Capturing Device.
“capture
[kap-cher]
4. to represent or record in lasting form: The movie succeeded in capturing the
atmosphere of Berlin in the 1930s.”
“I was reading the dictionary. I thought it was a poem about everything.”
Okay. I agree. Starting out anything with a quote from the dictionary is both haughty and tired. As if a writer understands the dictionary better than anyone else and can demonstrate it by copying and pasting the definition of a word. And the Stephen Wright quote, while brilliant, has the same originality in a piece about language as Corinthians 13—’love is patient, love is kind” blah, blah—has at a wedding. But both came to mind when I sat down to explain to someone other than myself the idea of a capturing device and, given the theme of this piece, I felt I needed to give them place.
I really didn't think there was much to figure out about the term "capturing device": a device (or thing) to capture (or catch) things with. A thing used to catch other things. Done. But that sense is pretty far down the "capture" definition—and I had to go through a lot of violence to get there: "1. take by force or stratagem, take prisoner; seize. 2. to gain control of or exert influence over. 3. take possession of as in a game or contest." And the top synonyms offer no relief: abduction, apprehension, arrest, confiscation, imprisonment, occupation, seizure, taking. But I bought the domain and a subscription to squarespace, so now me and my $238 are all in.
How can my capturing device be un-captured and re-caught sans the feelings of entrapment?
Let's start in the innocence of where I started. I was a new teacher, fresh out of grad school who found herself at a conference about something Englishy and earth-shattering when I happened upon a presentation about helping students collect and save their ideas. The groundbreaking concept? Ensure the availability of "capturing devices" like butcher paper on tables, small notebooks strewn about the room, chalkboards, whiteboards, and requisite writing tools (this conference was pre-smartphones). When the students' exuberant ideas spring to life they can be captured; recorded in lasting form. Un-captured thoughts may not come again.
JK Rowling says that Harry Potter popped into her head fully formed. What if she had not bothered to write it down? Where would you be then, muggle?
“Ideas come from everything.”
Ideas move through the air, in and out of grasp, break apart, recombine, and sometimes land. That something wonderful may be visible through only one person's lens, one way of seeing the world.
I have let too many wonderfuls go.
The visual I keep coming back to is of a spider's web; a web not quite complete but drawing your attention; marking out a space. It is violent, strategic, and imprisoning. It is beautiful, vulnerable, and strong. Arachne didn't ask to become a spider, she just wanted to make something compellingly beautiful—and it caught her up.
A spider's web seizes whatever comes near and doesn't let go. So this is my web, my capturing device, my frayed asterisk at the corner.
