boop

Mentally and emotionally hungover from what I'd call a "rough day" yesterday. Listening to Silver Jews at work and feeling sad but glad to have something to be sad about that isn't my own fault.

I had an important meeting with a big gallerist at which I thought we'd set a date for a big solo show at her gallery. Turns out that is not what is going to happening. To avoid the long, boring, and honestly quite confusing version–because I sort of glazed over as this was all happening–she decided she wants to take things slower and feel out the relationship. "Maybe we do a group show," she said. This all made total sense, but it was weird because she had really come in guns ablazing. So I felt really embarrassed and naive, though she had given me every reason to believe that this show was going to happen. Maybe I misunderstood some part of the arrangement. I don't know.

Anyway, I was in an awful mood and it was worsened by some news from Hong Kong; this curator is giving me a hard time about some telecommunications regulation that prevents this one work of mine from being exhibited. I had suggested a way around this that seemed perfectly reasonable and actually like a more interesting framing to me, but she was being really annoying about it.

I have to find a way to get over this existential fear that my whole career will be snuffed out without any notice. This big gallery thing sent me into a tailspin of self-doubt. But it's like, some things I just can't be ready for and that should be okay.

When I was a kid my parents would chastise me for this tendency, wanting everything all at once. I wanted to be an expert on every topic. The best at every subject, sport, hobby, etc. This resulted in me being, not great at everything, but really good at the things I already naturally excelled at. Which I guess was a result of the dark underbelly of this tendency: a refusal to pursue anything I didn't have a natural proclivity for.  so I became an excellent writer, a better painter than most of my classmates, the history student with the most esoteric knowledge, the girl who knew the most about music (because I couldn't play it), and so on. This probably made me insufferable to be around.

So now, at 26, this usually ends up being an okay tendency because like anyone else I am good at the things that I am good at, and I've been able to have a career where I don't really have to  do the things I am bad at (math, middle-management organizational tasks, etc.). But I still want everything now. Which, in the first half of my 20s was a boon, but I think as I'm aging into being just another adult doing some stuff, it's becoming a bit of a liability sometimes. Because, for one, people don't actually like when you're younger than them and feel entitled to success even though you've done a few things to earn it. Two, in your late 20s–at least as an artist–I guess you're supposed to be strategic, take your time, and wait your turn. I don't know how true any of this actually is, but whatever.

Anyway, this is a really bratty post, but a blog is a place to be honest with oneself! I think!

D helped me feel better, and I spoke to L and she also helped. Then Natasha met me for coffee and talked some sense into me. We ended up talking about how ambitious our friends are and how that can skew perspectives. It's true, though. Many people would be pretty satisfied to be where I am at my age and likewise for most of our friends; we are all fairly accomplished. But, as she said, fortunately or unfortunately, we all want to rule the world.

Later, I said this to D and he jokingly sang that lyric, "everybody wants to rule the world." And I told him, no, a lot of people really don't and are very happy to fester in what we'd see as mediocrity.

As a side note, D had a very exciting day, start to finish. I told him, and I was being honest, that him having a good day was a net positive in my book, despite my shitty day.  I was a little surprised by how much I really felt this way; conceptually, it goes without question. But genuinely, emotionally, I felt happier because he was happy. Incredibly obvious emotion, but sometimes I feel like people just talk about some of these feelings and don't really feel them. Like this is a thing you're supposed to feel in a relationship; you're a good and empathetic person if you feel these feelings. I guess it's nice to know I'm not a psychopath.

Speaking of psychopathy, I was reading Cady Noland's "Metalanguage of Evil"–the big gallerist gave me this rare book that has writings by a bunch of women artists: Noland, Kara Walker, Adrian Piper, etc. Her descriptions of psychopathy remind me of someone and it's perhaps incredibly unfair to call anyone a psychopath, but I do sort of think this person could be one. But maybe I'm just searching for bonkers explanations for his cold disposition. Anyway, I also thought that the way she described psychopathy sounded a lot like how most people function in our ContEmporaRy MoMent.

I had dinner with Chris, which was nice. I don't think we'd hung out one on one in a long time. It blows my mind that we've been friends for four years now. He also helped talk me down and then later showed me these latex paintings he has been making. They were quite good. He said he wants to do a show of them with white roses all over the ground, sort of as a reference to the mafia. I thought this was a great idea.

Anyway, I am hoping this show stuff is secretly a good thing for me. At this point I just feel like a fool, and a little bit like "who am I kidding." I suppose I didn't like that this woman told me to my face that my future is uncertain. This, I do not like. I like certainty.