Everyday Matters by Danny Gregory

Everyday Matters Reviews

• 
  Jon

  I so enjoy exploring a good bookstore, and herein is a case in point. I stumbled across this in one, a great little discovery. Everyday Matters is the personal sketchbook/diary of Danny Gregory, an advertising guy in New York who was living the uptown, fast-paced good life with his wife and son. His wife was then involved in a horrific subway accident that left her paralyzed. This book is a sketchbook account of life during and after this life-altering experience.
  
  On the back cover Gregory sums up the book: "Two years before I started drawing, my wife was run over by a subway train and nearly killed. Well, this book is about how art and New York City saved my live."
  
  I was intrigued by this book, as it mixes everyday sketches from life with thoughts and meanderings of what Gregory was facing at that time in his life. FOr me, some of his sketches communicate so much more than words ever could. I especially connected with the idea Gregory describes of how, when sitting an drawing the world around him, he's forced to slow down and really see the world around him... and how good that is.
  
  It's true, honest, creative, and heartfelt. Fantastic.
• 
  Lenny Husen

  I LOVE this man. He is a personal hero of mine.
  This is a memoir, and a sketchbook, and a look into how one person chose to change to adapt to adversity. Gregory is all about Resilience and Mindfulness, WITHOUT (Thank God) having to use those words to describe the process by which tragedy becomes thriving.
  
  Great for anyone who, like Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, once loved to draw and was discouraged for not being "good enough."
• 
  Bill Lancaster

  This is a book of a man who finds a way out of despair by the simple act of drawing. Danny Gregory's wife, Patti, had a horrendous accident in NYC and Gregory's life was turned around. And he found that drawing and sketching was a practice that helped both he and his wife recover from her accident.
  This is the second time I've read this short book which is illustrated profusely by Gregory's sketches. He is not a great artist, nor particularly skilled at drawing. But he is terrific at describing his inner dialogue, his approach to drawing and his ability to convey his wonder and amazement at how this act has changed his life. I've read several of his other books, which are less personal (except, perhaps for "A Kiss Before I Go" which I've not read) and am always impressed with how openly and astutely he writes about drawing as a personal practice.
• 
  Parka

  
  
  (
  More pictures at parkablogs.com)
  
  Everyday Matters is a personal sketchbook journal started by Danny Gregory after his wife's accident on the subway.
  
  The writing is personal and heartfelt. The perspective unique. Danny Gregory talks about his life after the event, how it motivated him to draw, and how he learned to see things differently.
  
  The illustrations are watercolour and black and white ink sketches, complete with captions and thoughts when he drew them.
• 
  Tchatchke

  Danny Gregory is one of those people who doesn't have to try hard to inspire because he inspires just by being himself and living his life. If you don't want to start drawing after reading this book, then you'll probably want to start doing something else creative. You'll look at your life in a new way, that's certain.
• 
  Ja'net

  Even though the ending of this graphic memoir veers off into more telling than showing, most of the book serves as a beautiful reminder of how appreciation of "the little things" can ground us in the wake of tragedy, when we feel most lost in our own despair.
• 
  Nancy

  Definitely recommend this book to anyone caught in a slump, whether it be artistic or writing. It puts the proper perspective on life no matter what crisis situation you could find yourself in. I'm not suggesting sketching will fix your marriage, straighten out your children, or bring a loved one back; but, in this book Danny Gregory honestly tells how sketching helped him get through his crisis. Danny Gregory exposes his true feelings after his wife Patti's almost-death accident that left her an invalid. His introspection was generating unreliable and conflicting data, and sketching was able to bring him out of his self-absorption and back into reality.
• 
  Mirek Kukla

  Poignant and uplifting, “Everyday Matters” is a short but unique graphic memoir in which Danny Gregory tell us, in doodles and handwritten commentary, how he rediscovered meaning in the world by taking up drawing.
  
  After his wife becomes disabled in a terrible subway accident, Gregory falls into a cycle of depressive self-pity and guilt. Life becomes a "meaningless hell" (8), until one day - one a whim - Gregory starts drawing. The experience has a profound impact on him: "I took my time and suddenly I zoned out. My mind went blank, my breathing slowed, and when I finally stopped to look at my page, I was amazed that I had managed to create something so beautiful." (13)
  
  The rest of the memoir is more of an exploration of art, meaning, and the beauty of everyday life than it is a biography. The tone is personal, and the writing is thoughtful, if meandering - a sort of dreamy, stream-of-consciousness internal dialogue.
  
  Gregory’s thoughts are interesting and insightful; I especially enjoyed his speculations on why drawing the world around him gave it meaning: "We lump people into things and experiences and categories… it’s efficient but it strips the world of texture and chance. … What I began to see by drawing is that everything is actually special and unique and interesting and beautiful." (17)
  
  The book is unique in the way Gregory interweaves his words and drawings. The store is told in as many pictures as sentences, and this juxtaposition of words and images gives an unforgettable texture to the story told and thoughts conveyed.
  
  “Everyday Matters” is a memorable, uniquely-told tale that left me inspired to return to drawing. It’s a bit light on content - expect to finish it in less than an hour or two - which makes it hard to recommend, but if you can borrow a friend’s copy, it’s well worth your afternoon.
• 
  Stephanie (aka WW)

  This is a charming little book, which features approximately a year’s worth of the author’s drawings and thoughts on everyday matters, which are as disparate as the stuff he keeps in his refrigerator and the skyline of London. The motivation for the book was an incident in which the author’s wife fell in front of a subway car and was paralyzed from the waist down. The change in the couple's lifestyle affects the author, of course, but doesn’t take over his life or this book, which plods along its way pointing out true “everyday matters” that may be missed if we take life too fast.
  
  As charming as this book is, however, I’d recommend Maira Kalman’s book of paintings and thoughts, titled The Principles of Uncertainty, over it.
  
• 
  Kate

  One day everything is just fine. You're busy running from work to home, taking care of a dog and a baby boy. The next day your wife is run over by a subway train and paralyzed for life. That's what happened to the author of this book. His way out of his fear, sorrow and confusion was learning to see the world through drawing. This is a very sweet, nurturing, quick-to-read journal/memoir that doesn't demand a lot of the reader. In fact, it's pretty soothing. It is chock full of his drawings--every single page. Good to pick up and read if you're having a rough day.
• 
  Laura

  I find Danny Gregory highly inspiring, and I enjoyed this volume of his very much. It is part memoir, part sketchbook, and all heart. Having read this, Art Before Breakfast, and The Creative License, my favorite is The Creative License, which has more to say to readers who want to build a sketchbook habit—more tips, more pep talks, more ideas for things to draw. But I did enjoy this, and I will return to it from time to time, because anything by Danny makes me want to draw. So I'll finish this brief review and go draw—perhaps the most telling "review" I could leave.
• 
  Maria

  An excellent sketch journal-memoir. Danny Gregory shared his story, what made him start drawing, and might even saved his sanity during hard times. It's very inspirational - made me grab my sketchbook and a pen and go out there to draw.
• 
  Debbie

  This is one of the most unusual memoirs I've read to date, and a very interesting one. It feels like watching over the author's shoulder as he talks and draws. It's personal and beautiful. I enjoyed watching his story.
• 
  Mary

  A book of loss, life, love and drawing. And of New York --
• 
  Heather Mattern

  This book took my breath away. I wasn’t prepared for the raw “real-ness” of it. This is not just a book about drawing but rather it’s a book on finding happiness in each and every day!
• 
  Chris

  There is a moment, near the end of Everyday Matters, when Mr. Gregory speaks of overcoming his discomfort of drawing in public. It was awkward he said, to have strangers approach and ask to see his drawings. He felt pretentious, shy, inadequate, etc. Gradually, though, he began to allow others to see what he drew, to see as he saw. In return, these people would generally talk to him about themselves. They would tell stories of how they saw New York, of missed subways and late night pizza and occasional tragedy. "They were giving me the gift of themselves," Mr. Gregory says.
  
  Everyday Matters is a sketchbook. There are drawing of shoes, medicine cabinets, and tins of ravioli. There are watercolors of Death Valley and Paris. Doodles of cows and farmers. Drawing, Mr. Gregory tells us, is not simply a matter of making marks on a page, but a way of seeing. A way to appreciate things as they are. That is all and everything.
  
  Everyday Matters is a diary. It happened that one day Mr. Gregory's wife fell on the tracks of a Subway. The train did not stop in time. She survived, paralyzed. Confined to a wheel chair. Life, as Mr. Gregory knew it, was over. Things were tough on Patti, too. Everyday Matters tells of Mr. Gregory's thoughts regarding the revolution of his world, the bitterness at chance, the weariness of condolences from friends and family, and the impossible necessity of moving on. Patti is still his wife, after all. They still have a son called Jack. Things are what they are and that is the way, he knows, they will stay.
  
  Everyday Matters is an exercise in recovery. Recovery of momentum, of life, of the world. Mr. Gregory has written another book I've read, The Creative License, in which he instructs his readers how to see. To look at a tree, for example, and not see a "tree", but see something gnarled and wavy and very much unique unto itself. This book, Everyday Matters, is where, it would seem, that the motivation to see came to Mr. Gregory. There's a remarkable sort of poignancy to his drawings, whether they be of cityscapes, of Big Ben or Sixth Avenue, or of the small objects that surround him, of, yes, everyday matters: toothpaste or ravioli. His son. His wife. There is a quiet urgency throughout. An unspoken need to hold onto what reality there is, and to somehow learn to appreciate it simply for the miracle of it existing at all.
  
  And it is that need, born out of tragedy, which is Mr. Gregory's gift to us, if we'll only take the time, a moment, to see the world as he sees it.
  
• 
  Nook Little

  What a wonderful book. I really didn't expect it. Danny Gregory is just a regular guy who had to go through a painful experience with his family and much like the rest of us used art to immerse himself and forget his problems. Through his journey he was able to appreciate every day matters.
  
  The book doesn't teach drawing (similar to some of his other books) but it's more of an illustrated memoir or an art journal. What I really loved was how his drawing style changes with every passing page. In the early pages his drawings were simple and they gradually become more complex.
  
  The drawing style is very loose-hand, simple, quirky, cartoonish. It reminds me a lot of Quinten Blake. There's so much depth and character in the way he draws because it isn't simply depicting what he sees but it's actually showing you HOW he sees things. Alongside his funny notes, you come to understand how he's looking at things. I also admire how he constantly challenges himself into looking at things from different angles and drawing them differently. He experiments with different point of views, cross-hatching and drawing different subjects.
  
  His love for his wife is very heartwarming and the message of his book is very powerful although it's packaged in a very simple way. I highly recommend this book for anyone really and not just artists. It's a wonderful idea to have this book on a coffee table to enjoy with tea and biscuits.
• 
  Ciara

  i may have been a touch uncharitable in my rating of this book. allow me to explain: this book is comprised of pages from sketchbooks the author kept following his wife's tragic accident in a new york subway station. she fell on to the tracks as a train was coming & her lower body was crushed by the train. she is now in a wheelchair. the accident changed their lives in many ways, & inspired gregory to start documenting through drawings & making more of an effort to slow down & appreciate the little things. all of this is a premise that i fully support, & many of gregory's drawings are very charming & cute. so why only two stars? the only reason is that i just really have a hard time getting excited about visual art. i'm just not a visual person at all. i really prefer words to images. people with more patience & appreciation for drawings would surely give this book a much higher rating & get more out of it than i did. i never really realized before how intolerant i am of drawings, comics, & all the rest until i started reviewing books for this website. across the board, graphic novels, sketchbooks, et al get lower ratings than they rightly deserve from me, just because i don't have the patience to appreciate visual nuance. sorry.
• 
  Josephus FromPlacitas

  This stopped being a book with a forward-moving concept after the first dozen or so pages and devolved into something of a sketchbook or journal of drawings. The author gets his true-life tale moving with the story of his wife's catastrophic accident and permanent injury, then shows in real time how he uses the drawings as a means of regaining normalcy and adapting to his new life. Along the way he explains how the family members' lives have changed and how they're struggling to deal with his wife's handicap, which is an engrossing story. But it pretty much has come to a stop by the end of the first quarter of the book. The rest is drawings. Which might be fine I suppose, but ultimately alienated me as a reader. I didn't realize he'd come to a conclusion in talking about the central conflict and kept expecting him to bring it up again, but then realized about halfway through he was never going to get back to it in a substantive way. The tale had stopped developing. So the majority of the book becomes a not very interesting collection of drawing exercises with semi-whimsical notes curling around the images. It started out as a wonderful idea for a book, but it stopped being a book way too early in the game.
• 
  Andrea Paterson

  I am very drawn to the idea of this project and also to Danny Gregory's use of art as a way to be present in the world. I'm a huge fan of the Everyday Matters Facebook page and the community of artists gathered there. That being said, I didn't really love this book, and I truly expected to. I think the problem was mostly in that I was expecting more of a story. Based on the book cover description it seemed that there is going to be more of a narrative arc directly related to coming through the aftermath of his wife's accident. But in actuality there is very little about their relationship or his family in this book. It's mostly focused on his daily drawings and while I completely see the value in the project I was only moderately interested in the book as a whole.
  
  So five stars for the basic philosophy and three for the execution I guess? While the drawings and sketches must have deep personal meaning for Gregory I just found that that feeling of connection didn't come through for me. However, Danny Gregory is one of the reasons that I began drawing in earnest again so he gets 5 stars for that too!
• 
  Sue

  I have been wanting to read this book for awhile, after finding the Everyday matters challenge group online during a prolonged web surf a few years ago. It is an illustrated diary/journal that the author started after his wife was disabled in a subway accident. What drew me to the book at first was that there didn't seem to be many illustrated journals published in the book market [most are online blog-type viewing, if at all, which is understandable as they're normally for the artist herself] - then I noticed that he said he wanted to teach himself drawing, so this made it different from a lot of the online journals who have professional or practiced artists. In other words, a book I could get and look at from someone who doesn't have much art experience [like me]. I have been drawing more this summer, and reading this inspired me to go get one of my sketchbooks back out. Really liked his discussion of slowing down to 'see' what he was drawing, which made his work much better.
• 
  Maddison Holland

  I have been wanting to get better at drawing and finding my style of illustration and this book kept popping up so I knew I wanted to read it. I had the opportunity to borrow it from a friend and it only took a couple hours to read the whole thing. I didn't realize it was a memoir (because apparently, I don't read) so I was definitely expecting more of a technical book on drawing.
  
  I think it's great that drawing has helped this guy see the beauty in the world, etc but it was a really depressing story because it doesn't sound like he found the true meaning of life through Christ (as I believe as a Christian). So it's great that drawing has power and changes the way you see the world, but it won't give you the true satisfaction of lasting meaning that Christ can give.
• 
  Susan

  What a great book! After a terrible tragedy strikes his family, Mr. Gregory takes up drawing and learns to see the wonder and beauty of his world again. In this book, he shares his drawings (some terrific and some just terrible) to tell his story.
  "We can't control what life deals us, just how we respond to it. And if we are monomaniacally focused on the bad stuff, we are missing the beauty of a half-eaten apple, the sunshine on the bedspread, the smell of warm cookies". Through drawing he has learned that "every day matters" and reading this book may help the reader remember this too. The only issue I had with this book is that it is handwritten, which at times was hard on the eyes.
• 
  Jenny

  After his wife is paralyzed from having an accidental fall onto the subway tracks of NYC, Danny Gregory attempts to make sense of the tragedy of life by picking up a pen and some watercolors to document the everyday objects that we neglect by leading busy lives. His idea of slowing down life, a necessity with his wife, leads him to appreciate the little things that surround us.
  
  I found myself really inspired by Gregory's ability to find a way to cope with the tragedy of life by journaling with words and drawings.
• 
  melydia

  I knew Danny Gregory by reputation for a long time before really encountering him through
  Sketchbook Skool. I found I really appreciated his take on art and sketching and journaling. I liked the idea of connecting with something by drawing it. This book is basically a memoir through sketching of the time following his wife's tragic accident that left her paralyzed from the waist down. It's sad and beautiful and hopeful and inspiring. I read it in one sitting and will definitely be reading it again and again.
• 
  Sheri S.

  Everyday Matters is a heartfelt book about changes in life and the importance of noticing the little things. Gregory's life was dramatically changed after his wife fell off a subway platform and she was run over by a coming subway. The book reflects his thoughts and feelings following this incident and how his life views changed. In some ways, Gregory's drawings remind me of some of Shel Silverstein's works and I especially like the pages where Gregory used watercolors. I look forward to reading another one of Gregory's books.
• 
  Christine

  I learned about this book at a nature journaling weekend workshop. I am certainly no artistic (although I play one in my mind), but this small diary is inspirational to those who want to draw but feel less than.
  
  It’s more than that, of course. It tells the true story of the author and his wife who have a young baby who live in NYC. Tragedy befalls them and derails their lives. The author uses drawing, really seeing things around him as a way through his emotions. It is touching, personal, and emotional. His drawings are wonderful.
• 
  Alyssa Olafson

  I wasn’t impressed by this book unfortunately. The blurb for this novel’s premise shares struggles of the author’s wife getting into an accident and becoming disabled — but this book is not about her disability whatsoever. The author focuses on his own re-discovery of a love for drawing, but mentioning his wife’s disability rarely just felt exploitative and as though he needed a way to make his story interesting. This book also uses outdated and rather ableist terminology and models of viewing disability :(