Hi friends,

This one’s more about my art and creativity journey. Neurodiversity-related posts will return next week so feel free to skip this one if it isn’t up your street.

At the start of the year I said I was going to spend 2026 ‘having a go at stuff’.

The Year of Having a Go at Stuff - by Ren Riley

It has such a ring to it...

Basically, I was sick and tired of never making anything tangible or trying stuff I’d always wanted to do. It was time for that to change. So how have I done so far, three months in?

Making art and learning about it

I went to one IRL art group session and I’ve yet to return since. Why? Partly because they’re on Saturdays and Saturdays are for recovering from the week (if you know, you know).

I did buy a bunch of books about drawing, went through a phase of drilling the fundamentals (aka drawing lots and lots of boxes and cones), and overall I do feel like my ‘proper’ drawing has improved a bit. I’ve found that I enjoy drawing faces.

Problem is I haven’t sketched anything in about a month. Like a lot of ADHD folks, when I’m distracted with various projects, I forget that I enjoy other things. In this case, I kind of forgot that I like drawing, and went back to just not doing it. Must change that soon.

One thing I have loved however is developing my scribbly illustration style. So much so that my commissions are open on Etsy if you’d like you’re own scribble made by me.

I’ve also been learning lots about the history of art and different periods, including finding a new found appreciation for modern art. Charity shops are fantastic for art books - things that would have cost upwards of £20 available for 50p. That’s how we like it.

Film photography

I think I’ve mentioned previously that last year I bought an untested 35mm camera off eBay. Not my most sensible financial decision - I had no way of knowing if the photos I was taking were even going to turn out.

Turns out they did! I got them developed and some of them actually look decent. In fact, I’m using one of the photos as the front cover of my next zine. Want a sneak peek?

My next zine is another batch of poetry called ‘Your Flowers’. It’s available for pre-order now. I loved working on this one and I hope readers like it too. You can also get your hands on it in another way, I’ll tell you what that is further down this newsletter…

I’ve started a new roll of film and this time I’ve not been precious about taking notes in my little photo notebook where I would write down the aperture and shutter speed settings. I’m going to go with the flow a bit more (interesting choice for me, let’s see how it goes).

Again, charity shops have been a god send. I found 35mm film photography textbooks and reference books on a charity shop tour with my Mum late last year, and they’ve all come in handy this year. Google who?

Making zines

At the start of the year I made a zine in a day, after becoming really inspired by the zine community on Substack and elsewhere online. It’s called ‘Through the Window’ and so far I’ve sold 18 copies. Wild.

Once ‘Your Flowers’ is finished and out in the world, I plan to make zines that feature special essays not published in this newsletter, as well as zines featuring my photography, illustrations and just random bits of things I have created. That’s the beauty of zines, they can be anything you want them to be.

Which leads nicely to…

Writing poems

At the start of the year I just wanted to get on and make something. I’d been dithering with my book of essays for about a year, getting nowhere fast. Writing a book was a ‘big thing’ in my mind, I put a lot of importance on getting it right. So as I pondered and worried, I wasn’t making much progress. I felt stuck.

Writing poetry is different for me. With poetry, I find I have more control over it than I do with prose and it doesn’t feel unwieldy. I can shape it like a bit of air dry clay, as opposed to having to throw a large (prose) pot. Apologies, that was such a rubbish analogy.

I know some poets reading this may have beef with this next opinion, but I don’t think there are any rules in poetry either. That lack of constraint really fuels my imagination, and I feel freer writing poetry than I do writing anything long-form.

I spent a few afternoons this week writing poetry in the local library. It’s my favourite kind of ‘artist’s date’, an idea from the book ‘The Artist’s Way’ by Julia Cameron. Essentially it’s a period of time you carve out for yourself to nurture your creativity.

Most of what I wrote these past two afternoons has been diabolical to be honest, but that’s not the point. The point is about blowing away the dust in your brain and getting the creative muscles flexing. I flexed mine and nothing much happened, but it’ll get easier the more I keep this practice up.

What’s next?

Meeting more people IRL is the goal now. I was going to go on an organised walk this weekend but I find myself under the weather sadly. There’ll be other opportunities. I’m feeling quite anxious in general at the moment and I find that creating things does soothe my worrying. Even writing this newsletter helps.

I’m also setting up something that will keep me accountable to creating new stuff four times a year. It’s something I’ve wanted to do for a while and I hope you’ll love it.

The Wavy Mail Club!

The Wavy Mail Club is my new snail mail club!

Every 3 months I will be sending out:

• A newA5 zine (could be poetry, could be an essay, cartoons, photos or something else entirely) - This time it will be a copy of ‘Your Flowers’

• A new die-cut sticker designed by me

• An A5 print of one of my scribbles, and

• a letter to the club.

The first mailing will be sent out in mid-late May, but I’ve opened the listing now to give me an idea of how many items I should be ordering!

People can choose to sign up for 1, 2, 3, or 4 mailings, as it’ll be mailed out once every 3 months.

You can read more about the mail club and sign up here.

Get your Wavy Mail here!

If you’d rather not have physical media and digital is more your thing, check out my ‘Wavy Thinker’ tier on Patreon which gives you access to the digital versions of the zines I make. My regular Patreon support enables me to justify writing this newsletter every week and put in the time necessary to make it readable.

My Patreon

I’m so excited and raring to go with the Wavy Mail Club! Hopefully I’ll have at least one person sign up. The fear of failure is huge, but if you don’t go for something, it’ll never happen.

As the saying goes: shy bairns get nowt.

Thank you so much for your support. You guys have encouraged me so much with my writing and my art - I’m so grateful.

Take it easy,

Ren