I finished my final comic for the Sequential Artists’ Workshop Year Long Program! Here’s Walk Like Me , followed by some thank-yous, future plans, and a personal update.
And now, for closing thoughts. It’s been a great year of learning how to do something new, and I didn’t do it alone:
Thank You For Your Support
I’ve come so far and had so much support! It started with little dreams and welcoming people and places - someone on a message board that said I could make comics of my dog; sitting at the bar at my favorite restaurant, feeling welcome there while dreaming over a manhattan - should I learn something new? - my partner Brian gushing over every little doodle I make him “ I love your drawings”! - showing my sketchbook to family “you should go for it! “… these little moments go on and on. So thank you.
Then when I got to SAW, I learned how to tell stories and to draw gestures and expressions and to think about why we are making art at all in the first place. I learned how to take feedback, how to give feedback, how to support others, how to find ideas, how to draw piles of garbage. If I never make another comic, it would have been worth it to learn all those things, and because it makes me appreciate how freaking hard it is to create in this medium if you’re working independently and how hard it is to grow without other people. And holy shit, the work my classmates are doing is amazing! I don’t want it to be over.
All I wanted was to make one thing that one person saw that didn’t already live with me. And now I know what that feels like!
What’s Next
It’s been a lifelong dream for me to have something in print; Walk Like Me is going to be in a print anthology through SAW!
I’ve got another comic that will be in a digital anthology in a few months. More details to come!
Currently I’m trying to decide whether to jump into another 6-month intensive to work on a longer form project versus work on some smaller comics on my own and have a more chill summer.
I also have a couple of collaborations I want to explore (you know who you are, I’ve been lazy about contacting you)!
And of course I could make endless comics about movies!
Other ideas the universe throws me.
Not having deadlines from the SAW Year Long Program has freed up a lot of time, but without deadlines I haven’t made anything since Walk Like Me. But I’ll go easy on myself since I finished this one less than a month ago…
That’s all about finishing the Year Long Program. Now, onto a mental health update. Content warning: depression/mental health struggles.
A Phoenix Moment and a Bowl of Beans
So you might notice that all the rest of my comics on this Substack are no longer here. Well, I’m going to be open about this as it’s mental health awareness month and all.
I deleted it. The whole thing in some kind of burn it all to the ground episode to deal with feeling terrible. And it’s not recoverable (I tried). That was really dumb. A lot of stuff was getting me down and I had no motivation at all - everything from unresolved generational trauma to low self-esteem to poor eating habits to excessive alcohol consumption to unresolved chronic pain keeping me from my usual outlets to work stuff and probably more.
I felt like I was the absolute worst person in the world and should hide, hide away for eternity. And this isn’t the first time I felt this way. It looks like I’m having a lot of fun on my social media accounts, though. And I’m filled with Divine’s light and protection, so life is just one long joyous strut, right? But it isn’t for me sometimes. I just want to be honest. If you know me, you can probably tell anyway.
I want to say I’m sorry for deleting stuff that you supported - whether you hit the like button, sent me an email, texted me to nerd out over art stuff, told me in person you got enjoyment out of this, told someone else I was your favorite cartoonist while I smiled bashfully in disbelief, took the time to write me an actual letter in the mail telling me to keep going, critiqued my work to make it better, or walked the dog alone while I disappeared in a mountain of bristol board for a week - I’m so incredibly grateful and moved by how caring you all are. The bright side is all of those moments of support helped me get up after the burn-it-down moment was over. Though I regret the great deletion, I want to start again. And I still have all that stuff, just not posted on Substack.
I have some work to do (and I have access to healthcare and therapy and whatnot, so that’s good). One step at a time.
I wasn’t eating super well leading up to this, and my partner cooked a pot of beans in the aftermath of the great Substack deletion. It was a real good brothy bowl of beans, and that act of care helped. And he told me that he’d had a “Phoenix Moment” or two in his life - destroying something and then being filled with motivation and drive to create something better and new. Just hearing that “I’ve been there” made me feel so much less alone.
It made absolutely no sense to isolate myself and try to cut off people I know care about me when I’m struggling. But I do it when I’m down. One thought that pulled me out of it is that if I can figure out a way to recover when things feel really bad then others can too. And if you ever feel (or are feeling) this way, I’m sorry you went through that. It sucks.
The end of Walk Like Me isn’t insincere, though. I felt that panel when I drew it. And it makes me happy to look at it. And that others might feel happy when they look at it too. That’s something.
Yours in beautiful freakishness,
Kristin
Love this post Kristin -- sent you a note in the SAW network : )