It's after 1am and I'm in bed with Nick at Nite on mute. The cat is under the covers curled up at my feet. It must be a kitty sauna in there since I'm running a fever close to 100. Oh well, I'm glad someone in this house is warm, because I'm freezing.
This is the second time in as many months that I've been sick. I know where I got this one (thanks Ardra!) but it's really frustrating that it hits me NOW of all times. I just started working out again two weeks ago. My boyfriend and I broke up last Tuesday. I've had to cut back on my hours so that I've basically taken a 25% pay cut, and now I might be missing work if I don't get rid of this fever. I'm on the verge of starting a new life and I don't even feel like living it--that's not a suicidal post-breakup thought mind you, it's a sick thought. My mind has energy my body finds repulsive. I HATE BEING SICK.
I understand that there is a process to life, just like there is a process to art. I don't understand speedbumps like illness--maybe it's the universe forcing me to rest--but for the most part I understand the process. The process is what it's all about. A weird thing happened after I sent off my reel to Pixar... instead of getting excited about a possible phone call, I just sort of thought, "eh." Really. After all that work, turning my back bedroom into a photo studio, freezing to death taking pictures in a car graveyard, staying up all night drawing, all I had to say at the end was "eh." It wasn't about the goal. Looking back, I don't think it ever was about the goal. It was about the process. The process itself is what made me feel alive, what got me out of bed every day and almost stopped me from going back to bed every night. And now I'm just fine if I never hear from Pixar. Sure, if they call I'll be out there on the first flight for an interview, but if they don't, it's really ok. Obviously I won't ever hear from ILM again, and that's ok too. First I thought, if they're going to treat their applicants this way, I don't want to work for them anyway (true), but again it's about the process. I would get there, get my tiny little studio apartment, and I would be working my way up to doing just one thing. I would get to Pixar and be doing just one thing. Just one thing. I've never been happy doing just one thing over and over, day after day after day. Never.
It's obvious to me now, I have to do this on my own terms. I have to be an artist. Not a lighter or a shader or a compositor. An artist. My own work, in my own time, on my own terms. My own stories. The entire process. This is what 2008 had to tell me about myself, and that's fine. I went in with a goal but also an open mind, knowing that the outcome could be completely different from what I thought I was going for. This is what I came out with, and I'm actually very happy with it. Now I can do whatever I want, however I want, from beginning to end.
But that changes the job game quite a bit. I'm done at Collin County in February. I have a freelance gig starting right after that, and it should take me through another couple of months. Still web. Do you know how much I hate web, how much I wanted Collin County to be the last web job I ever had? Well, it will keep me eating and paying rent so I won't complain. But I had to say that just once. I hate web. Ok more than once. I'm done now.
"Trust the process," I remind myself. The process of life does involve eating on a regular basis. I do know how lucky I am, really I do. And I like my boss. Heck, it's a lot of programming and very little design so I'll probably end up enjoying it before it's all over. I do like a challenge after all. And BWC pretty much cured me of wanting to be a designer. Not their fault, I'm just not good at putting so much effort into something to only have someone else's design picked, which they spent like five minutes on because they pretty much stole it from a bunch of other people's designs. Or to have 42 different logos rejected by the same client because they think they know our job better than we do. I can't deal with that. But with programming, either it works or it doesn't. I get it to work and I've accomplished something. I get it to work fast and I've accomplished a little more. Nothing subjective about it. And nothing personal. You always know when you've done it right, and it's not whenever some idiot with no concept of what you really do tells you so.
So the job situation changes. I do still need one, a permanent one. One with health benefits. I've been on Cobra since I quit BWC, but they renew their insurance in June and considering how things are going over there, there's no telling what kind of hillbilly scheme they'll come up with this year. But I digress. My goals are not about getting into entertainment now, they're about living a truly artistic life. And I have found North Texas to be probably the worst place to be an artist, at least the kind who needs the support of other artists. Not that there's anything wrong with old ladies painting watercolor bluebonnets, they just wouldn't get my creepy doll theme. Few people do, actually.
Denver, however, is a great place for an artist. They have classes, they have groups, and there's my mom, who as a painter herself, knows where to find all of them. There's scenery. What good is a plein air paint set if all you have is a view of 75? And there's also a job, with a medical simulation company. It's a programming job. I love programming. I left MultiGen because I hated the military stuff. But medical? Could be very, very cool.
And imagine having enough money, and perhaps even enough time (no mandatory Saturdays getting a film out the door) to own my own house and produce my own work. With the support of other artists, this could be exactly what I'm looking for. But I'm keeping my mind open, "trusting the process" as they say.
It's true though. If you focus only on the goal, getting it or not getting it, being there now or not being there yet, things fall apart. When I get on the treadmill at the gym I have to look at it as a process or I won't get on it again. When I create a piece of art, the enjoyment is in the creation of it or else I wouldn't do it. And as far as life goes, that's the process you have to trust most of all. Part of that process, unfortunatey, is seeing doors close. The end of a job, the end of a relationship, it's all part of a process to teach you what you need to learn, to get you where you need to go. We have what we need when we need it and when we don't need it anymore, it disappears. If you don't trust that you don't need it anymore, and you keep trying to hang on, you get stuck and you never go anywhere. You limit how happy you can ever be. You wake up one day and realize you've settled for less than what you can really have because you were afraid to see what else was out there. You have to let the doors close and the windows open.
So that being said, I'm looking for the windows right now. I'll still need a goal, I can't create art without one. But there are festivals, competitions, and there's always SIGGRAPH. There are plenty of deadlines to go around. I just need a stable job to support it all. And an idea of course, but I'm already working on that one. Look for that in a future post.
