Don’t know what it was in particular this week, but it’s been a rough one.
I think I took my “sketch, don’t snack” strategy a bit too far; I was skipping lunch completely, solving the issue of eating it too early and not spending extra money on a second lunch later. Unfortunately, that means I reached the “hangry” stage of the day a lot earlier, and it lasted until I got home; combined with a few frustratingly busy days at the day job, and it did not put me in a great state of mind for doing anything. Going to make sure I have at least something to eat during the day to stop that cycle before it goes too far.
In related news, tomorrow’s Fifth Ace Showcase page may only be up on Saturday; between the crashing energy, social obligations and taking every opportunity to earn a bit of extra cash, my evenings have been/will be rather unproductive on the art side. At least the pencils are all done, so I have less to puzzle out than I would otherwise; getting all the pages done in advance is still paying great dividends, regardless. Similarly, my #Swordtember uploads might end up being a bit sporadic in the next few days; my buffer has run out due to lack of time/energy at the day job, so I might even skip a few if I can’t build it back up in time. There’s only so much you can account for when it comes to life in general, I suppose.
All of the above hasn’t spelt out a particularly happy label for my mood lately, as you can imagine; the roadblocks in productivity and frustration at work brought on a severe case of the “poor me” mindset. It’s that feeling of helplessness in a situation that you cannot change, not for lack of trying to find a way out. The only thing I can do about it is wait, and I’ve done so much waiting already. If we’re lucky, I only have to stick it out until the end of the year; I don’t want to jinx anything, but some progress has been made in regards to our overall condition, and it may come through by 2024. It’s the first, bitter taste of that terrible illusion: hope (5 points to anyone who knows where that line comes from).
I stopped actively hoping for stuff to happen a while ago, this year in particular; too many potential opportunities for change that fell through will do that to a guy. I instead resigned myself to just letting whatever would happen, happen; I keep my head down and just try to do my best without getting attached to any possible outcome. I wanted this year to be the one where I made some concrete decisions and be less “go-with-the-flow,” and while there have been a few areas where I’ve done that, there is still so much more beyond my control where my decisions have no impact. There are some things I cannot change, so I have to control what I can instead, which is only so much and not nearly as much as I’d like. All this to say, hoping for change is scary, because if it falls through, I don’t handle it well. There never was much hope; just a fool’s hope (only 2 points for that line, that’s an easy one).
On that sombre note, I’m going to knuckle down and get back to doing what I can for now; ComicCon is two weeks away, and there’s a lot of stuff I want to get through before then.
Ciao for now.