I'm seeing a lot of one-night collaborations these days. A bunch of zinekids get together in groups of two or more, and stay up all night to write and lay out an entire zine in one shot. They do this at night in order to take advantage of the late-night copy shop employees and lack of lines, and to get that kind of dreamlike, sleep-deprivation inspiration that hits right around 3 a.m. for most people. And in most cases, the results look like they're one-night shots: thrown together, sometimes a little less than deep, and often short enough to warrant a less-than-a-dollar cover price.

Morgan and Adrienne collaborated like this. In crude handwriting and simple cut-and-paste, they put together a zine that is tiny and scattered in focus (as everything starts to be at 3 a.m.). The one recurring theme is a whole lot of horn-tooting. Adrienne talks about how cool Morgan is. Morgan talks about how cool Adrienne is. Then Adrienne talks about how cool she is, herself. And so forth.

At first, I thought this was a whole lot of self-indulgent, nearly-obsessive crap. I don't really care how cool Morgan is. I don't know Morgan, probably never will know Morgan, and wouldn't know her if I passed her on the street. I groaned, turning a page, and then it dawned on me: A little body/soul affirmation is really needed these days, especially for girls this age. So often, we spend more time being self-deprecating and being negative and hard on ourselves and each other than we spend on telling people that we really do care. Looked at in that mindset, I realized we should really all be doing more of what Morgan and Adrienne are doing. In a way, they're leading by example.

I still think it may be better done in the privacy of our own letters or, if in person, in our own homes. But I don't think We're So F*cking Brilliant is such self-indulgent crap anymore. If anything, the buck I spent was worth the reminder that a little patting myself on the back is all right. Write to 'em and see at 1510 SW 13th Ave #46, Portland, OR 97201.

(As an addendum, I should mention that not all of this zine is just about how cool the two creators are. Some of the cut-and-pasted articles are actually beautifully written and could stand on their own. The artwork, even as basically-constructed as it is, is really pretty cool, and I'd love to pat the two creators on the back for the strength of this offering, but they seem to have done enough of that themselves that it just seems redundant at this point.)

[ by Elizabeth Badurina ]
Rambles: 29 June 2002