I got that dreaded envelope in the mail today. You college kids know what I’m talking about. The one with the innocuous, yet strangely threatening reminder from the Registrar? The one with neat spaces to plan your future course load? The one that talks about declaring your major? That one. It came.
Maybe this isn’t such a big deal outside of Reed. Most colleges allow kids to dabble in uninterrupted, inter-disciplinary bliss — Art and Physics? Absolutely! Political Theory and English? Why not! Majors and Minors are nice that way. Unfortunately, working in a program like Reed’s, “minoring” in another subject generally means writing a second thesis.
Generally, I’m not one for New Year’s resolutions, but during my quiet celebrations to usher in 2010, it occurred to me that this would probably be a good year to start taking myself seriously.
Okay, that sounds wrong. The free-spirited are always preaching that whole “Don’t take yourself too seriously” schtick — and by and large, I agree. Life isn’t meant to be spent in deep, brooding contemplation. It’s for living — pure and simple. However, there’s a difference between taking life seriously and taking yourself seriously. And in my book, the latter has a lot to do with taking a certain amount credence away from things you end up doing for other people, and giving it liberally to the things you do for yourself. Especially in the halls of higher education, it’s really easy to lose track of those things you used to like doing on lazy afternoons. It’s easy to forget that you ever had lazy afternoons. Life is a whirlwind of things that must be accomplished for other people. Some of those things may be pleasurable, they may even line up with you personal interests, but there’s a lot to be said for giving the rest of the world the finger while you give yourself the time and resources you deserve to complete something that gets you fired up.
Where’s this going? Right here. I maintained a sporadic blog while traveling a couple years ago, and it proved a nice way to keep in touch with friends and family, but its time has long since passed. This blog is a little different. More evidential. More challenging. Even, should it come down to it, more coercive. It’s designed to keep me working, keep me thinking, keep me remembering to make time for the things I care about.
So welcome to the new arena for my artistic adventures. With any luck, this blog will track my progress as I begin self-publishing my new minicomic BAGGYWRINKLES, working towards my certificate in Comics and Independent Publishing from the Independent Publishing Resource Center in Portland, and getting the guts up to table at the Stumptown Comics Fest this coming Spring.
Stay tuned!
