It’s always a bit weird to be writing this, but here goes. I’m
one of the winners of a
2019 CBC Trailblazer Award. With a trophy and
everything! I have to admit to having mixed feelings about awards*,
but it’s still pretty neat to have won one. And since this is
the
second award I’ve won for my art-related activities, it is
another “arrow in the quiver,” especially given how hard
it’s been to get to this point.
Hard?
Hell,
yeah.
Art,
as a career, is not the easiest thing in the world to make a “go”
of, especially given the austerity-fueled times we live in. And it
has taken me a long time, longer than I would have liked, to reach
the point that my art is, for lack of a better word, “professional.”
‘Course, one of the interesting things about art is what one
means by “professional” can take on all kinds of
different meanings. It really depends on who you are and what you
like.
In
my specific case, I knew I was pretty rough, but we really do learn
by doing.
“Doing”
also meant falling on my face. A lot. I’ve covered that in a
piece I wrote called “
On Getting Stronger” so I won’t
cover that again here.
I
think one of the interesting things about the Trailblazer Award is it
really is recognition for the work I continue to do around my
first
graphic novel,
the road to god knows...
Who knew, when I first self-published it almost ten years ago, it
would still be finding a life
now? That’s in large part thanks to the documentary film
I Am Still Your Child, written and
directed by Megan Durnford, produced by Katarina Soukup and the fine
folks at
Catbird Productions, and
supported by all the creative folks behind it (including “behind
the scenes” people like Alex Margineanu, Howard Goldberg, Kathy Sperberg, Stéphanie Couillard, and Sara Morley, as well as folks like
Jessy Bokser, Sarah Leavens, and Marie Leavens who I shared screen time with). The
film gave a “second life,” so to speak, to the graphic
novel and has led to speaking engagements, panel discussions, Skype
conversations, and on and on.
And,
more concretely, it’s given me an opportunity to talk about my
mom. Not just her battle with schizophrenia, but also the poverty we
battled combined with the lack of social programs to help her. To
talk about the immense courage she showed (courage I’ve
really only became truly aware of as an adult) while she fought a
lonely and often terrifying battle to navigate a truly unforgiving
health care and social aid system. And
what it was like to grow up with her, for both good and ill.
It’s
funny; my mom died pretty young, at 48. And I’m slowly but
surely approaching that age myself. In fact, I’ve now lived
longer
without her in
my life than I did with her (she died when I was 20, and I’m
now well-past 40 myself). But the memory of her stays with me still.
That’s partially because I loved her, of course, but also
because I still find, to this day, how unfair her situation was. And
the fact that it never had to be that way. Despite all of the “by
your own bootstraps” nonsense we live in (you know, that idea
that any failure, let alone any health issue, is a sign of personal
rather than societal failure), what happened to my mom was grossly
unfair. What is heartbreaking to me is that the unfairness she
experienced is experienced by so many other people right to this very
day.
Yeah,
yeah, awareness about mental health and mental illness is better.
There’s more open and frank discussion around it. Sure. But
poverty has not gone away. The lack of social support really hasn’t
changed. Welfare rates for anyone (let alone single moms) have, if
anything, gotten much worse. We can talk about “resilience”
and “perseverance” as much as we’d like. We can
even point to individuals who’ve managed to do just that, but
what about those who can’t? There’s still a chronic lack
of
systemic support.
There’s still a culture that desperately needs healing (don’t
believe me? Look at the
suicides that are still occurring in the wake of the Parkland
shooting).
I’m
pleased to do what I can to help. And I’m proud, damn proud, to
talk about my mom. To help put a face on what otherwise might be
simple dry statistics.
To use my art, as best I can, to show what some of this is like. But
it’s hard not to escape the idea that in a very real way, the
2019 Trailblazer Award should
not have gone to me.
It
really should have gone to my mom.
She
died in 1994, alone and isolated. I had moved out some months before
because I had to, for my own sanity and self-esteem.
What
I try to stress to people, though, is that she had hopes and dreams.
Things she still wanted to accomplish. Who knows what she might have
done if she had managed to beat a truly vile disease and get
healthier? She’d be 73 right now, probably feisty as all get
out, and probably telling her own story to people, trailblazing
change.
I
don’t doubt that for a second. But it was not to be.
I
placed, a long time ago, the grief along with the disappointment of
what could have been. It is what it is and it happened a long time
ago. But other people, right now, are going through similar things.
And even if mental illness is not a part of it, there is still
crushing poverty, a cold and often hostile health and social services
system, kids going hungry, massive personal debts, and horrible
unhappiness. All the celebratory economic statistics in the world
doesn’t change that. There is a lack of solidarity with each
other, not just with our fellow citizens but a lack of solidarity and
fellowship with people around the globe (don’t believe me? Look
at all the hate against immigrants and refugees we’re seeing
now).
We
have to overcome this.
And
what about me? Well, I continue to grow and get stronger, especially
with my art (both visual art and my writing, too). And with my art I
try to not just focus on the past (though always to honour it), but
to move forward with new stories and new adventures. One of the
things about falling in love with art, with comics, and with visual
storytelling, is that the growing and learning never stops.
Using
comics to tell stories has been, I think, the most rewarding thing
I’ve done as an adult. And I can still remember where I was
when the journey started to where I am now. Harder than hell, yeah,
but rewarding all the same.
I
can’t wait to see what happens next.
*
The late Harlan Ellison, back on the “Awards” episode of
the
TVOntario program
PRISONERS OF GRAVITY said it best: “I
think awards are bullshit. I think awards are
detrimental to
the writers…You win a Hugo, you win a Nebula, you win a Horror
Writer’s Award, you win an Edgar, I’ve won all of them in
multiples for god’s sake. What you’re getting are
popularity awards.
If you were a good boy that year. If you were published in the
right
place. If the
right people read
it. If stories that were five times better than yours were published
in places no one saw them.
Then you get an award. They’re
meaningless.
They
had value, years ago, as being, you know, you could put them on a
cover of a paperback. “Hugo Award Winner.” Well,
every
book you pick up now is a Hugo Award Winner or Hugo Award Nominee. Or
someone thought this should have won a Hugo. They
don’t mean squat.
The
minute you start thinking that you’ve won an award because
you’re a terrific writer, you’re
dead.”
Always
good to keep in mind, right?
Postscript
Here's the CBC Video Interview with me about the Trailblazer Award:
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