To Not Follow Your Passion

I'm not entirely sure who reads this without me showing them, but whoever that may be, sorry for not writing in this. I think everything is just a bit slowed down, really. None of the bloggers I follow have written any blogs for a long time either (actually Sykes did kinda recently), so maybe it's a peer thing. I have nothing to write about because for a good while my life hasn't had any significant changes, and I'm amazed it's been so long. The days are all one big blur, because I don't do much. I don't actually mind it like this though, which is probably worrying.

But anyway, today I tried applying for a temp job for a nightshift in HMV in Kingston. Thought I'd apply for the nighshift because my body clock is usually naturally fucked (I am writing this at 4am) and I wouldn't have to deal with lots of/any customers most of the time. Which was why I was a tad annoyed that the form said that previous customer experience was essential. It seemed like previously having a job is a prerequisite to getting a job (I have never had a job before), which is frustrating. I'm sure I just need to look further than 1 online application, but still. My hours would be from 9:30pm to 6am. I'd mostly be restocking. If I need past experience for this, what else can I do?

Creatively, I have been actively working towards something that I think will get me some internet exposure. I posted a link to "The City" before, but I have cleaned it up a bit and added about a minute and half of footage, I think. I plan to try and get it sponsored by Newgrounds or another sponsor (maybe flashportal or someone else), and depending on if it does, decide what to do next. If it doesn't get sponsored, I think I might just forget about animating anything for a while. It's not really much of a passion. To explain why I do it might take a bit of a while.

Basically, drawing has always been my biggest talent, or at least it is the one I have explored properly and been the most public about. But a single picture or image can never make such a big impact, at least I would not be able to make such a big impact in this way. I have a love for story telling, characterisation, etc etc. Thus the best I can really do with combining both of these things is animation. It is basically a version of film that I would be competent at, and have no real visual ristrictions, yet be completely individual. I'm not sure what it is with me and creating alone. For some reason I don't ever feel confident with speaking for my creations with any other method besides letting them speak for themselves. I feel uncomfortable explaining the intentions and the story behind something. Back when I was 13 and making movies in 3d Movie Maker and creating threads to hype them up on forums, I would always say the story was "a secret". Possibly because often that aspect is pretty weak with me without the style and way it is told to back it up. Working with other people would mean I couldn't explain my intentions with a finished product, because I'd need them to help with that said product.

But it's not really something I want to do because animation itself is perhaps the most boring and tedious thing in the world. I'm actually leaning towards doing animation in university, though I should hurry up and realise that it's a pointless venture for me. I like animation. I like films. I like stories. If I wanted to be a creative director of an animated movie, I would not need to be an animator, and the story telling aspect and having my own world visualised is the really appealing part. The only reason I make cartoons is because I like the end product, not the process. Having a career where I animate for someone else's creation and directive vision would be my nightmare; all process, none of the feeling of your creation jumping from your mind and into something others can see.

On the matter of university, I've decided that it is something I eventually want to do next year. Because I feel like I need to experience it. Thinking of something that would be worthwhile for me is another matter, and is the problem with creative things. I've gone back to what I was in 2008; I know what I want to become, but not what I want to persue. Knowing my dream and being unsure if I should follow it. It's weird how I'm backtracking. The more I look at what it would involve being a musician properly, the more I want to back away from it.

But how can I say I don't want to be a musician when people like Mark Kozelek exist, reminding me through his bands Red House Painters and Sun Kil Moon just how perfect it is as an individualist medium, and how if I could make just person feel what his music does to me, I would have succeeded at life. To not follow your biggest passion when you are only alive and here once for a very short time...I don't think I could ever rationalise it. I am not going to strive to settle.