...I have a tendency to translate that to "trust that it will be flawless". That is unrealistic AND stupid. With every dismissal of a piece that I, in my opinion, have fucked up - I am telling myself "THAT IS THE BEST I CAN DO". No. That's, as Jamikka would say, "ungood". Because it's not. I need to revisit my failures, try to determine why I failed, try to create something better...challenge myself more.

Today I pulled up the same photo of Angelina...looked at yesterday's fuck up and asked myself "IS THAT THE BEST YOU CAN DO?" and then I went to work. Today's sketch is not even the best that I can do, but keep your fingers crossed for me tomorrow. I'll get there.

(DISCLAIMER: Please, for now, excuse any typos ...my blogs are written during bursts of inspiration and I have to get it down while I can.)