December Update! (Patreon)

I'm sneaking in under the wire with this one by still calling it a "December" update, but HEY -- technically it still counts. So, for continuity's sake: December.

I've  returned home to Toronto after living out of a hotel room for 2 months in Vancouver, shooting on a TV show that I landed a guest starring role on (woo!). Living in a hotel is weird, and not at all as romantic as the "Eloise at the Plaza" kids book makes it out to be. I'm happy to be home! I've been able to open up the little store on my website that I've been selling our Writing the Circus zine through, and there's already a nice handful of orders again.

It's going to be time to start drafting up Issue 3 before I know it -- I've assigned myself start of January as my "commence drafting!" date. I think I'd like to take this one to address the concept of 'Slow Circus' that I've been writing about a little bit on Instagram, and which I've based the big Vacuum Book project around (VERY QUICK refresher: tired of staring at videos of circus artists, so going for the nostalgic stop-motion film effect of a large-format art book full of gorgeously sumptuous photo essays, and new written work, by moi).

There's 2 reasons why I'm leaning in this direction for the next WTC issue:

It seems like a good opportunity to take some space to thoroughly flesh out that idea without the constraints of an Instagram caption limit, and it lends itself well to that "creative writing + essay" combo that I've established in the first two issues.

Plus, it can help me talk about the BIG VACUUM BOOK PROJECT in a way that keeps building up a foundation of theory and curiosity and interest in ways that we can encourage more circus discourse, and elevate the art form in so doing, in general! Allow me to explain a bit more ...

I came home and in a typical fit of let's-overdo-everything, RIPPED the band-aid off my constant, incessant hand-wringing over the Vacuum Book itself. Meaning, I have thrown myself off the proverbial cliff and forced myself to meet a deadline that I sent out to the portion of my mailing list that was following my Germany stories (Supertalent). [I know many of you are also on that list, but if you're not, and you feel like you missed out, I am compiling all of those writings into a .pdf. I'll share it here for all of you to collectively cringe at.]

I divided up the last 3000 word chunk of storytelling for that adventure into 4 parts, and drafted myself an email on the 5th day -- the last day of 2020 *flips the bird* -- where I officially start the pre-sale for the Vacuum Book. This is such new territory for me, and I've been frozen, telling myself I need to get more things in order before I push forward but ... that's really not the case. I'm holding myself back at this point. Thus -- the ripping off of the proverbial band-aid.

All the pieces of the puzzle have been in my hands, disassembled, for some time. I've been scared to start putting them together. I preface the following with the caveat that I have thought all of these things through and have actionable items to do my very best to make this venture successful .... but all of us have a big Imposter Monster in the back of our minds, even if we publicly deny it, and this is what mine has been dripping in my ear: 

• I'm scared that making a project/product/art object with such a high base cost to create will fail (it costs about $45 to make; to clear my costs for creating the damn thing [which includes studio rentals, photographer fees, lawyer fees, etc] I need to mark it up $25. That feels like a lot; though for what it is, it's not).
  
• I'm scared that I'll somehow fail at communicating the value of the book and no one will buy it.
  
• I'm scared about being embarrassed about having the gall to think that I might make something that I expect people to pay seventy dollars for.
  
• I'm scared the quality will somehow be sub-par and people will be angry with me and feel tricked.
  
• I'm scared I'll screw up marketing it and people will feel tricked/ripped off anyways ("i thought it would be bigger!" "why aren't there more pictures!" "this writing sucks!")
  
  And so on.
  
  My internal voice can be pretty mean. And none of the above has to be true:
• I'm good at communicating: I know that I'll do my best to translate what I know about the project to others, and my best is (almost) always good enough to get the job done.
  
• With 30+ original images in such a large format (with fancy lay-flat binding, wheee!), which can be left open flat on a table OR propped up on a bookstand to display like a print, it essentially functions as a large, rotating art collection that one can flip the page on at will (and people would pay the same price for 3 prints, roughly.)
  
• I get to order a proof copy to check over myself before following through with the full print run, and the printer I'm going with replaces damaged books. The quality of their printing is excellent.  Plus, if there's more than 100 addresses, I can opt for drop shipping -- which is going to be important if these end up going out when I have to fly back to Vancouver. 

So . . . there you have it.

What kind of Imposter Monsters have you folks been fighting lately?
I got more DMs than public comments on that last bit of writing I asked for your opinions on, and I loved reading them -- thank you. Don't be shy to send me a message if you'd rather not talk about your Imposter Monsters semi-publicly -- but also -- we've got a pretty awesome little group here, if I do say so myself.

P.S. I owe all of you beautiful, supportive, patient humans a detailed breakdown of how it'll look like for this big book getting to you, depending on your tier level. Don't worry, I haven't forgotten -- that breakdown will likely happen early in the New Year. Please just rest assured that I'm basically budgeting for / planning on having copies on hand for every single one of you that automatically get one (duh) and/or want one (lower tier friends) -- so if you see me trumpeting about "ONLY 200 COPIES AHHHHH" on my socials in the coming days ... that does not apply to you ;) ----> So if you're on the mailing list, and you see the "Pre-Sale!" email coming out on the 31st ... you don't need to do that.

In the meantime - stay strange & wonderful.

XO

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