Emoblog/2017/11/12/collaborative friendship

The thing I was going to add to the "love language" list: collaboration.

[8:30] I feel like I should probably write an essay about this, but highlights as they come into my head:

[8:30] When I imagined my "ideal relationship", it always involved creating things together -- music, writing, whatever. (edited)

[8:31] I sort of have it wired in my head as the end goal of all meaningful relationships.

[8:31] I always figured maybe most people want to have children for this reason -- it's an expression of that need for creative collaboration.

...

So, like, Tigger writes down two or three short lines... I write another half-dozen verses spinning off of those, work out music for it, record it -- but I consider her an equal co-author because she had the original idea [ SECRET REASON: because I want to have a collaboration with her that is cool and makes both of us look brilliant ]

[3:47] Another: Anna plays and sings most of a song, age 6? 7? ...I think this is awesome, and manage to get her to record part of it, and then I put in background music and percussion and stuff and loop her voice as necessary to provide filler and turn it into something semi-presentable because I want her to feel that we created stuff together, that I helped her express herself.

[3:47] Another: Hilary runs into a bug with a program I wrote for the lab, and leaves me a note about it -- in the form of a parody of The Raven...

[3:48] ...which is just the kind of stuff I eat up with a spoon, so of course I do my best to respond in kind -- in the form of a parody of Jabberwocky.

[3:49] Here we go (need to make it more searchable): http://woozalia.com/wiki/Me/geek_filk_exchange

And, more recently, I think maybe some small part of me sees my annotations of Jenny's notes as being kind of like the ultimate collaboration between us.