I need to draw more. I really miss having that outlet in my life. I also used to be good at it. I’ve been reading the greatest e-comic and seeing the art there makes me feel dumb and lazy for not doing it myself.

My mom gave me a set of erasers and art pens for Christmas (erasers figure prominently in my drawing technique so I always need new ones… erm… what?) and I haven’t even opened the packages. That is unacceptable. Also unacceptable is the fact that I haven’t produced a single piece of frame worthy art in well over a year. Not even a photograph. A couple of good show shots, but those don’t count as far as the creativity bug counts.

I know a big part of it is I’m afraid. Afraid I lost “it.” I have a stupidly little amount of formal training, 99% of it is trial and error and asking my mom (who is incredibly talented) for help. I’m afraid that since I let it go rusty I don’t have the disciplined, learned skill to bring it back. I also don’t know if I have the patience. It will take work to get back to where I was five years ago. I don’t know if I can trust myself not to get frustrated and give up, and I wouldn’t want to give up on this. It’s one of those things where if I give up it means I lose a piece of how I identify myself and that would be devastating. I know that sounds incredibly melodramatic, and I know it is, and on one level I don’t mean it in that way. On another, more primal level, though, it is completely true.

I also just miss the outlet, the chance to pour all the pent up crap onto a page, even if it is crap. I’ve been using other coping mechanisms, some healthy, some not so much, but they really aren’t the same. I can’t say I was happier when I was drawing, (in true emo, Van Gough style my best work seems to occur when I am the most miserable) but I was definitely more… centered? Aware? I’m not sure, but there was something there that isn’t right now and I want it back. At the same time, I can’t really force it; “it” doesn’t work that way (see: lack of formal training). “It” needs to be coaxed out of hiding, I need to start small, almost not trying, in order to coax it back out into the daylight, shake off the cobwebs and render “it” useful again. It’ll be shy and skittish and run away again at the worst possible times and I’ll need to relay the trail of breadcrumbs and start again.

Step one: Unwrap erasers.