Marking time—and books!
Introducing baby's first book club merch: bookmarks.
My co-parenting kid schedule was off this weekend for life reasons that aren’t worth relaying. We’ve had more or less the same schedule for going on 8 years so the rhythm of my week/ends are pretty routine. Except when they aren’t. And this weekend, that made all the difference.
Saturday nights are generally movie nights. (I probably pick one out of every six choices.) Sunday mornings are lazy. My daughter is at the perfect age where she can turn on the TV by herself, but still asks for permission first. She says good morning, and then lets me keep sleeping. I’m very grateful I’ve raised her right. By 10a, after at least 1.5 cups of coffee, we’ve turned the TV off and migrated to the studio to art before leaving to do whatever comes next.
But, not this weekend. When the calendar Tetris settled into place, we landed with a block of time together mid-day Saturday and not again until Sunday night. We’re having absolutely perfect weather here in NYC, genuinely some of the best days of the year, so I asked my kid, “We can do anything! What do you want to do today? Ferry?! Park?! Playground?!”
“Can we go to the bookstore?”
We sure can.
Which is how, on a stunning Saturday afternoon, my not-quite-ten-year-old daughter and I sat at a folding table outside of Greenlight Bookstore & Yours Truly, Brooklyn for two hours with a bunch of 20-somethings pasting “junk” in our journals. Turns out, what I used to simply call “journaling” or “using my sketchbook” or maybe even “scrapbooking” has been rebranded.
At the table were people from three out of five boroughs; this was no locals-only group. My daughter and I had stumbled into a movement. A viral video IRL? The people at the table shared their journal pages with mementos from other meet-ups and traded links to upcoming workshops. Everyone had something to say about the sacrifice of quitting or never joining Instagram. One woman expressed awe that HP had sponsored a photo booth for a recent junk journaling event. I quietly cut and pasted into my journal, awestruck, listening to another generation crafting their way to community. And my daughter was listening, too.
I wish I had asked permission from my kid to share some pages from her journal before she cozied up into my bed tonight—I know no one appreciates kid art like their parent—but I was a pretty proud dad watching her patiently work, filling page after page after page into a recently gifted sketchbook. And most importantly, she was proud of herself. At one point, she ripped a pink heart doily down the middle and pasted it into her book side-by-side. A little while later, not satisfied, she ripped half out and offered it up to me: “This one’s for your book.”
My heart! We said our goodbyes to the group (one woman asked us to sign her event page!) And then I dropped her at her mom’s for the evening.
This morning, for the first time in as long as I can remember, I woke up on a Sunday alone with nothing on my agenda until an ambitiously-scheduled, afternoon appointment at a local Risograph printer. For the uninitiated, imagine Riso machines are the love child of your old office Xerox hunk and the hippie selling screen prints out of a van. Artists and counter-cultural types love to print with them because it’s relatively cheap and has a bit of a distinctive, DIY look.
Today, my mission was to make me/you/us a bookmark.
As you know, I read a lot of books. I’ve also painted a lot of walls in my adult life. At some point, I realized that the free paint chips at the hardware store are basically the same size, shape, and weight as a very good bookmark. Thus began my habit of slipping paint swatches in books. (True story: Twenty years ago, I asked Todd Oldham to sign a paint chip at a book signing. Now I feel old again.)
That was as far as I had gotten in the concept for the Being Alive Book Club’s first merch: paint chips. And, probably pink and blue, because… they are my favorite colors.
Beyond that, I really wasn’t sure at 8a this morning where I was headed. But I had time AND an actual print deadline. All the necessary ingredients. I turned on the kettle, turned up the jazz, and then friends—I spent five hours designing uninterrupted. Unbelievable. And then I was early for my print appointment.
I guess the junk jounalers’ vibe rubbed off on me, because only when sitting down to write tonight did I realize that I had created a digital collage not unlike what the group was manifesting yesterday. Still recognizable as a paint chip, but made up of photos of my library of books by trans authors.
I printed 150 for this first edition, in five different variations. Offering up first to paid subscribers, anyone who has attended a Being Alive Book Club gathering, and folks who stop by in the chat. And then I’ll put out a call for anyone else interested in something colorful for their next read.
Reminder, we’re reading
this month. He’ll join us Wednesday, May 28th on Zoom to talk about his memoir, Frighten the Horses. You can RSVP here. Can’t make live? I’ll post a recap and you can hang out with us async in Substack’s chat.xx Kyle
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Annnnnd! I just realized that the Todd Oldham paint chip was a gift for someone who is now a Being Alive Book Club MEMBER. Incredible.
Your bookmarks turned out beautifully!