Just One Cup

When a minimalist approach needs a deep clean. Thoughts on adaptability, silver linings, and doing better. Plus, Illustrate Your Week prompts.

[The audio for this show is Creativity Matters Podcast Episode 497.]

"Minimalism is not a lack of something. It’s simply the perfect amount of something.” — Nicholas Burroughs

Happy Sunday!

I put my coffee cup in the microwave this morning for thirty seconds. I was more than halfway done with the cup, but it was cold, and I realized “I could.”

I could give it a quick zap, which is normally not the case.

I’m a one-cup person, have been for a number of years now.

Maybe that started before the pandemic, maybe after. I could check, but it’s a detail that doesn’t have to be precisely placed. I know roughly where in my life this change falls. It’s been years.

This doesn’t mean I only drink one cup. It means I use one cup.

I’m on my second third cup since I started being a one-cup person. The first one was a lovely, bright, aqua stainless steel mug. Maybe we could say seafoam green, but vivid. Maybe it brought mermaids to mind. It was smooth to the touch, and the color made me smile, so much so that when I replaced it, I bought the same color again in a different brand.

You might think a one-cup cup could last forever. That hasn’t been my experience.

The current replacement is about a year-and-a-half old. It’s a deep purple with a bit of a color-shifting quality, just a bit of iridescence near the top. It’s peaceful, maybe a bit moody. It has depth. It is a comfortable color, but I liked the other color more.

Unfortunately, while my one-cup approach suits me well, my habits related to the one cup are poor. I use the cup daily. That’s easy. But I clearly don’t do a good enough job keeping it clean. In my head, the one cup is a lot like the wonder of wool pants.

In reality, modern stainless steel can’t keep up with me. Even with a cursory daily rinse, with or without soap, over time, the cups cling to the history of all of the cups of coffee they’ve held.

Over time, my current cup, and the ones before it, developed terrible stains. Over time, the frequency and depth of the staining increased exponentially.

I’ve used vinegar and baking soda. (Couple the cup issues with drain issues, and I am a big believer in Arm and Hammer and chemical reactions.) I’ve soaked. I’ve scrubbed. I’ve let the cup sit with boiling water and dish soap. I’ve tried the magic eraser.

In the beginning, it might only take a determined scrub. But the cup has become more and more stubborn over time. Usually, after a few days of working at it, I can get the cup to usability again.

This time, I’m on my second week of trying and trying again to deal with buildup, especially up high, near the inner rim. There is some degree of stain on the interior that will never go away, but this cup has taken on a muddy life of its own near the top. I think shifting to milk after years of almond milk may be contributing to this, but it’s just a guess. Anyway, the upper rim is the holdout.

I’ve scrubbed and scrubbed with a toothbrush, and I am making headway, but the cup still sits in the kitchen, full of soapy water, toothbrush propped on top, and every morning, I’m pulling a regular coffee mug out from the cabinet (or, often, rinsing the one from the day before to use it again because, really, I like the simplicity of my one-cup habit).

I’m close now. I am probably only a few more scrubbing matches from victory, from a grime-free, if not perfectly shiny, interior.

In the meantime, I’m using regular mugs and am grateful.

The downside of the regular mug is that coffee gets cold so fast in our house. I’m not interested in a warmer or a fancy mug with a built-in heater. That would go against the whole simplicity model I have going. I don’t want more stuff. I don’t want something oddly weighted. I don’t want electronics in my cup. I don’t want anything that plugs in or recharges.

This morning, I gave the remaining half cup a 30-second nuke simply because it dawned on me that I could.

Heating it up reminded me that we are adaptable. With this traditional mug, heating up the cold coffee was possible, was a perk, was a bit of a silver lining.

I’ve never been overly fond of microwaved coffee, but, today, it felt like a bonus, like the trade-off.

As people, we are adaptable. We can make do.

We can find silver linings.

I prefer my one-cup life. Eventually, I might need to replace the purple one, but right now that feels counter to the minimalism that led me here. So, I will keep scrubbing, and I vow, this time, to do a better job really thoroughly washing my cup each night.

Maybe I can do better.

I say the same thing about my tax records each year, too.

Looking around, I know my cup habits are mirrored all over the house. I’m not proud of that.

But my 100-day project? That’s nicely organized in a Notion database. I can see at a glance the days up to now. I can look at a board that shows the days by verb. I can look at the thumbnails. I’ve used the series to grow a new database of affirmations.

Illustrate Your Week? It’s absolutely in a database. All of the prompts each week are searchable, viewable, trackable.

My Substack calendar? It’s in a database.

We are always a mix and often a mix of extremes. We are adaptable, and there are always silver linings.

I didn’t share a lot of art today. I’ve been enjoying some soft work with colored pencil in my illustrated journal, and I am looking forward to the Week 18 prompts. There are lots of inspiring things on the calendar this week. I didn’t share journal images this week because as I scrolled through my photos looking for sequences of cups, I was overwhelmed by how many photos I’ve taken (and take) with coffee cups. Even my “dress” photos often featured a coffee cup, usually the aqua one.

I was struck, too, by a noticeable change in the last year. I worked for a year or more straight on a small folding table in the living room. There are hundreds of photos of art and coffee cups and tools scattered on that table. Then, I moved that table out and pulled an old coffee table back into the room.

The photos seem to have almost stopped. The folding table may have been plastic, but it fostered something. In its own way, its broad top invited photos. As ridiculous as it sounds, I think I should get the folding table back out!

It is tempting to think it is the change of table or space that has made the difference, more frightening, and more honest, to think it might be me.

There are such stories captured in our cups, captured and held in the quiet photos. There are stories and years in the hands curved or cupped, wrapped and hooked, in the faces that sometimes peek out from above, in the shades of coffee, in the stains and drips and rings. More than any other photos snapped in my “space,” the coffee cup photos capture something intrinsic and true. They hover in a space I hold close.

I hope you snap a photo of your cup today. I hope you draw it.

Amy

Note: This post may be too long for email because it contains a number of photos. Please click through to read in a browser or the app.

(There is audio for this post, but it won’t be available until Monday. I’ll add the link to Episode 497 of the Creativity Matters Podcast when it’s ready.)

Random table and cup chaos. A. Cowen 2020

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Comic Affirmations

I haven’t shared a Sunday update in a while on the 100 Day Comic Affirmations project. It is going strong. We are now in the 70s. I am really enjoying it and already worrying about what I’ll do or feel when it’s over.

One of this week’s panels strikes me as oddly fitting for today’s post. The oversized cup here is a subtle allusion I like. The affirmation is straightforward.

Day 65 of Comic Affirmations 100 Day Project. A Cowen 2024

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Draw Your Mug

Years ago, drawing my coffee mug was something that “brought me back.” I think at the time, I talked a lot about “just one cup” in terms of drawing “just one cup.”

It is almost funny now to realize that “just one cup” became something truly literal in my life.

I do suggest people draw their mugs.

Draw the same mug over and over or work your way through the cupboard. Drawing mugs will teach you about form and depth. It will reinforce the importance of drawing what you see rather than what you objectively know. You know the opening is a circle, but it won’t be a perfect circle when you draw it unless you are looking straight down at it, head on.

Draw what you see. How tall? How short? How symmetrical? Where is the inner lip? Where are the shadows? Highlights? How does the handle attach?

Coffee cups are good for embracing the wonky, too. In the end, it will almost undoubtedly look like a coffee cup no matter what happens with the line.

Coffee cups are good for drawing hands, too, and for understanding the infinite range of motion and perspective possible with any drawing. So many angles. You could draw your mug and your hand again and again and again.

My camera roll is full of coffee cup sequences where I take dozens of photos from different angles, shifting or turning my hand just a bit.

Twenty-five images of a hand and a coffee cup. A Cowen 2019

I love to draw from images like these. I also love simply seeing them, all of them.

One cup is fine, but I’m not a one-photo person. At all.

Coffee cup and art images. A. Cowen 2021

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Favorite Nine

At some point in 2019-2020, there was an Instagram wave of people sharing their favorite nine coffee mugs. I was doing my 50 Before 50 list at the time, and drawing favorite mugs was on the list. I didn’t draw my mugs in a grid, but I did take photos and think about the nine I included. We had already winnowed our shelves a time or two at that point. It was a fun exercise.

Here is the grid I made in early 2020. (Looking at the date on the photo, I’m surprised to see it must have been just as the pandemic started.)

Nine favorite coffee mugs. A. Cowen 2020

(Yes, most of these share something obvious in common. They are all many years old. Most were gifts. Most of these are still go-to choices for tea or, like now, when my one-cup coffee cup is putting up a fight. Looking at this photo, I think there are maybe three or four others, similar, that I frequently choose in a pinch.)

You can tell a lot about a person, I think, by their coffee or tea mugs. Go through your cabinet. Which nine would you pull? If you share a photo, tag me. I would love to see!

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The Weekly Bits and Pieces

🎯🖋️ Week 18 prompts for your illustrated journal

💭💥 Days 64-70 of Comic Affirmations (paid subscribers)

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Writers to Read

I recommend a lot of writers, and some I recommend over and over. I know that many of you go on to read and subscribe to people I share in my posts, and I think that is wonderful.

• Fearless Creativity: Lessons from Teenagers (

  Kelcey Ervick
  ) — I love Kelcey’s style, and I really enjoyed this recount of a poetry comics workshop for the masses.

• The reality of reality (

  Elizabeth Beggins
  ) — This piece is on a topic similar to today’s post. Elizabeth often makes me laugh, and this post has an unexpected moment of realization.

• Solo Flight (

  Nan Tepper
  ) — A wonderful post from Nan about flying.

• His place in the world ( Michael de Adder )

• Can trees roll their eyes? ( Jason McBride ) — A favorite recent haiku poetry post.

• Internal monologues and a spot of aphantasia... ( Emma Simpson) — A topic I always find interesting and have talked about often because it has such an impact on my drawing — something I find frustrating and limiting.

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Made It?

Thank you for reading. It’s nice to get comments. Let me know what stands out for you or what you think after reading. You don’t need to recommend denture cleaner to me. I do know some suggest that. It should basically be the same principle as using vinegar and baking soda, so I’ve never bothered to buy a box. Maybe I should.

• What’s your favorite cup or mug?

• Are you a silver lining person?

• What’s your favorite thing to do on a day off? (That reference may only make sense for podcast listeners.)

• What would you call a “soft tech” nitty-gritty, productivity, organization, habits, databases, writing apps, and tools counterpart to Illustrated Life?

Thank you to those who continue to read and support this space. It means the world.

Thank you for reading Illustrated Life. Please consider subscribing to receive the weekly email. Writers need readers, and I am grateful for every reader!

Paid options are available for those who can and want to support the substack, the podcast, and the #illustrateyourweek prompts. Subscriptions not your thing? One-time donations are always appreciated.

Random notes:

• “Just One Cup” was the title of a 2016 podcast episode.

• Somewhere along the way last week, maybe when adding the podcast link, I seem to have accidentally locked the post. It was not intentional, and I didn’t realize it until I was setting up this post. If you found you could not read or comment, I apologize. The post is unlocked now.