Here we are at the end of the year. I caught up with the first chapter of my zine and started on the second chapter. I had a good Christmas with my brother. I’m glad there’s no more Christmas music playing at work, and now I just have to wait to get past the cherry on the pie that is inventory. Before I get into the main thing, I want to say something about Marty Supreme, since I just saw it. If you like Timothee Chalomet, it’s a good performance. Overall, I don’t think it works. It’s all very fast and chaotic, which would work really well in a movie about this sleazebag either turning his life around or getting his comeuppance. Because Marty is a sleazebag, and a very unlikable protagonist. Instead, they decided this was supposed to be a sports movie, where they never really make table tennis look that exciting, and also give us no reason to root for the hero at the end or be happy for his ending. I mean, to be fair, there’s a few shots of table tennis that look pretty good, but they don’t commit to a particular presentation. There is a lot in this movie to enjoy generally, I just don’t think they put it together in an effective way.
Of course, I’m now looking back on this year and ahead to the next, and all the challenges that sit between me and what I want. I still have a finished comic, a remake of Bet Your Sweet Bottom, that I want to sell, and no plan on how to do that. I worked hard on it, with the intention of putting it out in the world in a serious way. The thing is, I still don’t know how to. Partly, it’s fair to say that my insistence on selling it in person before I do it online could be an excuse to not follow through. On the other hand, a big reason I want to sell it in the first place is to connect with people in a way I haven’t been able to before. It does seem to me that I shouldn’t allow myself to compromise on my desire for convenience. But of course, I keep running into the wall of anxiety and fear and ignorance, a wall I need to overcome to make meaningful progress in my life. I really do want to do this, and I believe in what I made. I also feel really guilty that I haven’t done it yet. I dream of having a positive encounter with one person at such an event, which is as much as I can get myself to hope for at the moment. None of that has been motivating enough, because at the end of the day, I’ve been alone and invisible my whole life. I don’t want to pay money to go to a big event and present myself to the world with the most important thing in my life and get ignored. In my head, that seems like the most likely scenario. So, what is my desire here? Do I want to see through my extremely simplistic and ignorant business plan so that I can move another step towards being a professional artist in any way I can, or do I want to put myself in a position that combines as many of my fears and anxieties as possible at once so that I have a singular event that represents me overcoming every obstacle that’s ever held me back?
Having written this, the smart thing seems like selling one thing online first, since that requires the least exposure for me personally; any success through such a channel would provide me with context and hope for what I could expect at a convention or other event. I want to finally move past all this, and I’m being really impatient about it. All of these things are intimately connected in my head, so I feel like I need to confront all of it at once. I mean, I’m not going to stop making these comics, so I need to do something with them. Part of my reluctance to go online first is that doing stuff online, at least as far as I know, involves being active and “part of the community” on social media. I barely know how to make posts, and as far as I know, as many as five people have ever seen any of them. Being a social media person is another entire skillset and mentality I don’t have or know how to get. I’m also very unsure of the future of social media. With the AI bubble building, I’m awaiting for what its collapse will do to social media (as well as the whole world, really), and if there’s a future for the internet as it has existed until now. I mean, that’s a pretty good excuse for me; I’m not in it at the moment, getting into it is terrifying, and the presumed eventual downfall is the only part I know anything about.
I want to make comics, and I’m going to no matter what else I have going on. I want to progress in my life and my goals. All the things that have held me back in my life are also the things I have to address to move forward, no matter which path I choose to go down. It all feels insurmountable, because I haven’t learned how to get past any of these obstacles, and I don’t know where to begin at this point in my life. But my art demands it. Having ambitions really does suck, because no one has all the skills and abilities to achieve their ambitions alone, but you also have to start alone and maybe go it alone for a long time in this country. At least, I certainly have to. I am lacking in both skills and connections. It’s so much easier to focus on what I can do and not think about what I can’t. Yet I also don’t want to spend next year sitting alone at home, drawing comics no one will ever see, and using the work I put on my own desk as an excuse not to pursue a social life simply because I’m too scared of it. I have a finished product, so I have already done what I can now; the next step is waiting for me.
I know this feeling, too. There was a time when I was too depressed to make art, and I wanted to find a way to enjoy my life without it. I could feel my life slowly choking me, with these…for lack of a better word, plastic walls closing in. Just artificial and empty, with nothing I wanted and nothing to look forward to. I don’t like having a similar experience as I work on my art, on a project I am fully serious about. This was supposed to be the thing to pull me out. Something else is still holding me back, keeping me from taking that next step. Making the art was always the easiest step I could have taken. It doesn’t require anything except to spend my time differently. Easy steps first is also the smart way to approach things. I’m just having a really hard time determining what the next easiest step is for me. Even the things I’ve said here could easily be excuses, and I’m still missing something.
I guess a big part is that learning anything social requires other people, and I’m terrified of hurting other people. I didn’t realize how easy it was to do that when I was younger. Once I did, I didn’t figure out how not to do it, because I didn’t and still don’t have any idea how I fit into the world that everyone else lives in. Any step I take risks doing the one thing I fear most, which I assume can only close doors. Just as I adamantly assume no one wants to teach a 31-year-old how to date like they’re in middle school, I assume no one is going to have patience for me to figure out all the other basic social skills I need to build an art career. Especially when I’m saying I’ll figure these things out, and I don’t have any reason to think I will; if I were intuitive about it, I would have figured it out by now. The learning process is uncomfortable and frustrating, and I’ve come to expect that and even relish in it with the stuff I enjoy and understand. With the challenges arrayed before me, I don’t see discomfort or frustration: I see pain and suffering, for both myself and others.
At the end of the day, I do want to move forward somehow in the new year. I’ll probably find an online venue for myself and go from there. Unless I find a convention or other event first and really commit to it, that’s probably the best option I have to make any kind of progress. I know I can make a book, start to finish, which is something a lot of artists in a similar position I see online have trouble with. I’m also still happy to hold onto my current position in life that allows me to put energy into my art at all. My current project has been teaching me a lot that I want to put into the next project. There’s progress in some parts of my life that I’ve been able to find, and the next smartest thing I could do is figure out how I figured that out so I have some methods to consider.
Weekly Art Blog 12/21-12/28/2025
Life in the Gutters 