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Word Building Persuasive Speech

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I first came across you through your newsletter, Pen Parade, where you explore how our tools influence our work. Is the selection of the right tool — the perfect pen — an important part of your process?

It is and it isn’t — I try to embrace the idea of just making do with what you have. It’s so limiting to say “Oh, I need to have this certain pen or I can’t do it.” I’m like that with so many things — if I just had the right camera, if I just had the right paper. It’s an excuse. You work with what you have.

But at the same time, the freedom a particular tool can give you is really important. When I sit down to do a comic, sometimes I know exactly which pen I’m going to use, but sometimes I just uncomfortably try a lot of things until I find the right one.

In college, I took an art class as a requirement — I didn’t particularly love the …show more content…

In most of my drawings, there isn’t much rendering, or detail — I try to keep it simple, so that it doesn’t have any more impact than the words. In a way, the drawings function similarly to the words: the simple lines make them almost another letter, another form.

To me, your work really exudes happiness — a feeling that maybe, after all, things are pretty beautiful. Would you say that you’re happy?

I’m actually really relieved to hear you say that, because I’ve had people comment before that my work to them seemed motivated by darkness, or depression, which made me feel a little scared — that my work was being misunderstood. I would say that my work is primarily motivated by the idea of finding the positivity in something dark.

And yeah, I would say that I’m happy. Of course, I’ll have moments where I’m not, and I think it’s important to acknowledge those too. Happiness is more potent when you’re living with awareness of the alternative.

So, speaking of that alternative: what keeps you up at

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