Jack Cheng's Blog, page 5

#411: Of Models and Mentors

Right before Thanksgiving I went to see my friend Alise read from her new poetry collection, What to Count. It was a salon-style event, with the theme of “mentoring,” and while I don’t remember this being part of the reading it’s in Alise’s book, from a poem called “Back to School”:

I went back to feel the pressure
spinning in circles, arms at sides, then
flat on the grass, book bag on chest
clouds beyond a wooden frame,
the worry, a structure held firmly in place.

Shane, one of the hosts, also added ...

#410: Catnip for Perfectionists

I’ve had a temporary workshop in my basement for the last year or so, which amounts to little more than a portable table saw, a workmate plucked from my parents’ house, and a pair of sawhorses with a sheet of plywood laid across. For the last couple of weeks, with an eye toward winter, I’ve set about making the shop more permanent.

I drew a floor plan but didn’t make a model; it was quicker in its current state just to move things around. An hour here, another there, an afternoon trip to pick up ...

#409: Gardening Class and Career Advice

This fall I’ve been taking a foundational gardening class through Michigan State University. It’s the first step to becoming an Extension Master Gardener – a fancy title that just means that you’re certified to volunteer in a more-official capacity educating local communities about various aspects of gardening.

Each state in the US has at least one land grant university, and every land grant university has a program like this. My friend Cassie went through the California version and now works wit...

#408: Second-part Community Project writeup; Zine giveaway

Hi friends, I just posted Part Two of my Building Beauty final project writeup; you can read it here.

I also have a few neighborhood pattern zines left over after handing them out to my neighbors and sending them to Dumpling Club members. These fellas:

I thought I’d offer them here! Let me know if you’d like one, and if I have more interest than zines, I’ll do a random drawing from the responses I get by the end of next Sunday.

Jack

#407: Summer Odds and Ends

A week from equinox, the window for outdoor projects here in Michigan is narrowing. There are trees to be planted, cozy roof decks to be built, bricks and blocks to be laid. It’s hard to read unless it’s dark, and I’m in bed, and then I fall asleep almost right away. Maybe I’m still riding waves of summer workshop, the Adriatic rhythms; I mostly just want to be outside. But there will be a time, soon, for indoor projects, for deep work on the next book.

Julia and I missed our connecting flight ou...

#406: Plecnik’s Ljubljana

I spent a couple of weeks in Europe at the end of August, most of that time in Slovenia for a summer Building Beauty workshop at a once-abandoned farm. I’m still metabolizing the workshop itself, but Julia and I had a few days here and there to explore Ljubljana, the nearby capital.

What a pleasant city. And one shaped by Jože Plečnik. There is perhaps no modern architect who’s had a greater influence on the overall character of a city than Plečnik (1872–1957) – not even Antoni Gaudí on Barcelona...

#406: Plecnik’s Ljubljana

I spent a couple of weeks in Europe at the end of August, most of that time in Slovenia for a summer Building Beauty workshop at a once-abandoned farm. I’m still metabolizing the workshop itself, but Julia and I had a few days here and there to explore Ljubljana, the nearby capital.

What a pleasant city. And one shaped by Jože Plečnik. There is perhaps no modern architect who’s had a greater influence on the overall character of a city than Plečnik (1872–1957) – not even Antoni Gaudí on Barcelona...

#405: Building in the Community, Part 1

I’ve posted the part-one writeup of my final Building Beauty project, wherein we were tasked with creating something real and positive within our own communities. You can read it here.

If reading makes you curious about the program, Building Beauty is also having a second virtual open house on August 24, 2023 at 16:00 UTC (noon Eastern). It’ll be hosted by students, alumni, and staff at Summer School in Slovenia, where they’re helping to restore a formerly abandoned farm.

Just write to hello@build...

#404: Chronos/Kairos

I rolled out some updates to my membership program this week, and also rechristened it as Dumpling Club. For newer Sunday letter readers thinking, “You have a Patreon thingy?” The answer is, Yes, I do. And yes, I’ve been a poor promoter of it. Allow me to pledge-drive you for a few sentences: Memberships help stabilize my writing income. They also subsidize my author visits to under-resourced schools and libraries, allowing me to offer a sliding scale while still earning my standard rate.

That’s ...

#403: Ludicrously Capacious

One welcome aspect of a book’s publication is space. Imaginative space, the capacity to work on new stories. It’s not quiet enough to finish the manuscript; capaciousness doesn’t come till it’s done done. That’s not true for every writer, but it is for me. In the last weeks I wrote most of a short story that’s been germinating for years, and have started pulling at loose-threaded novel ideas, seeing which wants to unravel.

The thread analogy rings familiar. Am I borrowing it from somewhere or som...