1 February 2019 🔗
Austin Kleon:
The other day on my walk I was rushed by an off-leash pitbull. “He’s friendly!” his owner shouted, like they always do. I usually curse off-leash dog owners as stupid or entitled or whatever, but on that particular day I wondered: Do people who let their dogs off-leash simply lack an imagination? Or do they simply refuse to use it when it comes to their beloved pets? This makes much more sense to me: that they simply cannot or will not picture in their minds the worst happening.
This isn’t really what the post is about, but I think this all the time whenever I walk Bruce Wayne. I’d love to let him off the leash, and on a couple of occasions have. My neighbors, on the other hand, have a very well-behaved dog who is never on his leash. This, I thought, was my opportunity to train my own dog to be off leash. And while they are outside together, he stays close. However, none of this good behavior stuck when the neighbors dog isn’t around. Oh well.
Getting back to the actual post, I wish I could see images in my head. I always thought it was a metaphor people used. I don’t think not being able to pictures things in my head takes away from my own creativity. If anything, if I ever wanted to see something of my own imagination, I’d have to put it down on paper. I think this is why I have a strong desire to keep paper around, even as someone who has been tied to technology for so long.
I’m also one of those people who has to hear each word in their head in order to read something. I always wonder how things would be if these two ways of mentally processing things were somehow different.