Everything Is Never As It Seems

I thought (hoped) that having these two shows hung and off my plate for the time being would alleviate a little bit of stress. Not the case. At all.

For some reason, this dark dread has planted itself on my shoulders, leaving me grumpy, anxious, and tense. Even though my deadlines for school are not technically until late October, early November, I set a personal deadline of September. By September 1st, I want to have everything packed up and sent out to their respective schools. Even though that deadline is two and-a-half months away, I'm still terribly stressed. The gravity of this decision of where I'm going to spend (at least) the next three years has finally hit me. I know what I want, but I can't help but be haunted by the fear of "What if I don't get in?"

I sell art fairly regularly. I've been afforded a lot of opportunities that artists my age (and hell, twice my age) have never gotten. I work hard and try to challenge myself in my approach to creating art. It actually occurred to me FOR THE FIRST TIME last week that, outside of my constructions courses, I have no formal studio training. Everything that I know about art, everything that I've learned about the technical aspect of art is all self-taught or learned through the observation of my peers in the arts district. While I strongly believe that this life experience has been invaluable in teaching me the functional approach to creating art, I'm still deeply concerned that the admissions boards of the schools that I'm applying to may not necessarily see it the same way. I have multiple years of schooling behind me, and I've garnered marginal success as a working artist, but will my lack of formal art training work for or against me?

Over the past few days, I've felt very...lost. My list of schools has fluctuated drastically, and I've felt like I desperately need an objective point of view to help me finalize this list. I got very excited about the notion of applying to MinneapolisCAD, but was immediately hit with the drastic impact of weather. Minneapolis looks like a great school and great city, but I don't know if that type of jarring weather experience is something I'd be able to handle as a lifelong Phoenician.

If I had to put everything into perspective and make a decision based on the bigger picture than JUST the school, it would be MICA or Corcoran, hands down. Not only are those two schools my top choices, I already know that I love the area, the weather seems to be fairly mild compared to Minneapolis' FORTY DEGREES BELOW ZERO. I'm experiencing minor hypothermia just writing that.

I'm meeting with Gretchen tomorrow, partially because I feel like she'd be able to give real, unbiased advice. Mostly, I just really miss her because she's not able to be out as much with Blueberry. I'm holding my breath until I see her, because I just know that seeing her will just...help. The advice I seem to be getting from everyone else is either "You're not leaving" or "Don't worry, you'll figure it out."

It's just...hard. It's hard to plan for something I can only control to a point. I know how badly I want this, and I know, if given the opportunity, I'll succeed because I refuse to accept failure. I've worked too hard for too long to accept failure. I just hope I'm given the opportunity.