So This Is 2024
It’s been a year. It started off well with three months in Portugal but went downhill fast after I flew home to the Netherlands to have solar panels installed on our house, vote in the provincial elections and take care of a few more appointments that I had to be present in person for. That went smoothly, but when I flew back to Portugal, I caught COVID at the airport and spread it to my wife immediately. So we both spent our final few weeks in that country for the spring sick and isolated. Aggie was sicker than me from it; however, I took much longer to fully recover and by the time I felt anywhere near my old self, it was November and I was taking prednisone for my arthritis.
Then came the summer of chaos with the family friend who suddenly became homeless. At the end of that, the family friend was not homeless anymore, but he also wasn’t a friend anymore. Sometimes helping people leads to outcomes that make you feel worse overall.
These two things contributed to a severe lack of energy on my part and it’s telling that while I was able to get things done before that infection (22 pages of Tess Durban got made in the space of a few weeks, and I set up selfhosted websites for that comic and others in multiple languages, and also I successfully completed February Album Writing Month and 30 Days of Characters in April), nothing went smoothly for the rest of the year, until, again, November when I and two others rented a small studio/office space and I started working there. I picked up Procreate Dreams and started preparing to animate. What with the sheer size of any animation project, I decided to put that on the back burner, but I will be back to it in the new year.
But by that time, I was starting to feel the pinch of not having an income for a whole year. So I’ve been looking for work, and the start of 2024 will be dominated by that, and commissions for art, which I shall be opening shortly, to fill some financial gaps that would otherwise appear. That’s not a New Year’s Resolution, it’s a plan that I can adapt as needed. Long-term, I want to get back into a regular job.
My New Year’s Resolution is to record myself on a musical instrument every day, and listen to the recording, so I can pinpoint and fix faults. I don’t have to keep the recording, but listening at least once will be mandatory.
In 2023, getting back to truly regular playing has been one of the things that brought me the most joy and while I didn’t get an album worth of songs recorded (written, yes, recorded, no), I haven’t given up on that idea and will be taking part in FAWM this year to beef up the selection of songs.
I’ll probably be working on those here in the Netherlands, because the passenger’s seat in the van for my wife’s winter trip will be reserved for her son who is coming from America, and I’m afraid to fly again now. So I’ll spend part of the winter separated from Aggie, but I’ll try to make that time count. Draw that art, make that music, chase that employment.
I think that’s all I want to say for now. The new blog setup is flexible enough for me to add more as I think of it, but you know, the morning of January 1 isn’t the best time to write coherent posts. We’ll see.
Previous || Next