Getting back in

It’s been hard.

No. hard barely covers it.

I started writing this journal back in the beginning of February. if that doesn’t tell you how hard this year has been. I don’t know what will.

My first two weeks weren’t good at all. I’d been feeling a massive amount of winter blues over the holidays. When I arrived I was kinda out of it. Tired all the time and not wanting to do anything at all, let alone go out. Sometimes, if I’m feeling down or agoraphobic I take one day off, to breath. I didn’t go in four for days straight. Not good. On Friday I went in for an hour. I didn’t even do anything. It was hard enough just getting there.

The next week I went in without doing any work a twice. Maybe three times. I might have done a bit of sketchbook drawing. I’m not sure. Everything about those weeks was a blur.

Somewhere in the second week I was talking to someone on Discord who was wheelchair bound due to cerebral-palsy. He used to travel all over the world. Now that’s mostly over. It made me feel so sad. I felt like I couldn’t go outdoors. But he genuinely couldn’t. It seemed so wrong to me. The world isn’t meant to be box that you can’t escape from. It got me to take a walk. Just a short walk. But it was a step out.

I really thought I was going to crash out and burn again. That I just wouldn’t get anything done and drop out. But I told myself. “The hardest line is always the first. Do that. Just do one line, and you’re doing something.” So that’s how it started. The first key was the hardest drawing I’ve ever done. But a lot of that was just how much pressure I felt was on it. This was the first key. If I couldn’t get this right, I wouldn’t be able to do the thing at all. I felt I had to get this perfect. But I told myself to just make something passable. That was hard enough. and hard to stomach.

I think it took two days. Maybe three. But I did it. And it was indeed passable. Good passable even.

Things weren’t easy. I started going in once a day for just an hour. Doing what little I could. After a while I was doing one drawing a day. These were hard drawings. Keys. I had to make these look good. But I did drawing that were okay. Not perfect, and not totally like the character sheet. But I worked hard to make the poses like the ones on the storyboard. I couldn’t just copy them. The poses had to be adjusted to make them more real and give them more weight. They also had to be moved around to fit the finished background. And making the expressions right was hard. Not as blazingly hard as it has been in the past (mostly) but it was tiring.

I started pushing myself after a bit. Granted I was spending a lot of time just walking around. Maybe reading comic books. Making myself do anything was hard. But after a while I was doing 2 and half drawings a day. I started feeling something strange, hope. Though I was still retreating into myself when I got home. Not able to go out even for food. And I was still skipping most Mondays.

Then an end started to come in sight. I saw I was getting close to the number of keys I needed. It was unbelievable I was doing something. I vowed when I only had a few drawings left I’d go in and stay in till the last key was done. I stayed in till 14:30. I was exhausted. But I did it. I never thought I’d get that far. But I did.

Talking to Morgan I found he would rather I’d done keys with a “Shape character sheet”. Like a basic character sheet but with all the characters reduced down to simple shapes. Once again, I’m sure he’s completely correct. But I’m very glad I did it this way. Going over the most intimidating obstacle in the whole thing, doing the character expressions, has given me a huge confidence boost. I now feel like I can do this! Granted I’m not sure I will get it done. Time is not on my side. But I’m going to try. I now at least believe I have the capacity to do this. I’ve also been coming in for longer too. Frequinely in till 2 in the afternoon. But sometimes I’ve even stayed in till 4:00. I will need to start staying in longer if I want to get anywhere close to finishing this though.

With all that done Owen and Morgan asked me to film all the keys to see how they read. I wasn’t sure why. But I did as they asked and I think it came out alright. Had a bit of an early Disney look to it. With Owen and Morgan giving me the green light. i could now make real animation. But First I had to make a shape character sheet. But that proved easy enough.

Slipping back into animation felt nice. Like a nice bath after a long day. This is where I feel most comfortable. Working with timing and spacing.

I’ve made little samples. I think I have a few seconds of footage. I hope to show it and my drawings soon on this blog. But right now finding the things I need to do that isn’t easy.

I must say though. I really like the pieces of animation I’ve made recently. For the first time recently. I really feel like an animator. Like the differnce I feel between these and my old ones are like night and day. I feels like they were made by a different person.

I think I have some idea of what might have changed but I need to talk about my home life first.

Like I said. I was in a bad place mentally when the year started. I thought I was going to have another meltdown. Talking to the guy in the wheelchair gave me the first real desire to go out for what felt like the first time in years. At one point several of my online acquittances told me that some of my online habits weren’t healthy and I needed to go out and meet some people in the real world. A sort of impromptu intervention. Well. Not exactly easy. I needed to think about a reason to go out. Not a need like food. Or an existential understanding of a good, like how I know it would be good for me to take more walks to exercise and get fresh air. I needed a project. Something tangible. Then I remembered something. Last year I’d watched a very good movie called ‘Beyond the Gates’ about a horror themed board game. Anyone who knows me knows I love horror. And horror themed board games are something I haven’t tried and would need to meet other people to do it. I looked around online and found something promising ‘Betrayal at House on the Hill’.

A game steeped in horror imagery and themes.

I remembered there was a cafe in Oxford that had open nights for people who played board games. I had been there one or twice, and found it rather expensive. but now I have an object, purpose to follow.

I looked around. And I’ve found some places that could help in this goal. And how boy was that an adventure. At one point I took a walk to try and find it on my own. I had a merry walk around the south of the town, and found a nice looking Greek Orthodox church. I hope I can go to a service there some day.

I eventually found the place I was looking for. It was actually about a stone’s throw away from the castle. They didn’t have open nights. But the guy there was very nice. Set me up with a single player friendly game as a test and even told me how to play it. He also told me about another place nearby that did have open events. I checked it out. it’s not as cool as the first place, but I’ll give it a shot. I hung out there for a bit and even met some people who were having a mini convention. They seemed to like me enough. At least i don’t think they disliked me. But it did make me think I can’t just talk to people who are only into nerd stuff. It would be too intellectually limiting for me. I need to be around people I can talk to about higher minded things. Art and literature and religion and philosophy. I’ll atrophy without being able to talk about these bigger ideas. I fear I’m not smart enough to talk such things. But I’ve got to try. Maybe there’s something around the museum that can help me with this goal?

Feeling like I have a project is the most dramatic shift in my agoraphobia in a while. But it is also tiring. I don’t think I’ll be able to commit to this quest full time.

Another thing that I think helped was over the winter I spent some time looking over the video that scarred me so in Paris. After a while, it’s just become another thing I’ve seen. An unpleasant thing, but just a thing. There’s even a few bits about it I like about it now. I did hope I might warm up to it and find something far more interesting. But It’s just a shock video for all I can relate to it. Nothing more. Getting over this big even in my life probably also helped me build some confidence.

I’ve even gone to play mini-golf with someone I sorta know. That was something new.

But i think the biggest thing that happened over the end of winter was I wrote two short stories. Nothing amazing. But they felt like real stories. Not just collections of words pretending to be a story. I don’t know if anyone else thinks they’re any good or not. But I think they’re good. My old drawing teacher once asked me what i thought it would feel like to do a drawing as a real artist. I gave a rather ignorant answer. He told me, “You want to do another one”. And that’s how I feel about these stories now. I want to do more of them. I want to create whole worlds of stories. I love making these!… But animation and drawing must come first. I think with a bit of effort, I’ll feel I”l have the same attitude about them too.

I’ve been full of memories of my love for art and walking and nature and creativity. There’s so much of my old life I’d love to get back to. I’m not sure I deserve to be this happy.

But I do have to start working to make sure I stay on this upswing. Rather than just crashing while I’m high. Next week I start giving this my all.

Getting back in wasn’t easy. and I still haven’t exactly gotten my life back. Maybe just back to where it was around October of last year. But considering I was sure I was going to crash and burn again, getting back in instead feels amazing. I feel like that video meme of Mr Incredible becoming Canny

There’s still work to be done. More therapy I need to iron out some deep seated issues. But I think I’m beginning to understand those too. There’s relationships to think about. Some can’t be repaired. But as a wise space marine once said, the good thing about friends is, you can always make more of them.

I think what really allowed me to get back in was to take things piece by piece. Letting myself be honest about how weak I felt. Taking the hardest part of the whole thing bit by bit.

I think a lot about a story by the Reverend Wilbert Awdry from the Railway series. That’s Thomas the Tank Engine if you only know the TV adaptation. The story is called Edward’s Exploit. In it Edward, the oldest engine on the railway has to pull a train of tourists to the centre of the island. Only to struggle to start. The other engines mock him and say he should give up and be preserved in museum. The tourists have a nice day out. But on the way back heavy rain hits the island. Edward’s sanding geer fails. His driver drops sand on the rail by hand to try and keep the train going. Then Edward’s side rods break. Causing the train to stop completely. His crew inspect the damage.They have to take his broken side rods off. Leaving him effectively a “single”. An type of engine that was old fashioned when he was new. His driver asks him if he can get the passengers home. Edward tries. But it’s too heavy and he can’t get a grip. Then his diver has an idea. He semi-detaches each coach. Letting him pick them up one at a time. It’s still a huge effort. But Edward finally gets the train moving, then finally flying along. The Fat Controller is cross. But all the passengers Cheer Edward and his crew. And when he finally gets home “Battered, weary, but unbeaten” the other engines are respectfully silent. Here’s the TV adaptation of it.

This gave me some motivation during those dark days. And i think it descibs me well. Battered. Weary. But unbeaten.

I have this strange sense that no matter how week and small I feel, There’s some part of me that’s never been beaten. And I can grow it. Start seeing a meaning in my life again.

Here’s to hoping!