Earlier this week, my friend Kyle sent me a message asking if I wanted to grab a bite to eat, an opportunity I quickly jumped at. A large part of our conversation that day ended up revolving around a new project that he was in the early stages of developing, a project that had, on some level, been sparked by a Twitter debate a few days before. His project, WhatIsDallas.com, launched today.

The catalyzing Twitter discussion revolved around how Dallas is perceived, and how it’s a city that is constantly either 1) solidly in the shadow of its cooler younger brother to the south, or 2) the central topic of some derisive conversation about city planning, obesity, or really terrible television. This is a frustration I share. Any time I leave this city I am on the defensive, feeling like I have to be prepared to justify my decision to live in Dallas as a creative individual. No one who lives in San Francisco, or Portland, or Brooklyn or even Austin ever has to think about the fact that mentioning their city of origin to a new acquaintance could result in a quick smirk, and maybe a football joke or some crack about Walker, Texas Ranger. It’s taken me a long time to come to grips with living in this city, and to come to peace with the fact that we’re here for the long haul.

The fact is, however, that there are good people here. We’re in a unique position of having a high density of smart, creative people who want to live in community, and who at the same time don’t have to deal with the built-in anonymity of being one of the millions that flock to the major creative centers in this country. We can all know each other.

Not only can we all know each other, but there’s so much opportunity to share. There’s so much opportunity to learn. We are not all bound together by our chosen profession or specialities, but by the bonds of living in a city where we really are the grass roots. We can design websites, open a coffee roasting business, renovate a hotel, or put on a concert. We can rethink major city infrastructure, and make those changes happen. We can teach people to screenprint. We can start a record label. We can open an art gallery, or even bake artisan pies. While you can theoretically do all of these things anywhere, here in Dallas the community is such where you have the ability to pursue your passion without being lost in the crowd. You can refine your craft in public, and your community can support you. That’s what’s cool about where we call home.

So, when Kyle laid out his plan for a website that would simply showcase Dallas creatives who are taking ownership of this community, I was excited. The fact is, we really need something like this here. While the opportunity for community is large, due to the expansive nature of the city and the disconnected pockets where we tend to live, making those actual connections can be difficult. WhatIsDallas.com is a step in the direction of making that process a little bit easier, and is hopefully a step in the right direction of giving this city its due. We live here. It’s our home. I, for one, want to be proud of that.

“Japanese farmhouses are dark. Gradually, you can start seeing. (I have never seen cross beams like that before. Wow…) Spacious, and very high ceilings… ‘This is great,’ I thought. Just instinct. The aroma of this house is beautiful. Smell of the earth, smell of the wood, smell of the smoke, a little bit. I felt life, very healthy life, being led in that space.” -Yoshihiro Takishita

Priorities, and building your house on a rock

I’ve spent a lot of time lately thinking about permanence. Humanity seems to find itself in a constant state of frenetic forward motion, trying to figure out what’s next and how to use it appropriately, which results in a rapid path from bubble to bubble through the modern age. This is especially easy to see in our field of design and branding, where the idea of “design” has already become so intrinsicly linked to technology that it’s difficult for the layman to separate the two concepts. Last week I was involved in a conversation about relevance, and if it’s possible to stay relevant long-term in the design field as it stands now. How can we possibly keep up with all of these new platforms and behaviours that we’re expected to master and then quickly move on to the next big thing? It seems unsustainable.

A Brief Aside:

After watching the Minka film, I took some time to consider a few questions that I definitely did not ask myself while watching it:

• Who made the hammer that built that house?
• What kind of hammer was it?
• What was the hammer made of?
• Was the hammer compatible on an Android device?

We forget that technology is a tool. Almost everything that we talk about at industry conferences today revolves around “the future of our industry” or “the mobile marketplace”, which is relevant, but it isn’t permanent. The key to remaining relevant in the branding industry isn’t just understanding technology. It’s understanding people. It’s understanding truth, history, and stories. Our job is to create things that speak to the core of the human sprit, which is why so many of us struggle with purpose. How are we even supposed to do that?

But the fact remains: that’s what branding is. It’s easy to be driven by commerce, and driven by conversions and technological fads, but if your brand isn’t built on a solid understanding of how people relate to the people, places, and products that they interact with, then it’s destined for a short life.

(Even the people who build McMansions and the latest in urban upscale condominiums with a mediterranean theme probably have a pretty good handle on how to use a laser level and hammer drill.)

Good brands are built to stand the test of time, and be flexible enough to remain relevant and beautiful, even as the technology and platforms change. They’re a reflection of how people see the world. So, as long as we understand people, craftsmanship, history, nature and the role of materials in tools in the whole process, then we should be fine as creators.

So, let’s all try and fill the world with Minkas. Just don’t get hung up on the tools, because no one will remember those.

The light was coming in just perfectly, and the weather allowed for an open window and a bit of a breeze. The joy that my kids take in a breeze is simple and amazing, and always a lesson in how everything is new.

Last night I got two hours of sleep. We’re dealing with a bout of colds and teething in our house, which means that most of our time is being spent trying to comfort the comfortless, and lying on the floor with some very sad, very tiny humans while they work out their own issues. We are a case study in growing pains. Lots of crawling away, and then coming back, and then crawling away, and then some howling and head-throw-backery.

It’s amazing how situations like these take the wind out of my motivational sails. While my ambitions and resulting project list stretch as far as the eye can see, all it takes is one night like that to sink into a state of despair that can only be remedied by a few gallons of coffee, an evening or two of terrible television, and a 9:30 bedtime. The collision of these regular occurrences with the fact that I feel like now is a time in my life when I should be producing my best work so far is something that takes up way too much of my daily mental energy, and is to blame for the fog of guilt that I constantly feel like I’m fighting my way through.

So, why do I love blogs then?

(That was the segue of a chronically sleep-deprived man.)

When Chris Shiflett tweeted his call to arms this morning in which he challenged us all to dedicate ourselves to blogging more, my first thought was, “Okay, perfect. An assigment.” Just like every other creative person on the web, my perennial new years resolution is always to “write more,” a conviction that falls by the wayside at about the same time I connect the dots that “writing more” means “people might read what you write.” I’m a man of abstract and self-deprecating thoughts, and have spent most of my life living under the assumption that people will like you more if they don’t have to listen to you talk very much. I probably would have excelled at The Milton Academy, where students were taught to be neither seen, nor heard.

However, though it’s completely unnatural to me, I love the blog as a platform for writing. I love it because I can write some boring nonsense about staying up all night with a teething toddler, and then shift immediately into why I am an enthusiast for online journals. The freeform potential of the medium is almost unparalleled, and the fact that we can explore ideas in a stream-of-consciousness way is such a simple idea that we can often forget how majestic it is. We might not all be James Joyce, but we can have our own tiny little Ulysses if we so wish.

Why not just keep an actual, physical journal then? A few friends and myself recently had a micro-dialogue (ANOTHER crazy concept) on Twitter about whether the term “blog” should be retired altogether. After all, wasn’t a blog something that existed in the early 00′s when we were all typing about biology class or whatever in our very own Xanga? These days, the conventional blog has been replaced in a lot instances by social aggregates and Tumblr, platforms that allow for things like sharing or commentary, but are less focused on content creation. Tumblr blogs don’t even come with a built-in commenting system (a “feature” that can actually be pretty refreshing. Another talk for another day.) So, as it becomes easier to share pre-existing content and cultivate a following around your taste instead of your ability to say anything specific, fewer and fewer people seem to be using their own public forum to tell their own story in their own voice.

Is that why we write in public? To tell our own story in our own voice?

As a designer, I’m used to creating with a purpose in mind. I have a target audience, a client, and a message. On some level, the reason that I blog instead of journal privately (though I do a little bit of that too, mostly in scraps and pictures) is so that I have the accountability of readership. A blog becomes a platform, and the words become a message instead of just musings, which can in turn start a conversation. This isn’t always necessary; sometimes, we all just need a little bit of a soapbox, a soapbox built in HTML5 with a responsive grid-based layout. But there is at least the potential of a dialogue when you write in public, whereas a private journal lacks that capacity. A journal is for you, and maybe your kids, and maybe everyone else later if you’re Mark Twain or Leonardo DaVinci. A blog is for everyone with an internet connection.

For me, Serious is Easy operates as a place of reflection. It’s a place to ponder memories and ideas, in a strange little world that I’ve created for myself. A lot of people use their personal blogs or websites to teach you something new, or to posture their opinions on the state of technology, politics or the world. That’s not what this place is for. Because of that, my readership tends to be very patient with very narrow interests (and they probably know me in person), but that’s okay. That’s why I love blogs: because they can be whatever you want, and it’s okay.

Shall we write more in public, then?