Scrap 001: I Could be Anything

A scrap of paper can become anything: a love letter, a shopping list, an idea that could one day change the world.

I've always loved scrap paper for that reason. I used to keep a ton of it stuffed in a folder, and that folder became the place where I'd collect and explore my ideas. If I could squeeze words and sketches onto a receipt, or an envelope, or a McDonald's bag, I would.

These days my ideas folder is an app on my phone, infinite in size and instantly available. I don't have to distill an idea down to fit the available space. I don't need to sift through a pile to find the specific idea I want. I don't need to think about my ideas any deeper after that initial splurge, and as a result I often don't.

There was one main reason I started using scraps of paper; I had no money and spent what little I did have on nice sketchbooks. Scraps of paper were a low-pressure, low-investment way to test things out. To see which thoughts would stick around and earn their place in a book. Which ideas would scrap to become something more.

That was a fairly organic process back then, happening any time I looked through that folder. There was a natural kind of filter built into my 'system'. A folder is only so big, for one thing. But also, each time I sifted through those scraps, I'd throw away the bad or illegible ideas and put the good ones back in the folder.

That folder became a dynamic and ever-evolving pile of my very best ideas. My Google keep account is, at best, a shit show. A giant vacuum of space that I keep flicking pebbles into. Hoping that one day one of them will spark the big bang. Or, at the very least, that a few of them might clump together into something vaguely planetary.

Those scraps of paper encouraged me to constantly think about and work on my ideas. To link things together, filter things down, and look for the gold. My phone encourages me to keep throwing crap in a bucket in the hope that the gold rises to the top. I’m more and more certain that gold is heavier than crap.

I'm not blaming Google keep or smartphones, I know it's on me. But, I'm sad that I stopped using paper so much. Sad that I feel creatively dumber (and number) thanks (in part) to my 'smart' phone. So I'm reinstating that paper stuffed folder, and the scraps that most excite and interest me will become SCRAPS that I share with you.

That's about as far as I've got with any kind of plan for these letters. But, I’m saving scraps of paper again and I'm excited to see what happens next.

Thanks for reading.