December 29, 2006

Going Analog

This month, I joined a cult.This international group is culturally diverse, multi-generational, and open to all who can hold a pen. The millions of men and women in this cult worship a $15 item found in finer stationery stores: an Italian journal called a Moleskine®. This is the story of how I became ensnared.

At the beginning, I just wanted to go analog. You know, as opposed to digital. A digital watch, for example, has a readout that tells you it's 3:45 pm. An analog watch has a clockface with hands. The small one is nearly to the four and the big one is on the 9 when it's 3:45. It's up to you to figure out if it's the middle of the night or the middle of the afternoon. Try looking out the window.

There is something pleasing about interacting with tools like an old-fashioned analog watch. It knows how to "show, not tell." It requires that I bring something to the relationship, even if it's only the ability to tell time I acquired from my first grade teacher.

Lately I've become disillusioned with the digital world of task lists, calendars, and project plans. The programs are so presumptuous. They presume that my meetings are always in half-hour increments and make me wrestle them to the ground to schedule a meeting that starts at 9:50 and ends at 10:45. There are elaborate note-taking applications that will organize my thoughts and color-code them. What if I don't want them categorized? What if I like the randomness of them? What if I just feel the need to doodle? Clearly, I was in need of pen and paper.

Whenever I plan a trip, I do my research. I check off places I've been before, look for travelers' reviews, and do a virtual exploration of the proposed destination.

So, when I decided to venture into the land of the pen-and-paper lifestyle, I followed the same procedure. I revisited the places I'd been: the hardbound journal with Edvard Munch's "The Scream" on the cover (too scary to pull out in public); the fine leather book with thin-ruled pages and gilt edges (looks too much like a Bible to encourage doodling in it); and the hand-made paper beauty with the bark cover (too delicate to throw in a tote bag.)

Reminded of what didn't work, I hit the stores. I fondled leather journals and tested their heft in my hand. I flirted briefly with the black-and-white-marbled-cover composition books we used in school, but they made me want to diagram sentences.

After field-testing a few dozen varieties, I turned to the digital community to advise me on how to go analog. That's how I found the Moleskine. This is not just a journal or notebook. It is LEGENDARY. Moleskines have been "used by artists and thinkers for the past two centuries, from Van Gogh to Picasso, from Ernest Hemingway to Bruce Chatwin," according to the official web site. Pretty impressive, even if Hemingway only used his Moleskine to keep track of his bar tab.

Hundreds of hyperlinks later, I had seen examples of highly creative uses of these humble little books held together by an elastic band. People use them to write, draw, plan, remember, analyze and illustrate their lives. They speak of being "hooked" on their Moleskines, of offering hundreds of dollars for their return if lost, and of it being the one thing, besides the cat, they would save in a fire. If a hunk of acid-free paper bound in cardboard and oil cloth could inspire this kind of loyalty, I had to have one.

I went to the local art store and settled on an unlined, large-size notebook. I invested in some gel pens, a paper cutter, a glue stick, a straight edge and a leather pencil case to store them in, so I could begin living the well-equipped artistic life I had discovered online. I was a member of the Moleskine Cult, Gel Pen Division.

There's only one problem. I haven't passed the initiation yet. To do that, I have to actually write something in the darn thing.