Yesterday was good, at least. May 15, 2008

OK.  Now that there are only sixteen days left until I am officially College Educated, now I’m freaking out. Tomorrow, in the second to last scene painting class of my life (unless I decide to go to grad school at Yale…not likely.), I have to take the exam to get into the union.  Mind you, this is a fake union test, so I don’t have to pay the 3K, and I only get four hours, instead of eight, to paint a 4′ x 8′ flat in a highly complicated land/sea/sky landscape, framed with a dimensional wood moulding (mahogany), complete with striped drapery hanging down over the wood moulding.  I’m nervous.  It’s not that I feel like I don’t have the talent to do this, its that any human might want to vomit blood at the thought of painting a mural at a frenzied pace for four solid hours, while an old queen sits behind on a chair with a clip board and the collar of his polo shirt popped, noting every move you make, every stroke you put down.  It’s nerve-wracking. However, this is the last test I have to endure of my entire scenic painting career at this place, and I have been waiting for this day for three years, knowing, for better or for worse, that it signifies a passing.  

I turned in my first final today, that felt good.  First Last Final exam.  Bizarre.  Where did these four years go?  I didn’t learn enough!?!  All of a sudden, I find myself asking questions like, “If someone asked me to create a cityscape in three point perspective, would I know how to calculate the multiple vanishing points?”  The answer is no, and that’s why there are books to tell you things like that, but somehow I wind up feeling guilty that I didn’t retain that equation.  I’m ready.  I’m not ready.  I’m so ready.  What the hell am I gonna do now?  

Grad school? I’d be awesome at restoration!  

Or maybe this job I just applied for is actually a job-in for Jim Henson’s Fraggle Rock, coming soon to Broadway.  The time frames do line up…

I think I am having an existential crisis.  Last year, I would have punched myself in the face if I heard that sentence pass my lips.  I think maybe that’s because I didn’t really know what it meant?  Or maybe because I had no frame of reference in my own life, never having waded through existential matters…maybe because I’m just At That Age.  Whatever the case may be, I might be happy, but I am  c r a c k i n g  under the pressure that the two weeks in front of me are about to exert.  This sensation is new to me…complete, abject terror as I think of student loan payments, and shiny, light-hearted optimism at the interesting way my life seems to be shaping up.  Someone (like, oh…say, a shrink) could maybe see that as manic, and I won’t lie…I kinda feel like I’m digging in for traction in the middle of an euphoric cyclone.  Cuckoo.  

Change is good.  But what the hell am I supposed to do with a sudden, nagging need to find the meaning in what I create?  The message is the medium? How can I create a style that’s identifiable and somehow fresh? Shit like that.  Good thoughts, but really?!? brain, right now?!? This can’t wait two weeks?!?  

Side note: the new Gnarls Barkley album, The Odd Couple, is my favorite new jam of 2008.  The album is a bit less aggressive than their last (St. Elsewhere), but also a bit less diverse.  That being said, I have not been able to get the songs out of my head for the last week, solid.  It’s great.  The lyrics are intelligent and sweet, the beats are infectious, and Blind Mary will make you dance…try it and see what happens.