Drawings, drawings everywhere and not a drop to drink

Not entirely true. There is cider.

Part of getting on with things has been getting sorted out, going through the mounds of stuff I hoard and working out what is useful and what is just being kept "in case". It is having two effects:

1. there is room to store what I really need

2. I am finding all sorts of things I forgot I had

It's like a treasure hunt at times. The sheets of mica have great possibilities. And I found my soft charcoal pencil and the blue drawing paper - at last.

I know where all my paintings are, always have, but I had forgotten a lot of the drawings I have done over the years. The small book with the sketches of my daughter when she was a new born, the abortive start of the Glorantha comic book, drawings of family and friends, me in different stages of pregnancy. Still lives, life drawings, Celtic designs, prelimary sketches for paintings, the list goes on. Stuffed into drawers, placed in folders, buried under yet more drawings. And for some reason some are in the filing cabinet with my tax stuff and research papers. Which is where I found Cthulhu Bunny.

This was done years ago, pre-children, for a convention I used to help run with spouse and friends. For those who don't know, Cthulhu comes from the horror writings of H P Lovecraft. Penguin and fox were con mascots at different times for different reasons (penguin was the first). There is a dressup paper doll sheet somewhere for the fox (his favourite was always the Xena costume). I'll see if I can find it. But in the meantime (and a day early):

HAPPY EASTER!

Cthulhu Bunny by Megan Hitchens

I Can't Send It Yet

 I have been doing a lot of thinking lately, and a lot of frustrated re-evaluating. Life zooms past and I sit here, achieving nothing. Everything is always on hold because everyone always needs something.

I grew up being told I had to be "responsible". Every time I expressed a desire to do something I was immediately met with "You can't make a living from that", generally with the emphasis on the "you".  I was pressured into leaving school early to contribute to the family coffers. A meagre income in a series of jobs I hated was more important than the risk of no income at all. Opportunities presented themselves and I felt obliged to let them pass because I was needed where I was.

There have been times when I have sought to change things. Twice I have gotten close, but always something gets in the way. Or more to the point, I have LET things get in the way. And life has plodded on, and I have been responsible, and my dreams have remained dreams.

About two years ago I heard Abney Park's "Letters Between A Little Boy and Himself as an Adult", and it gave me the horrors. Here were the failures of my life, and the possibility for change. I was frozen to my heart.

For those who are not familiar with the song (or the wonderful band), it is about a little boy corresponding with his grown-up self via a device called a Chronofax. (Go to YouTube. Find Abney Park. Your ears will love you forever)

The best description of a Chronofax comes, not surprisingly, from the novel "The Wrath of Fate" by Robert Brown (leader of Abney Park):

The Chronofax, built by Robert Brown. Image from abneyparkcrew

It looked like an antique typewriter, with a small greenish screen on the top that had the same sort of look as a Magic 8-Ball window. Its keys were round and laid out similarly to a contemporary keyboard. Just above the keys was an abacus-like slider, with dates on it. If I typed on the keyboard my words would appear on the screen. Then, if I pulled the lever on the side it would make a "shunk-ching!" sound, and the words would appear.
Supposedly, this machine would send a message forward in time, reappearing at whatever time was chosen. It worked, however, by clockwork, not magic. It would simply delay your message, and show it in the future. Time Travelling letters! Magic!...

Sounds great, doesn't it?

I brushed off the old passports and maps, and wiped the dust off its screen with my sleeve. There was a letter!...

Dear Mr. Brown,

One day I'll be you, so I thought I should write to you and make sure you don't change too much, or become anyone we'd hate.

Being a kid sucks. There has been a lot of fighting and yelling lately. It's not fun here. I'm scared all the time. I can't WAIT to grow up and get out of here. Please please please do something cool as an adult. I need something to look forward to...

...Some deperate message from my eight-year-old self had reappeared, and I was reading it as an adult. The message stung, especially since life was not cool or glamorous. Here was proof that as a small boy I was hoping life would get better. It hadn't, and it would get much worse for that small desperate boy. I felt like I had had the floor ripped out from under me.

Had I ever felt happy and secure? What would I say to this child, if I could respond? I worked a job I hated. After years of working for someone else, building someone else's dreams for them alone to enjoy, I had elevated myself to the position of guy who sits in a cubicle doing something with a computer. At least that is the best way I could describe it to my eight-year-old self.

I angrily typed a reply. I did not think for a moment it would actually go back in time, but I just could not let that little boy have the last word, summing up my failures and fears so succinctly. It was really just me venting in the first way that came to me:

Dear Little Boy,
I'm doing my best up here, but it's REALLY hard. I have to pay ALL these bills that I never make enough money to pay. I have to buy clothes I hate, so I can wear them to a job I hate, and I have to buy gas to keep my car running while I fight gridlock on the way to the job I hate. I even have to pay for parking at the job! All of these things add up to more money than I make, which means I now owe banks money for buying things (like lame cars) that I had to buy, just to go to the job so I could try to earn the money to give to the banks!...
...No, I am not something cool, I'm just doing my best to stay afloat, but I'm slowly sinking, and it sucks, and although you hate your home and family, I miss my childhood!

... I turned and saw that a new note had appeared on the screen! ... The note read:
Dear Mr. Brown,
That can't be what life is like! It doesn't make any sense! You're lying! You suck!
Why would you work a job you hated, so you could only barely afford to live a life you hate?! Adventures are free! Indiana Jones never even had a wallet that I saw!
I would NEVER live the life you're describing! There is no way I would let that happen to me after so much bad has already happened.
You lie and I hate you!

There it is. If your eight-year old self got in touch, what could you tell him or her? What WOULD you tell? I look back at who I was and what was happening and I think "How can I disappoint her? Her life is crap at that point. She has all these dreams. How can I tell her I haven't realised them?"

So that is what this blog will, probably, hopefully, be about. Me finally starting to pursue those dreams, well, some of them anyway (I'll have to tell her that the concert pianist thing will never happen. Hopefully she'll understand). I don't know what will end up on here. Hopefully a lot of drawings, some paintings and sculpture. Me getting my act together.

There may also be some weird side stuff, like my customised NERF guns, or the skeleton army I am painting for my son, or the clothes I am making for my daughter and myself. There may also be some personal change stuff too. I have been really ill for some years now and am coming out of that. Needless to say, fitness is an issue. I have started running (haha - 500m then having to walk to get my breath back - haha. Run. Good joke, ja?). We'll see what happens.

And there will be music. Lots of music. It is the basis of the human soul. I can't listen to music when I draw or paint (because I don't hear it), but it drives me a lot of the rest of the time. I always tell my children there is a song for or about everything. Music is really personal, so if you don't like what I put up, well, fair enough, you don't have to, but at least try to take in the lyrics (where there are lyrics) so you can hear what's the point.

I'll let Mr Brown have the last words here, as he says it so well:

I would not respond until I had better news, and that meant I had to make better news happen...
...I was tired of making excuses and hiding from life.