Crises, Existential and Otherwise
Sep. 24th, 2024 06:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pshaw_ravenWe're keeping an eye on this tropical system down in the Caribbean right now. Last night it was expected to develop into a category three storm within two days which is terrifyingly fast. It should be making landfall Thursday around the Big Bend area, but obviously the track can and will change. We're making some preliminary preparations right now and by tomorrow morning I'll know if I need to go fight crowds in town for a more extensive supply run. As it is, we may simply have a long power outage. And Waffle House is still open, LOL.
I'm trying to remember now - why did I want my stories to be in the form of comics? Probably because I like comics and I like to draw, but writing was always my strongest point. I'm a slow, meticulous artist, which doesn't allow me knock out pages of comics easily and has me agonizing over poses all day. The thing I'm working on right now, Lora, for example, has something like another thirty pages to go? I forget how many rough pages I laid out. And I cut a bunch of stuff from the story to make the comic something I might be able to finish before I die.
So, why don't I just write? If it needs a picture, I can do some illustrations or short comics. Actually I like doing short comics - around five to ten pages.
Why not write? I'm an English major who focused on literary criticism. I know how a story goes together. I know how world building works. I know where my towel is. People have said they like my art, yes, but I've had people put down a piece of writing I did and say, "Wow, that's really great." So ... why am I not writing?
I don't have a good answer for that aside from the fact that I kind of always wanted to be a cartoonist, but I'm now having to admit that my style of art is just not well suited to it. Of course that doesn't solve the problem of Lora being unfinished, but it makes future projects feel SO much less daunting.
I started re-reading some Gene Wolfe novels, and I suppose that helped nudge me. Every writer has that one author who makes you strive to be a better writer yourself, whether that's Gene Wolfe, Patrick O'Brien, or Ursula LeGuin. I just haven't been reading as much lately. My brain sometimes feels too wrapped in fog to do much of anything intellectual. Hopefully the changing weather will help - summer is just something to be endured, white-knuckling your way through the heat until one morning, the thermometer says 66, and you go outside and you can breathe. Or perhaps that's just me, a person who takes the Florida license plates that say "Endless Summer" as some sort of threat. Always summer! Always summer and never Halloween.
I'm trying to remember now - why did I want my stories to be in the form of comics? Probably because I like comics and I like to draw, but writing was always my strongest point. I'm a slow, meticulous artist, which doesn't allow me knock out pages of comics easily and has me agonizing over poses all day. The thing I'm working on right now, Lora, for example, has something like another thirty pages to go? I forget how many rough pages I laid out. And I cut a bunch of stuff from the story to make the comic something I might be able to finish before I die.
So, why don't I just write? If it needs a picture, I can do some illustrations or short comics. Actually I like doing short comics - around five to ten pages.
Why not write? I'm an English major who focused on literary criticism. I know how a story goes together. I know how world building works. I know where my towel is. People have said they like my art, yes, but I've had people put down a piece of writing I did and say, "Wow, that's really great." So ... why am I not writing?
I don't have a good answer for that aside from the fact that I kind of always wanted to be a cartoonist, but I'm now having to admit that my style of art is just not well suited to it. Of course that doesn't solve the problem of Lora being unfinished, but it makes future projects feel SO much less daunting.
I started re-reading some Gene Wolfe novels, and I suppose that helped nudge me. Every writer has that one author who makes you strive to be a better writer yourself, whether that's Gene Wolfe, Patrick O'Brien, or Ursula LeGuin. I just haven't been reading as much lately. My brain sometimes feels too wrapped in fog to do much of anything intellectual. Hopefully the changing weather will help - summer is just something to be endured, white-knuckling your way through the heat until one morning, the thermometer says 66, and you go outside and you can breathe. Or perhaps that's just me, a person who takes the Florida license plates that say "Endless Summer" as some sort of threat. Always summer! Always summer and never Halloween.
