No. 100 - The graphic memoir process

Hello kind readers

Am I doing it right? Is this thing on?

I’m still engaged with The Mother Lode—the graphic memoir that got delayed a few years—just. As mentioned in last month’s post, we’re doing a house exchange with people from Copenhagen for two months this summer. There’s a helluva lot of work to be done on our house if people who don’t even know us and couldn’t care less are going to be living in it. We are somewhat obsessed.

In other words, progress on The Mother Lode is slooowwww, but I refuse to wring my hands about it.

Not today, Satan!

I’m still working on the preface, and there’s a good chance I’m doing it all wrong. So be it, says I. If there’s one thing I know about myself, it’s that I’d rather gouge my eyes out with hot sticks than storyboard the entire memoir as a preliminary step before doing the “final artwork”. That’s not going to happen. I’m going to have to feel my way by painting/putting together actual pages that might get used or might not.

Don’t get me wrong—the manuscript is written. I do have a roadmap. But I don’t really know how to drive.

It’s possible—probable—that I’ll have to go back and re-do some sections, if not all of it. For example, after I’d brushed in unchangeable ink the words “it fell to me to empty the contents of the house” I thought, really Betty-Ann? Do you empty contents, or do you empty THE HOUSE?

You empty the house.

Not just edits like that, though. Bigger-picture changes will likely need to be made. Nonetheless I feel sure this is the only way I can find my way forward: by actually doing it. I’ve given myself permission to use decent paper, use my good ink, and spend time that might be “wasted”.

Except that nothing is ever really wasted 👀

TRUST

I heard an interview with Jacob Tiernay where he answered a question about whether he felt pressure about the second season of Heated Rivalry, since the first season has been such a runaway success. He said that the first season worked because he trusted his gut, and that he intended to do the same for season two.

I was reminded that once upon a time I, too trusted my gut while working on Life’s Work: A Visual Memoir—the exhibit that led to the graphic memoir. And that I needed to do that again. I had a sudden, clear vision of how the two options—trusting myself vs. not trusting myself—were equally accessible to me and I should simply make the right choice.

Make a decision to trust yourself.

The work will always be better, and more resonant to others, if you do.

Okay GO

Whether or not these pages get used as they are, this is where I’m at with the preface (PS, it’ll be larger/easier to read if you click on the title of this post and read it on Substack):

Well pardon me, but as I put this post together I saw that this isn’t how I want the preface to be. The preface paves the way for the story—sets the stage—and I need to take more care in deciding how I want to present it, and how I want it to look.

BUT THAT’S OKAY!

I needed to do this and see this, and now I can let it percolate.

Glory be.

THE JOURNAL BITS

For those who haven’t seen where the torn journal pieces ended up:

First they lived in the bedroom as I worked on stringing them up. I absolutely loved having the room lined in paper this way. But imagine the dusting.

At the Victoria Arts Council. The installation was hung in a former bank vault.

If you’d like to see the rest of the exhibit, please look here.

This post goes out on May 1st, my daughter Chloe’s birthday. She turns 33 today.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHLOE!

Thanks for reading! 😘

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