BLANK BOOKS

 I am a pushover for blank books.  Hopelessly, eternally besotted by them.  I am a collector, a buyer, a giftee, of blank books.  Perhaps blank books even multiply, secretly, on my shelves when I am not looking.  If they do not, then I am unable to explain the quantity of blank books that take up foot after foot of shelf space in my studio.

Sometimes I am looking for a particular kind of blank book, in this case something that would be suitable as a diary for a male character I am developing for a story.  (And incidentally...have you ever noticed that, judging by their appearance,  most blank books seem to have been created with the female in mind?  The male sex has very little to choose from---and that little of a boring and dull complexion---when in need of a blank book.  Discrimination.  Prejudice.)

 Other times, I am hit by a wave of nostalgia, as when I saw this miniature specimen, that reminded me of the composition notebooks I had used for years as my diaries.

Sometimes blank books are modest, and quiet...

...others rather flamboyant and garish.  

And when I spot this tiny bejeweled gem on a store counter...can I...should I...leave it behind?  No.  I can, and should, not.  

There is only one difficulty I have with my collection of blank books.  I cannot bear to use them.  When I translate thoughts into marks on paper, the result is such a mishmash...such a chaotic, undecipherable-to-all-but-me (and sometimes-not-even-to-me) mess...such a falling-short of the beauty that the clean empty pages of a blank book require...

So I do all my writing (and my rough picture-sketching) on yellow lined pads and newsprint, and my blank books remain, unused, on my shelves.  Pristine, unbesmirched, they are my cherished symbols of the possibility of perfection.