Output

It's funny. I've got a tiny little book sitting on my desk, inside of a cardboard box the size of a cigarette pack. I got it out of the Art-O-Mat at the Chicago Cultural Center a couple weeks ago.

The book is nothing special, an assemblage of found paper, some drawn on some not. It's actually a pretty boring little object, perused once and put down. The important thing is this: I could make it. So simple anyone could make it. But I didn't, and neither did you.

In high school, I had a series of notebooks, small unlined books that anyone could write or draw or whatever in, called Jehovah (odd story behind the name, ask me later). I guess you could call them "open source sketchbooks." They ended up being a collection of random quotes, tidbits of knowledge, quick sketches and sometimes diary entries -- not unlike a weblog in many ways. They evolved over time and became a sort of institution among my friends and acquaintances. One of them became an ingrained part of a class, as we riffed on the concept of frogs within its pages while we thought about religion and philosophy in literature.

The summer after I graduated, I made a whole bunch of "little Jehovahs" -- thin books bound with red thread -- and gave them out to several friends. The idea was, each one would take the book and spread the concept among their new friends at their new college. When the book was filled up, they'd send it back to me and I'd bind it with all the others into a consolidated volume, and I'd send them another blank book to fill. Everyone was glad to get their book, and promised to use it.

I didn't get a single one back. Not even from my best friends.

To be fair, the Jehovah that I carried around at the time floundered after I reached college. I didn't have as much time to doodle or play, and I had less interest in interacting with people through my little blank book. Still, it would have been nice to see at least some of the books come back to me. It felt like I had gone all out to create a cool collaborative project that everyone could participate in, and they all dropped the ball and kept the books.

So here's what I propose. I'm going to make a bunch of little books again. If you want one, let me know, and I'll send it to you. Fill it with whatever you like -- poetry, sketches, photos, diary entries, quotes, whatever -- and send it back to me, and I'll do the same for you. That way, we'll both have a book, and neither of us will feel cheated. Sound good?