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Friday, March 31, 2017

Maja With a J in: Awkward, With an A - Illustrated by Maja...with a J.

I think pretty much everyone I know has anxiety in some form. In fact, I think having anxiety has become the new normal. Every time I read an article that supposedly explains what it's like to live with anxiety, all I can think is "this is completely normal and everyone deals with this". Reading about it almost annoys me now, because all these articles seem to be asking me to treat someone with extra care just because they suffer from something that is a regular part of my - and, seemingly, everyone else's life too.

I have had anxiety since childhood, and so have you. I'm not sure who to blame for this, but I'm pretty sure it can be tied to pop culture and reality TV because I can't cut and edit my life and only keep the good parts. I don't know. I'm not here to solve anxiety. I just want to write, K?

At the beginning of 2017, I wrote a list of things I want to accomplish this year. I do it every year. I usually accomplish nothing. I am quite lazy, you see, and when it comes to learning to do something new, I am impatient and I usually lose interest pretty quickly if something is hard and I don't see results instantaneously.
One of the things I said I was going to do this year was learning to draw, learn to be creative with a pen and paper and maybe create a cartoon or something (I am never too detailed in my quest to learn new things, maybe that's my problem). I bought a sketch pad and a bunch of colour pencils and also a bunch of Sharpies in different colours because, honestly, who doesn't want a whole bunch of Sharpies in different colours?

I started drawing and as expected, I suck at it. But I decided I was going to learn to draw one thing - myself. A simple, cartoon version of myself. Here I am:

The resemblance is uncanny

I think I have tied my story together enough - I have anxiety like everyone else and I am learning to draw. What follows is a story of something that happened back in October of last year, and that still haunts me to this day but am I going to just ask and get it over with, no.

Was it serious? No. But that means nothing.

I meet a lot of people through my involvement in Sweet Adelines International, a singing organization for women. I am also friends with a lot of people from the organization on Facebook, without actually having met them in real life (or, IRL, as the kids say. Do the kids still say that?). Sometimes, I don't know if I have met someone or not, they add me because we have friends in common. I rarely send friend requests...because of aforementioned anxiety. That just opens up a whole new can of overthinking and we don't want that, do we?

Facebook informed me that it was This Guy's birthday. This Guy, whom I believe I have never met, is the husband of This Girl, who I have met and she is quite rad. Therefore, This Guy must also be quite rad. I don't know who friend requested who. Anyway - ping from Facebook says it's his birthday, so...

Yes, I have advanced to colour, isn't it fancy?

Feeling pretty good about myself here. Just a casual birthday greeting and a little joke about never actually having met IRL. No danger here. Except...

Believe it or not, I am not sponsored by Samsung.

Oh. F*ck.

Commence brain fry sequence.

We must have met at some SAI event. That is the only logical place. But which one? At regional? International? Was it at RES? IES? AHA? So many abbreviations and I can't remember ONE GUY? Think, Maja...THINK!!!

You can really see the terror in my eyes in this one.

I could have just asked. I could have said "really? when?" and that would have been it, but did I? NOPE. And to this day, I don't know.

Is that a dog or a cat?

There is no conclusion to this story. We'll just have to wait and see how this riveting adventure unfolds.

Bye!

I find no comfort in knowing that pretty much everyone lies awake at night thinking about every stupid thing they have every said. Maybe because I assume I say more stupid shit than the average person.