I’ve been thinking…
A dangerous past time, I know…
As I believe I’ve mentioned before, I’ve given up hope on actually earning a living creating art. This, of course, isn’t entirely true—I like to kid myself that one day I’ll quit my job and make art full time, but I’m of the opinion that I’m really only doing that because it both hurts to admit that I didn’t make it and without the dream of making it, I don’t really find much reason to stay alive. I’ll keep producing, keep lying to myself that success is right around the corner, but if we’re being honest, it isn’t.
I say all that to say that, having conceded my dream, I have to work to fight against being bitter towards the people who are seeing success with art. It generally isn’t terribly difficult, but it does hurt if I allow myself to wonder what life would be like if I had experienced some success with art. I like to lie to myself and suggest that I would be a giant asshole and that the lack of success inspired the thinking that allowed me to grow as a person but…did it?
Growing up as an effiminate leftist in the South with slowly developing mental issues around a rather conservative family, I learned to mask. I learned to not be myself. I learned that who I was was incorrect and that I should, if I couldn’t change that person, at least learn to be correctly ashamed of myself. Art was always an escape—because this isn’t already sounding trite and overly-familiar—and allowed me what I believed would be a way to relate to and connect with others. As I got older and tried to find my artistic identity, I found that what brought me the most joy to create was certainly not everyone’s cup of tea, but was also something that polite company like my family would be ashamed to be associated with. This led to me trying to create both what made me happy and what made my family happy. Now, don’t get me wrong, I do enjoy drawing landscapes and pet portraits, but it doesn’t make my heart sing quite as much as when I combine it with weird shit. Deep down, I know I developed it as another mask. It ultimately became just another way to not have to be myself.
To bring this back around, I wonder what damage I did to myself mentally. Trying to develop a career around what I wanted to do whilst simultaneously trying to create a career around art my family wouldn’t be ashamed to be associated with did me no favors when it came to financial success. Neither aspect got enough attention. Mentally though, mentally I was still just burning that candle at both ends trying to keep the mask on whilst trying to be myself and be happy.
Add to this a break-up right out of college that left me feeling absolutely broken and, yeah…I did a lot of damage to myself in my twenties. Art became less about creating something I enjoyed and more about trying to justify my right to exist. Art was like my way of trying to say that I mattered, but even with art, I wasn’t willing to take off the mask. Even now, nearing 40, I’m only able to because no one is paying attention.
Maybe that actually is the actual benefit of not seeing that success. As much as I’d rather be a working artist rather than someone who burns most of his energy and a lot of his time in jobs he would rather not be doing, at least I don’t have to mask. Maybe I’ve finally found a small little space to just be as close to myself as I can…provided no one knows about it.
Dicks for listening.