I wish I had used this site like I did last year, ideally even more so. I wish I had written in my journal even half as much as I did last year. I wish, I wish, I wish.

This year has flown by. I spent the first 6-7 months allowing my job to totally rule my life, and the last two trying to wrest it from its grasp. It makes me sad to think that there are tons of happy memories that I’ve made this year that I’ve already forgotten, or will forget in the coming few months. 2019 is a lot more worth remembering than 2018, which I’m more than happy to allow to fizzle out and fade from my mind entirely.

I spent an hour at the Tokyo Photographic Art Museum this evening. Something so small, so easily done, feels like it’s lit a fire inside me. The fire is still small, still sputtering and so easily extinguished, but it is there. It feels like I’m experiencing true emotion for the first time in months.

It’s not the oppressive, all encompassing depression that I felt in the first half of last year, but I’ve been feeling numb lately. I don’t know how long I’ve been like this. Maybe a few months, more likely a few years. Being in that museum made me feel something even if it was just for an hour. It’s a feeling that I’m still struggling to articulate, even in my own mind. It’s a feeling that makes me want to move, want to do something.

That’s not to say I haven’t felt anything lately, but what I do feel usually doesn’t have this effect on me. The giddy, dizzying mirth of laughing with friends, or the physical pleasure of sex never quite reach deeply enough. I feel satisfied that I’m living the life appropriate for a single 25-year-old and imagine how cool my teenage self would think I am. Then a day passes. And another. And now I’m back at work resisting the urge to tell every single one of my co-workersto go fuck themselves just for having the nerve to look me in the eyes.

I don’t think anything else in this world allows me to feel as deeply and fully as art does. Whether I’m creating it or appreciating it, in that moment I feel the engine start in my chest. All I can think about is this wonderful thing in front of me, and how I want the rest of my life to only be moments like this, deep and exciting and frightening and calming all at once. Then my ADDled brain moves on to the next thing, and I let the moment slip away.

The longer I go without that feeling, the less I want to go outside. The less I want to go outside, the longer I go without feeling and connecting to art. And on it goes. I only leave my house for obligations to friends or to my company, meaning no trips to the art gallery. My friends are intelligent, multi-faceted people, but I don’t want to have to worry about them being bored while I stare at the same photograph for ten minutes.

Which brings us to the point of this post. I don’t want this feeling to be forgotten again, thus making me start the whole process from the beginning. I’m sure this feeling is probably called “inspiration”, but it feels so glib and dismissive to sum up the only thing that fills up my whole chest with warmth and chills in one word. It’s pretty clear to me that I should rebuild my life to revolve around art, but the thought gives me pause.

When I look at a photograph or painting, all i can say is that it’s “cool” or “amazing”. When I paint or draw something, my reason for creating it rarely goes beyond thinking it would look good. I know people who work as scientists and can still draw and paint circles around me without trying. My lack of technical ability or artistic literacy doesn’t matter when it’s something I’m doing every couple of months, but making it my whole life or part of my career means all of my faults and weaknesses showing in the light of day. Creating because I have to, not just if and when I want to, fills me with dread.

So I still have a lot to think about. But at least, tonight I might sleep through the night for the first time in months.