Okay, guys. It's officially 2011. I have a lot of New Year's resolutions (most of which I probably won't keep), but here's my big one: create something new each day this year.
This comes in part from a quote I read on Neil Gaiman's blog. If you don't know who Neil Gaiman is, what rock have you been living under? He's an amazing author of books such as Neverwhere, American Gods, Coraline, Stardust, The Graveyard Book, not to mention the Sandman graphic novel series and multiple film scripts, short stories, poems, articles, etc. He even penned an episode for the upcoming season of Doctor Who! In short, this man is AMAZING.
This is what he wrote several years ago on New Year's Day on his blog:
"May your coming year be filled with magic and dreams and good madness. I hope you read some fine books and kiss someone who thinks you're wonderful, and don't forget to make some art - write or draw or build or sing or live as only you can. And I hope, somewhere in the next year, you surprise yourself."
Beautiful, right? So that's where the name of this project comes from. "Good Madness" is a direct reference to that quote, and to the challenge it proposes to "make some art" and "surprise yourself."
The BIG goal of this project is to create at least 365 new things. Works of art, writing, music, theatre, film, WHATEVER. Things that didn't exist before this year. It can be anything, really: knit a scarf, write a haiku, edit together a short film, write a novel, take photographs, paint a picture, write a song, perform a mime. Whatever I can think of that's creative for that day.
I'm a realist, though, and I understand that there may be some days this year that are beyond my control. Days where I have other obligations (work, school, time with family or friends), days where I am exhausted or ill, or days when I am too busy and happily distracted that I forget about all this entirely (I'm thinking LeakyCon will be one of these!). That's okay. Life is unpredictable. I'd be a fool not to plan for such eventualities.
So here are some GROUND RULES:
(1) I'm giving myself 10 "freebie" days where I'm off the hook. The hope is to not use them. Like I said, the BIG goal is 365, but the REALISTIC goal is more like 355. Also, if I use all 10 days up by the middle of February, that's that. No more freebies. I'm sticking with the rule of 10, and I hope you'll hold me to it.
(2) Another thing: I promise to not get in a rut. For example, National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) is in November of each year, but I wouldn't necessarily count each day of NaNoWriMo writing for this project. I promise to try to mix it up, to do different kinds of art, to make life more interesting than that.
(3) That said, not every art project can be completed in a day. Some days the "creation" I count will be a part of a whole: a sleeve of the sweater I'm knitting, a chapter in the novel I'm writing, a rough version of a song I may go back and rewrite later. That's the thing about art, too. Sometimes it takes a while to grow.
(4) I may not update every day. Sometimes schedules don't allow for that. But I will make updates on this blog (and sometimes on my YouTube channel, which I'll cross-post here) at least once a week. These updates will have to account for every day since the last update, unless I'm using a "freebie." So for example, I'm posting this on Saturday January 1, 2011. If I don't post again until Wednesday, I'll have to include my creations for Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, AND Wednesday.
(5) Updates: whenever possible, I will show you the actual finished product for what I've created. I may post videos or pictures of the object in question, or sometimes a post will be the creation itself, like a poem or photograph or excerpt of a longer piece. There may be some instances where I simply tell you about what I've created, but in the interest of transparency and keeping things honest, I'll try to put the emphasis on SHOW, not TELL.
There may be more rules that occur to me, in which case I will add them in later. For now, here are two things I created: a video summarizing some of what I've just explained, and a celebratory haiku.
Winter solstice gone,
We're halfway out of the dark.
Greet the year with hope.
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