Like Bats left to start their tour late last night. Though I recently made some adjustments to the cartoon I drew for them (for use as a tour poster) I was up before 6 AM this morning, so I figured I’d draw another cartoon inspired in part by one of the songs on their upcoming EP.
When I checked back in at Tranquil Shores (after getting kicked out) in October 2012, Like Bats had a show in Tampa just two days later that I was (consequently) unable to go to. It wasn’t until a month later that I found out they stopped by Tranquil Shores the next day to try and visit me. (Since I had just been readmitted, I wasn’t allowed visitors yet and they were turned away).
It’s been years since I saw Like Bats play live and I’ve never even met Matt and Alec, who stepped in when Kyle and Joey left the band. Seeing them play and seeing Mike and Dave (who’s on tour with them as usual) is one of the things I’m most excited about for next week.
It’s been a strange morning. (“Strange” being code for “I don’t feel like acknowledging what’s going on). When I first went outside today, it was early enough that it was still dark. And it was cold enough that I had to put on my jacket for the first time since February. I sat outside with coffee, pop tarts, cigarettes, and punk rock and thought about how much I missed rehab. A few minutes later, I realized I was sitting in some really shallow self-pity. I didn’t even know that I was necessarily upset, but I was embracing anything that made me feel sad – and reveling in how tragic it all felt. I was enjoying it in that way that kids like us do but – at the same time – I knew that a well-targeted attack/word could probably pull my pin like the Death Star and reduce me to a puddle – which would certainly take the fun out of it all.
I texted with a friend for a little bit and then drew this cartoon. I think I’ve got a grip on my day now.
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If you’re in any of these areas, go see Like Bats this week. They’re one of the best bands in existence today.
10/24- Boston, MA @ Fort Warner w/Peeple Watchin’
10/25- Hartford, CT @ Whitney House
10/26- Brooklyn, NY @ Lulu’s
10/27- Bethpage, NY @ Mr. Beery’s w/ Iron Chic
10/28- Baltimore, MD @ Charm City Art Space w/ Sick Sick Birds
10/30- Greenville, SC @ CFR
10/31- Gainesville, FL / The Fest
11/1- 10/31- Gainesville, FL / The Fest
11/2- 10/31- Gainesville, FL / The Fest
11/3- 10/31- Gainesville, FL / The Fest @ 1982
11/4- Athens, GA @ Flicker Theatre and Bar w/ Two Hand Fools
Here’s the first song I ever heard by Like Bats; it’s called “Lousy” and I love it as much today as I ever have.
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If you missed it, go read the short story I wrote that Razorcake posted on their website yesterday. It’s about me fucking over Rational Anthem in the desert.
“Normal Fuck b/w Who Do You Work For?” 10/21/13. Acrylic painting. 16×20″ stretched canvas.
Though it had become fairly regular with my expressive art therapy pieces, it’s been three months since I last felt compelled to cover my canvas with a sprawling journal entry. My newest painting though…
I take Adderall. If I don’t, I’m unproductive. But sometimes I can’t take my Adderall. Because I haven’t yet taken my Adderall. As much as I’d like to be clever – that’s not a joke. And when I admit that, it feels kind of pathetic.
I still don’t have a job, but I work at least eight hours a day. Many days, it’s much more than that. The work that I do is probably the only work that I’m capable of doing at this point in my life. It’s good for me and (it seems to be) good for a lot of other people too. It certainly seems to have more of a positive impact on the world than my work in [let’s say] a gas station would. It’s too bad that it doesn’t pay as well.
I’m not sure what my “job” is… Do I just do what I do, or do I need to dedicate the same kind of energy to marketing myself? I don’t wanna do that any more than I wanna work in a gas station.
I think a lot about “success” lately. I don’t think it’s just freedom (from rules, bosses, schedules, orders), I think it’s also… – I want to say freedom from anxiety – comfort (internally / spiritually). Excepting my EDD freak-outs, I stress about not having enough money to 1) pay bills and 2) keep Heather in love with me.
Look at that! I finally fucking admitted it!
You know… for a second, I thought this was big. But, really, it only means that I’m just like every other normal fuck on the planet.
Oh – shit. That is big.
Growing up, my dad taught me (or at least tried to teach me) a few things. One of those is at the crux of this piece. “If you don’t make enough money, (sooner or later) she’ll leave. It doesn’t matter how much she loves you. If you can’t afford to do things like go on vacation, then – eventually – she’ll find someone that can.”
My biggest regret (or possibly just the one I think of most) is something I said to Heather when we first started seeing each other. I was still living in Tranquil Shores then, so I was very much a blank slate; no one really had any idea what the fuck my life would look like even 30 days into the future. I had recently decided that I wanted to live, essentially, as I was at Tranquil Shores: I wanted to dedicate myself to art and other creative projects, and have a little time left to do standard mental health / recovery sorta stuff. When I told Heather, she asked how that could possibly be tenable in the long-term. I assured her that I was really clever – that I’d make it work somehow. And that “shit – if all else fails, I’ve got a fucking law degree from Georgetown – I can always go get a regular job. Work seasonally (or something like that). In any case, if I ever needed money, I’d be able to come up with it.” And why not? I always had in the past.
But “why not” is that I’m not a fucking drug addict anymore. Sure, I was always able to come up with money before but that’s because I was okay with heading over to the nearest college and stealing laptops (or anything else valuable I might come across). And – in case it doesn’t go without saying – I don’t do shit like that anymore. All that aside, what I emphasized was simply that I’mreally clever and that things are going to work out for me. I think I was more lacking in thoughtfulness than I was being dishonest.
When she told me she liked to go on vacations – and asked if I’d be able to afford something like that – the word probably rang that old bell in my head and sent me into panic mode. Without a second of pause, I just said “yes.”
Because of all that, I feel like I started this relationship under false pretenses – and now that I’ve already suckered her into liking me, it’s not the kind of thing I can just take back. In the end, I know it won’t make any difference (whether or not I promised to benot brokeone day); if I don’t ever make money (and it is an issue for her) it’s not like she’ll be obligated to stick around just because “she knew what she was getting into.” Then again, I was a heroin addict and a mental patient so… it might be fair to say that she knew (or at least should have known) what she was getting into either way.
I selected the “most outrageous” text from this piece for the title because I want to distract from how uncomfortable I am with the real subject. ”Who Do You Work For?” would make for a far more genuine title. I like it because it implies Heather and myself, as well as (potentially) a third-party audience (with – or instead of – Heather). After all, so much of the journal reads like I’m defending myself / trying to justify my life to someone. And just mentioning anything about financial anxiety within a piece of art makes the whole thing feel like a commercial solicitation (which also makes me uncomfortable).
Although, as Heather pointed out, I’m well aware that my pieces with journal entries on them as way less salable than the others and that by using her name in the piece (rather than a generic equivalent like “my girlfriend”) I made it even less salable. Which makes me happy – to spot concrete evidence that, though I might stress out about money in relation to my art, that tension isn’t influencing me in such a way as to detract from my (or my art’s) authenticity. I don’t ever make something with salability in mind; I just fucking make it. So while I may prove to be a commercial failure – so long as I honor myself and my expression – I can still be a personal success. And maybe that’s enough…
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In the journal written on the actual painting, I mention “EDD freakouts.” Emotional dysregulation disorder and borderline personality disorder are one in the same. I usually use the latter since it’s the more well-known but, in this case, I felt that EDD was a better descriptive term.
“Case For Pillow.” 10/18/13. Needle, thread, fabric, and marker. 26×26″ (length x girth).I just finished my most impressive work to date. (Our futon pillows don’t fit in regular pillow cases so… needle + thread + two pieces of fabric leftover from when I made “Gift Horse” + fabric marker = “Case For Pillow”).
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“Landfill.” 10/17/13. Marker on envelope. 9×10″.
In between addressing it and sticking it in the mailbox, I scribbled some shit on the back of an envelope while smoking a cigarette. Seven months ago, I wrote a note in my phone that said, “I’ll get to that landfill one day.” I don’t remember what the fuck that means, but I remember that it was really funny at the time! Now… not so much. Eh.
“The Island in Pinocchio Where Bad Kids Go to Be Bad.” 10/5/13. Acrylic and watercolor paint, food coloring, resin sand, and pen. 16×20″ stretched canvas.
Delray Beach has more rehabs, halfway houses, and treatment institutions (of all kinds) than any other city. It’s the so-called “recovery capital of the world,” which – by default – also makes it the relapse capital of the world. While plenty go to Delray and get better, just as many go and get much, much worse. The streets of Delray are swarmed with young, drug-addled fuck-ups from all parts of the country, which is why I love to joke that it’s the real world correlate of the island in Pinocchio where bad kids go to be bad. I got to town the night of January 20, 2012 and met her the very next day.
But fast forward to the last time I ever saw her: August 1, 2012, when we left the St. Louis airport on separate planes. She flew to Minneapolis to check into her fifth rehab and I flew back to Miami to collect some things. When I wound up in rehab myself (just sixteen days later) I didn’t know if we’d ever see each other again. As was evident in the journal entries I wrote during my first weekend at Tranquil Shores, I was confused. I thought about her a lot but did I love her? I argued the point both ways with myself. Tranquil Shores allowed me limited use of my cell phone after a time and (while her facility didn’t) she managed to get a prepaid phone smuggled in. I was making big strides in my treatment and trying to play by the rules and I encouraged her to do the same. I told her our relationship was distracting both of us from our treatment. She disagreed and took offense. Our phone calls got to be less frequent, shorter, and more argumentative. When I found myself getting wrapped up in other girls and starting to recognize the full extent of my codependency, I decided that my relationship with her had been more of the same. We had been close enough that I – of course – cared about and loved her, but I decided that it wasn’t a romantic love and that we had only been drawn together by shared emotional defects.
On April 21, 2013, I had eight months clean and she was checking into rehab for the seventh time. I wrote her a letter and shared all the things I had done differently in my last round of treatment that I thought had finally made it count. I also explained our relationship to her: how we hadn’t really been in love but just had a kind of survivor’s bond from running the streets of south Florida for five months after being kicked out of treatment. She didn’t get the letter but saw it on her way out the door. (Her counselor tried to use it as a bargaining chip to get her to stay but to no avail). She left and called me. I was frustrated that she had walked out and I was tired of trying to help when she didn’t seem willing to help herself. Why the fuck would she leave treatment again? By even taking her phone calls and trying to be supportive whenever she’d put herself in situations like this, I was enabling her continued decline. My counselor advised that I set a boundary and I did. “Until you have three months clean, we can’t talk.”
A few weeks ago, I got a text message. Five months after I had set the boundary, she had her three months. Or so she said. I had my doubts but I decided to take her word for it and I’d like to believe that it’s the truth. I told her she could call and she did. She was initially combative (there were some resentments a full year in the making) but the conversation lightened as time passed and, ninety minutes in, she said she had something she needed to tell me. She thanked me and said she couldn’t imagine what might have happened to her had I not stuck with her when we were put out on the street. She said that I was exactly the person she needed at that point in her life and that – being just a little bit older, wiser, and more experienced – I had saved her from who-knows-what terrible fate. And she said that she wouldn’t be the person she is today had it not been for my presence and influence, which had proven to be both tremendous and positive.
My kneejerk (internal) reaction was that I was a piece of shit and that we had been nothing but bad for each other – that we had kept each other sick. I put that aside for the moment as she continued to speak. I was sort of dumbstruck by what I was hearing. These were not the kinds of words I’d expect from her. She had always been boastful, independent, and above everything. Nothing could touch her; nothing could shake her. Nobody could teachher anything because she already knew everything. That was the girl as I remembered her. Her words forced me to remember another girl though: a side of her that I hadn’t seen or thought of in a long time. In an instant, I realized that I was wrong to assume that I knew her mind better than she did; I was wrong to tell her that she hadn’t really been in love with me. I had impacted her life in ways that I had never really considered (or had at least forgotten about). She always played so tough and, even though I knew it was just a wall she used to protect herself, I had forgotten that the wall wasn’t so thick as to actually keep anything from ever making it through.
After we hung up, I thought about the reaction I had stowed after being floored and humbled by the impact of her words. I remembered something that I had told myself over and over in those days: that I had to stay with her because – as bad as things might have been with me – I knew that they’d be far worse without me. At the time, I thought I could actually save her (save both of us) and that we could get well together. While I was absolutely wrong on that point, I really did look out for her and things really would have been far worse for her had I not been there. That part was true. For everything that I had done wrong, I couldn’t (or shouldn’t) discount the good that I had done as well.
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Before we hung up that night, she also commissioned me to paint something for her. I’ve been working on it, off and on, ever since but I finally finished it last night. In making it, I reflected on our relationship, which now spans twenty months. Three incidents came to mind that struck me as being particularly significant. I journaled about them directly on the canvas but it’s so layered that most of my words were washed away by watercolors or obscured by acrylics or food coloring.
The first incident was a night I had forgotten about – a time when the question of our love’s authenticity was nowhere near my mind. It was late at night, storming, and we were parked in the lot at the treatment facility that had kicked us out a month prior. [The treatment center and patient residence were separate properties, so the building was empty; it was a place to park that we knew cops wouldn’t come around]. We were in the backseat, fooling around, and had stripped down to nothing. Then – at some point, for whatever reason – we got out of the car, totally naked and in spite of the sheets of rain that were slamming down on top of us. Standing upright, in that parking lot, in the middle of that storm, we had sex. If that sounds dirty or cheap or vulgar, it wasn’t. We may have been living like homeless, scummy, junkie street urchins – and maybe wewere – but in that moment we were young, in love, and free – invincible.I felt like I had an amazing secret that the rest of the world would never know or understand. It was beautiful. I thought so then and – in that way – I still do.
The second was the day we ripped off a drug dealer and almost got ourselves killed. In anticipation of this entry’s length, I went ahead and wrote out that story two days ago in a separate entry. It’s a very different anecdote and has nothing to do with love or freedom; it’s just sad and desperate.
The third incident (and the only one of which my journals of are still somewhat visible on the canvas) was the recent phone call itself. It forced me, for the first time, to really look at and question the narrative I had constructed to explain (and discount) our relationship. Not only did she remind me that night that I don’t have things quite as figured out as I sometimes like to think, but also that truth is relative to the individual. I hate it when people try to tell me what I’m feeling and I was doing exactly that to her. I thought I was so reflective and enlightened when, in reality, I was being thoughtless, arrogant, and invalidating. Who was I to say that she wasn’t/had never been truly in love with me? Besides, what the fuck does that even mean? To be in love with someone. I think I know but does anyone ever really?
Maybe I was in love (and maybe I wasn’t). Whatever it was, I’m grateful for it – the good memories and the bad.
I played Calvin Mather in the short film “No Real Than You Are.” During the four weeks I was in town to work on the movie, I tried to pitch in with whatever I could to be helpful. This is some of my “prop work”: a perfect replica of a Walgreens prescription label. Every detail is exactly as it would be if Calvin were… you know… not a character in a movie. That’s the address and phone number for the Walgreens closest to the address I chose for him (my last address before going to rehab in December 2011). It was a shitty little box of a studio apartment that had mushrooms growing out of the carpet. I pulled ’em out, sprayed fungicide and other assorted chemicals, but they’d always grow back. Eventually I relented and just accepted them as part of my home. I kinda liked ’em.
So while this isn’t anything like my usual “art,” I think it counts. I didn’t have a scanner so I had to create it from scratch – and everything is 100% dead on. (Go ahead! Pull out a prescription bottle from Walgreens and see how it measures up!)
Another project I did for the movie… The night before the filming of the first scene in which a character would be sniffing oxycodone, I found out that the powder the crew had been planning to use (instead of real drugs) wasn’t going to work. So Chris Spillane and I went to Walmart at 2am and bought vitamins, food dye, hose clamps, bowls, a lamp, and a lightbulb and cooked up a pile of “oxycodone” that looked extraordinarily like the real thing. Walmart probably gets its share of sketchy characters during the third shift, but I think Chris and I won the contest that night. We both had a pretty good time with the whole thing. I remember laughing a lot that night, especially while we were still in the store. Back at the apartment, I was reminded of being a seventeen year old drug dealer, cutting cocaine with vitamins and acetone.
A couple days later, when we ran out of the stuff and needed more, I had Chris – plus Tola and Alex (the production designer and leadman) – sitting on the floor in my apartment, grinding away at vitamins as I mixed, colored, and cooked them. It felt like I was actually running a fake drug manufacture scam!
I would have loved to have been the cashier that rang us up.I had to sleep with the light on so our “drugs” would be ready for the shoot in the morning.
In case you’re wondering… while this is what went up the noses of the actors that sniffed “drugs,” it is not what my character was injecting whenever he did a shot. For that, I used blue Gatorade. While there were some concerns that injecting Gatorade might be dangerous… Back when I was shooting heroin everyday, I was pretty shiftless; if there was no water within reach but a bottle of Gatorade sitting next to me, I’d just put that in my spoon instead. Electrolytes are good for you, you guys.
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“No Real Than You Are” is currently raising money to help with the costs of post-production. If you’d like to contribute (or just watch the trailer), check out their Kickstarter page.
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Bent Outta Shape fans will probably enjoy that the RX# on Calvin’s prescription is telephone spelling for “IYDKMRNIGE.”
When I was asked to consider how I present myself to the world, I was able to identify four different “roles” that I play. While all of them are genuine parts of who I am, what’s not genuine is how I’ll focus on (or “play up”) whichever will best suit me in some situation. These days, I try to be authentic but I (of course) still do it to some degree. We all do.
I like this cartoon a lot but—in all honesty—it’s kind of bullshit. I hardly ever put myself out there in such a way as to risk being rejected by a girl. I just thought this up one night because I knew it’d be cute and it’d fit well with my “wounded child / stray dog” persona that some girls seem to find so endearing and attractive.
As redundant as my art may be at times, it’s incredibly rare that I’ll make the same thing twice. This cartoon is one of those exceptions. Below are some journal excerpts that explain why I wanted to create this image again and [bonus!] paint a pretty good picture of a kid with low self-esteem, trying to solve his problems with female attention.
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Tranquil Shores Journal, November 16th, 2012:
Saw Kelly at the Church of the Isles meeting last night. First time since she bolted from Tranquil Shores. She came up to me and was really flirty. Lightly kicked me ‘cause I was sitting on a curb smoking a cigarette and then sat down next to me. I kicked it with her at the Fairwinds table. Or – rather – I sat down at a table and they all sat down with me. She didn’t sit next to me, but across from me (which I commented on). We made funny faces throughout the meeting, with occasional little comments. I drew a picture of Satan with the caption, “Anal Sex and Goat’s Blood,” and passed it across the table to her. She asked if she could keep it and then pointed out that the crumpled paper on the table (that she had thrown at me a little earlier) was actually a note. I uncrumpled it; it said, “You’re hot.” I gave her a look. After the meeting, we traded numbers. I’m looking forward to that. Though she does have a boyfriend, he just got arrested so I don’t think it’ll be an obstacle. Not that I want to date her anyway. I do think she’s cool, but she’s not ready to get better. They don’t get to keep their phones in Fairwinds but she gets out in eight days.
I broke up with Chelsea. She keeps going back and forth. Trying to be mean to me, begging me to still be with her, saying I used her, trying to pull me back in with sex appeal (“I want you in my bed right now; I want to have sex with you so bad”). It’s all over the place. For the time being, I blocked her on Facebook. I think it should stay that way so she’s not perpetually flipping her shit every time there’s any activity on my page.
Alexis coins out in three weeks. I’m not thrilled about that.
Met another girl at the meeting on Tuesday. Lilly. She’s from Lexington. I said I had some friends there. “Anybody I’d know?” I asked if she ever went to shows or was at all into punk. “Sort of.” Turns out while she didn’t know the kids I named, she is friends with Infected (that sorta-metal punk band on A.D.D.). Outstanding. [I don’t know those guys, but that’s close enough to my world]. She was cute. Not insanely hot, but definitely a cute girl. We talked for a long while before the meeting, while Alexis sat to my left feeling totally neglected (I’m sure) which I kind of enjoyed. I had done the same thing with/to her back when Kelly was at Tranquil Shores and it only got her to pay more attention to me. At one point, Lilly was fishing in her bag for something to show me that she thought I’d get a kick out of. She couldn’t find it and told me she’d show it to me “next time” so after the meeting, I asked for a pen and gave her my number and Facebook. She hasn’t hit me up yet, but it’s only been a couple days.
The property staff is out of town for some training seminar so the clinical and office staffs are filling in as our weekend babysitters. Should be fun.
Tracy came by and I played “Song For the Desperate” for her. She liked “parts of it.”
When she left, it was just Ashley and I. We talked about girls and boys and rehab romance and I told her about Jesse’s coin out and running into Kelly last night. I also tricked her into telling me how much Tranquil Shores pays her (and then pointed that out). It was fun talking to her. I think she’ll be a good counselor.
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Tranquil Shores Journal, December 6th, 2012:
Kelly never called but word is Fairwinds decided to hold her for another 30 [which means she still doesn’t have a phone].For the first time since I saw her there, we went to Church of the Isles for our meeting tonight. I was looking forward to it all week ‘cause Fairwinds is always there on Thursdays. Until tonight… Maybe I’ll see her when we come back on the 20th.
Willa [who I met at Blind Pass recently] was at the meeting though, so maybe it’s for the best that Kelly wasn’t. I sat with her and pulled (what I guess is now) my “Church of the Isles” trick: I drew a picture and passed it to her. It was a fucked up looking kid offering a flower to a pretty (but disgusted or annoyed) looking girl, captioned “My Autobiography.” She said something nice but didn’t ask if she could keep it. But she did pass me a note with her phone number in it.
After the meeting, I went outside and sat on the curb to smoke a cigarette. Alexis came out and sat down next to me. I pulled the “My Autobiography” cartoon from my pocket and showed it to her. “Did you make this for me?” she asked. I froze for just a second and then nodded and smiled, “I did!” She was really into it. It’s funny how things play out sometimes.
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Journal, April 7th, 2013:
On top of everything else that happened yesterday, Alexis sent me a text. It’s gotten less and less frequent and I’m not sure why she even bothers at this point. It’s so pointless and she acts so oblivious. I tried to have a conversation with her and when that proved impossible, I just asked her to please send me a picture of my cartoon like she promised. It’s the one thing I’ve made that I don’t have a picture of. She told me when she moved out that she hung it next to her bed but I can never actually get her to send the picture. I think it’s because she knows it’s the one thing she’s got to keep me from ignoring her outright.
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Journal, June 21st, 2013:
Not that I expected her to show up this weekend [for the Tranquil Shores Alumni Reunion], but I just found out that Alexis violated her probation (again) and is almost certainly going to jail for the next decade or so. I saw it coming but it still… it’s just sad how fast she went from “shining star of recovery” to “totally fucked in the head and making all the wrong decisions.” We both let each other fuck us up a little bit but she was still my best friend for a while there—and I really thought she was going to do well. I really wanted her to do well.
In any case, it’s a safe bet that I’m never getting a picture of that cartoon. Is it fucked up for me to even think of that?
“You Make Me a Worse Person (I’ll Feed My Negativity and Roast in My Fucking Hate).” 6/21/13. Colored pencil. 9×12″.
I had to bring my scooter with me because I was going to be in south Florida for the next month. When I loaded it into the back of her car, I accidentally scraped the bumper. She was angry.
The document verifying that I had completed my community service was due with my probation officer that afternoon. I asked if we could stop somewhere to print it out before we left town. That was also a problem.
We were in no hurry and my probation was on the line. This was important to me. Why was it an issue? I didn’t understand. I was hurt so I didn’t insist upon it; I just got in the car, dejected.
We had a four-hour drive and in that time we didn’t speak at all. Eleven days after moving in together and just two days after the explosion of sunshine and fucking rainbows that was “Out All Day,”this is what came out of me… In bits and pieces, it says:
FUCK EVERYTHING. I’m ready to be dead now. This is a drain. I failed today. Can I say “everyday?” Fuck community service. Fuck being a responsible human being. Fuck the scratches on your stupid fucking car. Fuck our apartment. You make me a worse person. I’ll feed my negativity and roast in my fucking hate.
[If you’re not familiar with borderline personality disorder, that’s what it looks like]. Here’s what I wrote about this piece when I was done with it:
I don’t wanna share this ’cause I don’t wanna give people the impression that I’m unhappy. But fuck that. Real life isn’t a simple narrative on a straight trajectory in one direction. My art can say, “I couldn’t be happier,” one day, and “fuck everything, I’m ready to be dead now” on the next. That’s reality and I’m not into painting a picture of my life that’s any less honest than I’m capable of being.
This scribble isn’t exactly “art fully realized” but I held on to it like I would a photograph. It’s a document, an artifact, or a memory – and not a bad one. This was cathartic and it was an opportunity…
I didn’t have my website yet but I was already regularly sharing my artwork and (sometimes) related writings through my Facebook page. To that extent, my day-to-day and my emotional process had become a public spectacle of sorts. I always feel awkward acknowledging this but my art has come to mean something to people (friends, fans of my old record label, even total strangers). I’ve received more than a few emails and messages from people telling me how powerfully they’ve been affected by something I made or wrote. I’ve been regularly called “an inspiration.” [I feel especially awkward acknowledging that]. But it’s been amazing, encouraging, and – in turn – has truly inspired me. One consequence, however, is that I feel like I have a responsibility now. With this piece, I had a choice: Did I want to be some icon of hope or did I want to be honest about what my life, in recovery, is really like? In sharing it, I opted for the latter, and I’ve done my best to honor that decision every day since.
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When I first added this piece to the website, there was a journal entry from that day (9/22/13) along with it. I later decided to make that a separate entry.
Like Bats left to start their tour late last night. Though I recently made some adjustments to the cartoon I drew for them (for use as a tour poster) I was up before 6 AM this morning, so I figured I’d draw another cartoon inspired in part by one of the songs on their upcoming EP.
