Sorry, Tolstoy.

Collage of notes for a comic meet-up plus self-Portrait. Magic Cephalopod character is Lynda Barry’s

 

I read What It Is by Lynda Barry this week and was very moved. This book was one of several wonderful graphic novels I got my hands on recently, and it is reassuring how varied they are. It becomes easy to see that art is not only arranged in a scale of poor to great but perhaps more consequentially in broad and overlapping spectrums, where quality takes many forms. All unhappy artworks are unhappy in their own way. All happy artworks are happy in their own way, too.

I am being unnecessarily vague. I just mean, the variety of great artwork is comforting now, whereas it used to be overwhelming. I was afraid I would not be able to make a contribution. I felt I needed to be the best. Finally, I see that there is no such thing.

When I had little time and energy for art, my reaction to other people's good works was always envy. Now it might be admiration, intense interest for the purpose of my own learning, the desire to provide resources or other support to the artist. When I look at very good artwork now, I still have a first emotional reaction of insecurity, something like, "I could never do something that good!" I find, though, that my follow on reactions are swift, and more constructive, now that I have more time and energy for my own work, now that I am finally doing my work. My second reaction, it might be something like, "they are very good at what they do! That is not what I want to do, but I like it." Or, "I could learn a lot from this person. I wish I had mentoring opportunities."

The many beauties of Barry’s book include its countless unexpected therapeutic moments nestled within its colorful tapestry. I was able through reading her book to identify a growing wrongness I have been feeling over the last few days. When I left my job in August, I reveled in the increased time I have for my children and my artwork, and how both are benefiting, as I am. But lately I am finding myself constantly refreshing social media stats. Worrying about my shoulder pain. Fretting that I don’t know exactly what to do at every minute of the day. Just having a lot of distracting thoughts, that are clearly pretty useless. It's the sort of anxiety I feel when I don't have certainty.

But I am new to all this, and of course I don’t know very much right now, and have a great deal to learn, and this is a lovely thing – beginner's mind – when you can accept it. Frankly, at the moment I don’t need to ask myself if something I make is good or bad, or even if I am using my time exactly as I should at a given moment. I don’t know if I am doing the right things, and I shouldn’t know. You can see in the picture above a kind of squid creature. Barry calls this the magic cephalopod, and as I understand her, it seems to represent the part of ourselves, or our whole self, that we listen to when we're making our art. It is the antithesis of two questions that close an artist down and distance them from the connection they need to have to themselves. The two questions have to do with judging, is this good? Does this suck? Through my life, they have had a terrible influence on me, as they always do on everyone, I guess. The cephalopod lives in the don't-know space, and that is where I'm trying to stay.

I tried a first exercise, included at the back of this beautiful and wise part-biography, part visual guide, meant to lead artists (back) into their imagination. She asks readers to picture cars that have had significance in one's life, and eventually we are asked to call up an image related to one of these cars – an experience, a memory – and write about it.

So I thought up my ten cars. I remembered a lot of cars from my youth in the 70s and 80s, station wagons, orange Volvo, and my own cars later in life. Next, I focused in on a particular moment with one of them. Wrote about it, using her many writing prompts. I chose to write about a large pickup truck my family had when I was a teenager. It was a Dodge Ram, red, with an extended cab and extended flat.

I remember taking my drivers test in that car, and how the tester told me he'd never had someone do the test in a vehicle that long. I think it was 13 feet, something like 4 m? I couldn't perform the three-point turn in the tiny space provided. I did not find the test very challenging, because I had recently done a weekend motorcycle course with my mom that she and I pushed to finish despite a weekend-long torrential downpour. We were soaked, rain in our underwear and bras, but by Sunday night we were legal to drive the new family dirtbike. 

After completing Barry's exercise, I decided to sketch the truck, because the mental image of the lineup at the testing facility of all the cars, with my gigantic red truck in the middle, was so strong.

But when I draw the truck, I'm not the person behind the wheel. Instead, it's my dad I see. And, the lines of the truck, its color, metal, the shape of the lights, they appear under my pencil more similar to that old Volvo from my childhood. And he is not the age he was when I was a teenager. Instead, he is almost a young man, a young father with his first wrinkles on his brow. He looks afraid, again, not something that I drew on purpose.

I realized earlier this week how unhappy my parents where when I was a child. We did not have an easy time. A story for a different day. It's funny how we can take decades to recognize something so simple.