Just returned home with Kate and the kids, dripping with cold Spring rain, from the Kazoo Zine and Comic Expo at Norfolk United Church in Guelph. I selfishly wanted to drag the family out to expose them to the small-press atmosphere that got me started making comics oh so long ago. Amazingly they all dug it. My darling Kate dropped, like, 40 bucks on mini-comics, and all three kids found beautiful small-press items they wanted. The over-heated church (with it's accompanying B.O.) reminded me of the first TCAF almost a decade ago, and the presence of some old pals like Rob Collinet and Daniel Barclay contributed to the feeling I was time-travelling.
The first published comics I ever got paid for were produced while I was an Art Student at The Ontario College Of Art in 1991. This marks my 20th year as a professional cartoonist. I have been doing this full time for exactly half my life. And you know what? I have a lot of mixed feelings about it. I often remember to be grateful that I can make some sort of living writing and drawing cartoons. It really is an amazing magic trick to turn ideas in your head into money. And sometimes the pay is OK. But let me warn you-- more often it's not, and it can be a real tough go sometimes.
I mean, here I am, a 40-year-old professional cartoonist-- totally broke again. I'm working my ass off all day, every day, and I'm busted. Sure, my Ex-wife is partly to blame for that, but it still shouldn't be this bad. Honestly, if my brother-from-another-mother Mike Allred hadn't given me work in his new Madman 20th Anniversary Monster book as well as a fill-in issue on his iZombie series for Vertigo, I'd be begging for change on the corner. It's pretty embarrassing to admit, really. I mean, what sort of responsible parent would dare to live like this? No health benefits, no job security, no unemployment insurance... and the pace is killing me! I'm drawing a daily newspaper strip, drawing that iZombie comic, writing a graphic novel for my friend Mike Byers to draw, teaching cartooning classes, pitching two new animated series ideas, working on a couple of book projects, trying to find time to pull together a collection of older comics material and do my taxes, and apparently taking over as chairman of the Canadian Chapter of the NCS. And it's always been this hectic. For 20 straight years.
I'm not alone, of course. The Village Voice recently ran a piece called, 'If Cartoons Are So Big, Why Don't They Pay?', that had Pulitzer Prize winning legend, Jules Feiffer quoted as saying, "Cartooning never made me a living". I sometimes wonder why I do it.
The answer is, of course, I can't do anything else. It's just too late for me. I bleed ink, and there's no cure. In any event, I'm not qualified to do anything else. It's this or waiting tables, I'm afraid.
Some days when it's grey and rainy, I wish I were a young man with few cares and fewer responsibilities, sharing my mini-comics with likeminded creative types in a sweaty church. Enjoy it while it lasts, zinesters.
Jay, I understand everything you're saying here. I felt the same way when I read that recent Village Voice article. And that last paragraph of your post sums it up perfectly. I miss the days when I was at the copy shop at midnight with friends, frantically stapling. Those are the salad days. It's exciting and fun to be working all night when you're 24 but less so when you're older and worrying about mortgages and daycare schedules. LOL.
ReplyDeleteHere's hoping I get to see you again soon, buddy.