Day 715

I feel like I'm competing in a very weird marathon. I've got work stacked up through the end of December that keeps me busy every single day. It's not like the old days where I had five or six high paying jobs every month and had the rest of the time to myself. The world has changed. Now, I have tons of tiny little jobs that pay virtually nothing individually. To make the same income I made ten or fifteen years ago, I have to keep churning this stuff out like a factory.

The continual stream of website updates, quickly written 400 word articles, and down-and-dirty video production is tiring. I no longer have the luxury of really thinking about what I'm doing. For the most part, I put my brain on autopilot, rush full speed ahead, and then correct the inevitable mistakes in the revision stages. Sometimes the final result is surprisingly good, but the effort is seldom fun. For most of my career my work really was fun. Where did that go? A few of my friends still tell me that their work is fun, but I don't believe them because they're all on Prozac.

Five or six years ago when I was still doing gallery shows, I had this vision of myself spending the rest of my life wandering around taking cool looking pictures and then displaying them in galleries and museums. After my first two gallery shows, it became obvious that this experiment was more of a hobby than an avocation. I got lots of complements at the gallery openings, but weeks later at the conclusion of each show, there were very few of the red dots that indicated a sale next to the pictures. At one memorable show, I actually spent more framing the pictures than I made from selling them.

If the market went up 400 points every day, I wouldn't feel so gloomy about the mechanics of earning a living. I could live quite nicely if every day were like today. Unfortunately, when I wake up tomorrow morning, I have a strong feeling that the world will still be broke and living beyond its means. If Angela Merkel sneezes, or Italian bond rates keep climbing, today's gains will evaporate in an instant. Hey, American Airlines went bankrupt today. I used to work on the American Airlines account when it was one of most successful and highly respected airlines in the world. How the mighty have fallen. Probably the only thing left in five years time will be the Apple stores, still selling iPads at full price in vacant shopping malls.

Belle is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day