i've been utterly knackered for the last two weeks. i've successfully fought off the plague that's cheerfully laying waste to my circle of friends and coworkers, but to accomplish that, my body's throwing all its energy into the immune system. i plan to spend the holiday weekend sleeping and painting. with some light napping, just to change it up a bit. if i were feeling diligent, i'd practice karate, but seeing as how monday night found me holding a makeshift ice pack to my back in class, maybe not.
as a result of feeling like an animated corpse, i've not had much interesting to say. zombies aren't known for intelligent discourse.
comic-con is looming; only six months. i have absolutely nothing new in my portfolio, despite giving over my saturdays to frustration with liquin, turps, and oils. i have a great stack of exercises that should never see the light of day. i'm not sure even gesso would work to cover those trainwrecks up; i'd be afraid that the wretchedness would seep through and contaminate whatever i painted on top. i spent one four-week session wiping everything i painted off the canvases. i'd start, get frustrated immediately, then wipe all the paint off. sometimes i'd almost feel optimistic about nearly getting close to painting what i saw, and then the painting would mysteriously have gone wrong 20 minutes ago, so i'd wipe that, too. i've neatly managed to waste almost a year. so add some self-flagellation in there, though i don't know when in my life i'd have found enough time to get rested enough or good enough to paint something personal or thoughtful or meaningful. no, there was no time, because i stupidly spent my hours working at the day job, doing favors for friends, or other pro bono work, when i wasn't in classes or on the freeway, or helping friends and family out.
this is exactly the point at which i hit one of my moods in which i glower and swear that i will never do another nice thing for any other human ever again, and those grasping assholes who only speak to me because they want something from me can just go fuck right off. that mood lasts about as long as it takes me to unthinkingly answer, 'sure, i can do that,' when asked to do something for someone. and that, dear reader, is when i begin not answering my phone or emails.
i might surprise myself and have all the knowledge i absorbed in class coalesce into my skill. if that happens, i expect paintings to start leaping from my hands like athena from zeus' skull. i might surprise myself and stop automatically saying yes. i might surprise myself and stop wiping the canvas clean.