This is How I Remind Myself That Once Upon a Time

Hi Wayne — when I look back at these drawings, especially the sketches with words that help remind me of where I was and what I was paying attention to — I feel ambivalent. On the one hand, I remember the state I was in most of the time (undiagnosed depression, seasons of sadness) and I was trying to anchor myself in the present by sketching what I saw around me. Now, as I’m 2 decades older, I am using art to anchor myself in the present again but also recalling once upon a time when I remembered to use art as a complement to words when recording my memories. Yet the 40-year old me is happier compared with the 20-year old me, even as I feel the challenges I’m facing today are “higher stakes” than whatever challenges I was facing in my 20s. The 40-year old me is also more self-aware and self-knowing, therefore I feel more steady amid uncertainty.