Ink Hare, Ink Plots, & Bunny Trails
On the topic of Bunny Trails… Again.
My intentions in my introductory letter on Ink Plots was to share some background behind the names “Ink Plots” and “Ink Hare Publishing.”
Oops.
Let’s attempt it again.
Ink Hare Publishing
I think I’ve firmly established that I get easily distracted and wander down bunny trails. (See the first post.) This trait of mine has been referenced more than once over the five decades of my life, in kind ways and otherwise. And that’s ok. I identify with rabbits in that way. (I’m also small… that’s bunny-ish, right?)
The ink is the writing — and yes, it’s problematic to me that I am writing online in an inkless environment. You can’t see it, but my eye is twitching as I type this. I’d prefer to be typing on my vintage Corona typewriter (if it worked) or writing by hand. I journal daily, and the more everything moves toward AI, the more I cringe away from writing online altogether. I long for the simpler times when the internet was new and you could fact check for real. Well — much more easily, at any rate.
In short, I love ink, colors of all kinds, pens of all varieties.
Thus the hare. Thus the ink.
Ink Plots
Ink Plots is my way of sharing my thoughts. I will certainly try to be more coherent in what I publish from now on! If I have a title, for example, I have every good intention to write on that same topic. I may have gotten a bit excited and jumped ahead of myself the first post.
That said, I have analog dreams. I definitely take advantage of having so much information at my fingertips, and I’m as guilty as the next person of looking up locations online, checking store hours, looking for new ideas, and all the things we tend to do with our tiny pocket sized computers. Yet I also understand that I need to slow down. We ALL need to slow down. There is a great deal of good that comes of just being in a moment.
And so I am a bit enamored of writing, of planning things out longhand. I use pen and paper to plot and plan and study and examine and experiment and attempt and create and just try to enjoy. And I highly recommend others to try this, as well.
There is research that tells us that writing a thing out longhand actually engages a part of the brain that is simply not active when we are speaking into an app or even typing our thoughts out on a screen. (There really is. Promise. Scientific American has an article, “Why Writing by Hand is Better for Memory and Learning,” and this article, 5 Cognitive Benefits of Writing by Hand vs. Typing Notes, on Educognify is coherent and nicely research-based.)
But here I am, plotting along on a computer, inkless.
I’ll pretend that I’m inking, though. And I’ll ink in my journals. And in my art. And I’ll encourage all of you to do the same.
Digital drawing I did for Ink Plots logo. No AI. I admit, I adore him.
This fellow is from an acrylic painting I did some time ago. He felt so incredibly perfect for Ink Hare Publishing. (I love how it absolutely looks like he just got caught out doing something — maybe nefarious. In an innocent, bunny-ish type of way…)
