From the Archives: In Praise of Distraction and Collages
Removing the paywall in the new year
Hey hey! If you’re new to Mourning Pages, welcome! I am Penny Zang, an author and English professor. Start here to learn more about Mourning Pages. My debut novel, Doll Parts, will be published by Sourcebooks in August 2025. You can add it on Goodreads and pre-order online.
And if you’ve been around for a while, thank you.
Final exams (plus holidays plus birthdays plus travel plus deadlines) means I’m buried under a stack of papers right now, very much looking forward to days of creativity and cookie-making. Many, many cookies. Like this Monster Cookie recipe I’ve got my eye on.
I have at least one more post coming up—my year-end book list—but I am otherwise winding down for the year and dreaming of a small break before a new semester begins.
The post included below is one you may not have read before because it was behind a paywall. I hope to remove the paywall from all old posts in the coming months.
If you are a paid subscriber, I appreciate all the support! However, as I transition to a mostly free model on Substack, please feel free to turn off any auto-renew settings. Paid subscriptions will still exist for support, but all content will be free for the foreseeable future.
From the Archives: In Praise of Distraction and Collages
“Collage is like a hall of mirrors. Every direction you look, you see something different and visually stimulating.”—Nita Leland
Current distraction level: Mid to high
I feel pretty certain that if I consistently journaled about my mental state every January (or if at least I could find all of the loose notebooks where I did journal about it), a pattern would start to emerge. Distraction and avoidance, followed by guilt/shame/defense of my perceived sloth.
I tend to get excited about a new project and then proceed to avoid it, distracting myself with new interests or research. It doesn’t only happen in the winter, but January is ripe for these wobbly beginnings. Like the time I taught myself to crochet so I could make exactly one crooked baby blanket and never touch the tools again. Or the towering stack of library books I checked out all at once so I could research the history of crabbing in the Chesapeake Bay. During Final Exam week. Like I had nothing else to do.
There’s nothing wrong with any of this, of course. Artists deserve to have other interests, to fall down rabbit holes daily. But if I’m binge watching Love is Blind: Sweden, I’m not creating. For me, I’m likely using this other thing as a distraction for the writing that, for whatever reason, I’m avoiding.
Stop me from the needlepoint sets I just shopped for online (note: I do not know how to needlepoint but I think I might enjoy the stab-stab-stab idea of it). Or don’t stop me at all. I’ll do it anyway. I can’t even estimate the hours I spent over the long weekend collaging a punk rock narwhal. I love the results, I loved the process. That’s all that should matter (not the deadlines looming).
The dark, gray, and frigid days of January are for wintering and hibernation. That’s how I’ve talked myself through it the last few years at least. For artists prone to guilt and shame, this time can feel especially unproductive. Everything is so slow and cold.
It can feel like stasis. It can feel like this cocoon is never going to dissolve into something beautiful, like nothing will ever emerge.
I have to remind myself that winter isn’t “unproductive” (such a horrible word to use in relation to art). There’s something rich and wonderful going on here (on what honestly feels like the 45th day of January).
Gloria Panzera writes about the idea of letting it marinade, about how our best ideas come when we’re doing something else. Very relatable.
Percolating, marinating. It isn’t too late to go back in time and choose a new word for the year, right? How about a word of the month? Marinate would be my word.
Anna Brones writes about January’s midwinter creativity as creative fuel:
“That doesn’t mean that there aren’t new beginnings. There are plenty of them! But I try to remove the pressure that they need to build to anything, be anything. Some scribbles in a notebook there, some percolating ideas there. It’s a month for allowing half-baked ideas to stay half-baked for just a little longer, to remove the pressure of needing to make any concrete decisions about them, or making a plan for how to bring them into the world.”
The metaphor of writing and revision as a puzzle is a common one. We shift the jigsaw pieces (our words, scenes, images) around until we find the perfect fit. It can be tedious and time consuming, but soon a picture emerges. I’ve used this metaphor myself.
I’m not in puzzle-making mode right now, though. If I think of my writing as a puzzle, where one piece fits in one specific spot, my process feels rigid rather than expansive. At the beginning stage, where I am now with my new project, I’m not looking for a perfect fit. I’m looking for options and opportunities.
What if I moved this scene to this chapter? What if I combined these two characters into one? I’m blending and mixing and repositioning without an answer key or a finished picture to follow. Right now, there isn’t one right way to piece it all together.
Not a puzzle, but a collage.
That’s the January energy I’m trying to channel.
I’m not distracting myself, I’m letting my ideas brine.
It all goes into the silo, as George Saunders calls it. Or to quote one of my favorite Raymond Carver poems,“Put it all in, make use.”
I hope you are able to find your own collage out of what January has to offer you. I hope you are able to rest if that is what these cold days call you to do.
Happy holidays, friends! Let the wintering commence,
—Penny
Pre-order Doll Parts at Bookshop (or other online retailers)
loved this. definitely know the 'get excited then get distracted' cycle well!