Feeling disheartened

Where do I even start looking for what I want to do for the rest of my life?


I want to be able to work creatively, sustainably, for money, and not be way in debt from school.  There's just so much junk to sort through, I don't even know where to begin.

Sharpie & muji pen on sketch paper, from 12 Apr 2010.

fanart : dream king

As I have been reading a LOT of comics lately (at some point, I will discuss my feelings on Terry Moore (Echo, Strangers in Paradise) and the first two books of Sandman, and Free Comic Book Day comics), I did a fanart of the dream king himself.

Lots of room for improvement, obviously, but I was mostly wanting to play with actual ink and quill-esque pens & brushes for something more archival-quality and professional.  The drawback of using ink that you dip is that you can't whip out ye olde sketchebooke anywhere and draw, you have to set aside time and try very hard to keep the cat from sitting on your work.

sketch paper, ink, prismacolour (white), brushes and quill pens

What I would change about this: I would have just used the smaller letters rather than the big ones.  I think they take away from the picture.  Also, a more anatomically correct (this was based off my own figure, and I'm not nearly as long as Morpheus!) version would look better.

But, as this journal has stated before, this is the journey UP.  Things get better from here on out.

Small Town

My brother and I drove home together yesterday because we could.  Originally, we'd planned to go home Friday evening, but I had to work Saturday.  Going home to the small town is about an hour drive.  I used to commute, so I kind of enjoyed the nostalgic ride home (the cows weren't out, but I still saw goats, and my tree friend-- and, my brother drives a lot like I do.)

Yesterday at work I asked V, a good friend of the family, what happened with this girl (she's only a year older than I) who I heard had died.  And V told me it was uterine cancer, and that another prominent member of our community and someone who lived down the street from me had committed suicide.  My emotions went straight to anger.  Why would you do something like that, when you had so much going for you?  This person was, by far, one of the most respected members of our community, who had vision and leadership and artistic talent.  He directed the play I was in, he ran an art gallery, he sang in his choir at church.  I mean, what the hell?

I admit, I've been a bit depressive since returning to the 'States and being unable to find my dream job, or any job for that matter.  But I tend to put these thoughts on paper and I feel better after doing so.

This piece is from the end of April.  Sketch paper, sharpie, gel ink pen.

Gift Art : Thank you, Josie

Day five of a six-day stretch of 8+ hours running amok and my body felt like it was going to fall apart, between sheer clumsiness, a headache, and the stress of impatient customers and incompetent co-workers/trainee.  My bosses' sister Josie, who comes in almost every day for coffee and tabbouleh, offered me a discount for an hour-long full-body massage last week and I accepted, scheduling it for the end of the week when I feel most run-down.

It was heavenly.  When I got up off the table, it was like waking up from a good night's sleep, like I'd never experienced the (to quote April Winchell from Regretsy) "whimsicle fuckery" of the previous ten hours.  I felt refreshed, energized, and creative.  This was my thank-you piece to her, drawn in Border's/Seattle's Best (the same parking lot where I took my inaugural stick-shift driving of my beloved car, Felix).  I also started another piece, and came home and scanned a bunch of things to be posted later.

Sketch paper folded into a card, sharpie pen (outline), Muji pen (.5) detail, approximately 1.25 hours from start to finish.

The way to my heart...

...is to call me "Clementine."

This guy comes into my work place and it's like a ray of sunshine.  Eternal sunshine.

Current thoughts

So, I was near the top of my class in high school, president of the Drama club, brilliant and vibrant - and the only scholarship for college that I was awarded was one set up by my aunt in memory of my cousin who'd died shortly after graduating high school.  I cried on award night.  The next day, a teacher of mine remarked smugly that I must have been so glad to have gotten an award because of my tearful reaction.  I replied, "I would rather have won no scholarship at all in place of my cousin."

10 years later, a double major with honors (Phi Beta Kappa), my loans paid off, and four-point-five years of teaching and living in Japan under my belt, I'm thinking to myself that this go 'round, because I am going back into academics, I am not taking out loans, I am getting scholarships.  I am going to be paid to work hard at school.  I don't do things half-assed, I don't cheat, I don't slack off.  Less deserving people (and believe me, the daughter of the teacher who made the above remark was much less deserving) get scholarships all the time.  I'm an investment worth taking.  I prove myself again and again.  My current stint in a cafe, hourly wage plus tips that probably keeps me hovering around the poverty line, is not where I will be in five years.

I am breathing.  I am doing art.  I am learning.

The Beginning

I don't know what will go here yet.  But there will be content.