The First Step in Being Myself

This blog is supposed to be about my love of all things nerd, and I promise it will be...

... but this entry will be a touch personal. And I apologize for the length. I started writing and things poured out.

Since I was in kindergarten, I have been picked on. Way back then, I had a speech impediment. That was the first thing to get bullied. Through the years, thanks to my lovely classmates and general society, I learned that I have big ears, my nose is crooked, my teeth are yellow, my face is gross, and my arms are hairy. When I was a kid, my teeth were stupid and crooked. I got braces, my teeth were stupid and metal. First I was too skinny, then my ass was too fat (pick an insult, idjits) and all in all, I just suck apparently.

Through this all, while my feelings got hurt on multiple occasions, I built up a thicker skin. Instead of trying to change things to better fit in, I developed the attitude of 'f*** it, you don't like me, go f*** yourself'. Or at least I thought I did.

My 'f*** it' face as a kid.

Fast forward to today. I have been longing to get a certain haircut for the past six years. Reflecting on why I didn't just do it six years ago, I realized something important. While I thought I was confident in my appearance, I realize I'm actually terrified of being myself.

First, I didn't want to embarrass my parents. Being an only child, I was the 'center of attention' as they say. Now, I've noticed that when I say I'm an only child, peoples automatic reaction most of the time is "wow, lucky you, you must have grown up so spoiled." Yes, it was only me so my birthday was kind of a big deal and I didn't have to fight for attention or affection from my parents. However, with no sibling to take the spotlight, being an only child also meant that every time I screwed up, it was also a big deal.

I was a terrible student, never doing my homework, never studying, always daydreaming and writing stories when I should have been taking notes. Every failed test, every missed assignment, every threatening progress report and awful report card became the sole focus of that day, week, or even month. Looking back, I know school clearly wasn't for me (and it still isn't seeing as I dropped out of college) but I do wish that I had tried harder, if not to make my parents happy and proud, then at least to reduce the massive amount of stress and panic attacks I caused myself back then when, after blissfully living in my fantasy world, I was given my 'F' on the history exam and told I needed a parents signature on it. I wish I'd had a little brother or sister that would have dropped the bomb once in a while so I could breath easy and chill backstage for a moment while they were roasting under the spotlight. Then again, maybe they would have been perfect and intelligent, and I would have been in even deeper s***.

Needless to say, my appearance was also important, being an only child. I never wanted to disappoint my parents, so my teenage rebellion was limited to some crazy red eyeshadow and a fishnet shirt under my t-shirt once in a blue moon. I never expressed myself as much as I wanted to and I think that's when I started to subconsciously not care.

Second, I was afraid of being called a poser, or fake. I've always loved the goth/punk aesthetic. I think the clothing and make up are beautiful and I always wanted to express that. Most of my characters have that style, including the first comic book character I ever designed, Wyrd, who I first drew in my senior year of high school back in 2005 (pictured in black and white on the left).

The closest I came to expressing that style was when I was at the end of high school and just after graduation. I worked at CVS and would wear fishnet and insulting 'Happy Bunny' shirts under my photo lab coat (I'm still questioning why no one ever told me not to do this. The coat was never buttoned and the shirts said things like "you suck and that's sad") as well as several bracelets with studs on them. Even then, I was called a poser and wannabee. I've always been a dowdy girl, rarely seen with makeup, always wearing jeans and t-shirts and not doing anything with my hair most of the time, so the rare occasions that I dress or look anywhere close to how I want to, it's met with calls of 'fake'.

I remember the first time I saw the 'side cut' style six years ago on a singer named Cassie Ventura (pictured to the left), I thought it was the coolest thing. Totally badass and still feminine at the same time. I wanted to do it, but thought it was crazy and would be met with ridicule, so I never mentioned it.

Fast forward to today, everyone's mother, aunt, and sister have it, and now that I'm finally doing it, I fear it will be met with "oh, you're just jumping on the band wagon. Poser."

Why am I so afraid? I've overcome years of bullying about every aspect of my physical appearance. I've come out on top, refusing to mold myself to fit the standards of everyone else. I survived mostly unharmed after being extremely unpopular in high school where other people I've known turned to drugs, alcohol, extreme self harm or suicide.

All this time, I thought I had won because I didn't get plastic surgery. I didn't bleach my teeth. Now I find I've lost in an entirely different way. While I didn't change to fit standards, I also didn't change to fit my own wants.

My boring face circa 2010

I've become this blank, expressionless thing that yearns to look the way my heart feels, but is too afraid. I'm afraid of disappointing my parents, despite the fact that I am a 29 year old adult living on my own. I'm afraid of being judged as a fake because I'm just now getting a side cut, even though I really wanted it six years ago.

I've become so used to being nothing that I'm afraid to be myself.

I've become so used to being nothing that I'm afraid to be noticed.

I want to be my own person, not what I feel I'm supposed to be. I want to wear dark makeup and show off the shaved side of my head without thinking I'm disappointing someone. I am an artist, designer, writer, and creator. There are worlds within me. Strange creatures roam the halls of my brain when I sleep at night. Beautiful people emerge when I hold a pencil to a blank piece of paper. Why am I afraid to express my art on the outside? On myself through self-expression? I want piercings. I want tattoos. Why can't I do it? Why am I afraid to just cut my hair the way I want to?

I'm afraid, because for the first time, who I am and what I love will be on the outside for all to see. While it sounds dramatic and you may be thinking to yourself "all this because of a stupid haircut?" it is a big deal for me. All my life I've drifted through, unnoticed, admiring (and envying) the boldness of others. Their ability to be unafraid and show the world how they want to see themselves. My friend, Mary Kate, who went with me and got her own amazing haircut today, expresses herself however she wants to, unafraid to just go and do what she wants in the moment because she's fearless.

While it's in a completely different universe from the struggles of being Transgender (and I am in no way implying that my struggle with self-expression is anywhere close to how much a transgender person has to endure from the amount of hormones they have to take to the amount of surgeries they have to heal through to the endless amounts of people who don't understand and show them no respect), I want to be able to look in the mirror and not see a boring, average, pasty faced girl with long brown hair starring back. I want to see who I've always wanted to be.

And now I've taken the first step toward being able to do that.

Introduction

My name is Emmy, and I am not a mature, responsible adult.

When you are a kid, most of the time you want to be something weird when you grow up. Superhero, astronaut, princess, etc. I, for one, wanted to be a paleontologist. When you actually do grow up, you pick a more realistic job title and go to college to pursue it. Sometimes you make it into your desired field, but sometimes you end up using that very expensive paper (I mean diploma) to get into some other kind of decent, well paying, adult job. Or maybe you end up stocking shelves while being ordered around by a teenager and using your framed diploma as a dinner tray when you go home at night as you cry softly over your TV dinner. I don't know. I dropped out before I got one.

I am not one of those smart, responsible adults. When I 'grew up' I wanted to be a comic book artist/cartoonist. Oh yes, a very mature adult job. I attended my very first comic book convention in 2008, traveling up to the giant New York Comic Con with my fellow comic book nerd (and the source of my genetic drawing muscle memory), my Dad.

Me at the 2012 NYCC. A seasoned con pro at this point.

Walking through the humongous doors of the Javitz Center, I was immediately overwhelmed. Everything I loved and wanted to be a part of was around me. I remember thinking. "This is what I want to do. This is where I want to work." (Once again, super adult here.)

Wanting to pursue my love of comic book art and become a great artist with the hopes of working for Image Comics or my deep seeded love, Marvel in the future, I decided to go to college. One of the three greatest mistakes of my life.

Attending community college, I was thrown into the fine arts category by the oh so helpful counselor, despite my argument that neither oil painting or photography was within my comfort zone as a comic book artist. Needless to say, after a few agonizing, stressful years of being repetitively told that 'cartoons weren't art' I dropped out of college and sank into a deep depression and self loathing that kept me from drawing for a good two years (looking back at my work before that period, I'm angry at myself for stopping. I was better then than I am now). Unable to pick up a pencil without having PTSD flashbacks of my hard work being torn apart in front of a classroom of fellow artists, I turned my focus to other mediums, like writing, chainmaille and knitting... but every year I returned to NYCC (and later Wizard World Philadelphia) that dream of working with everything I loved was rekindled.

Having opened a store on Etsy back in 2010 called The Rusty Dragonfly, I began to make chainmaille jewelry inspired by my favorite things; comic books and pop culture.

Captain America Scale Mail Bracelet

After two local craft fairs in 2013 and 2014, I'm finally living out the first moment of my dream goal. I'm attending my third Wizard World Philly, but for the first time, I'm a vendor in Artist Alley!! I am selling not only my jewelry and pixel art tissue box covers, but also my cartoon style artwork in the form of 'Dollar Doodles'.

The kind of art I'm offering under
the title of "Dollar Doodle".

Offering 4x6 drawing commissions for $1.00 each is my first step into the actual comic book artist world and I'm both excited and nervous to see if people respond to it well.

Now that I've introduced myself, the person behind this ridiculous pile of nerd babble, "what the hell is this blog about?" you may find yourself asking. Encouraged by a new friend, Marie ( http://gilbertcuriosities.blogspot.com/ ), I dug this blog out of the internet and erased my half thought out useless garbage from six years ago. She was kind enough (and absolutely brilliant enough) to give me the wonderful idea to write about whatever show, book, character, or comic that I'm currently obsessing over, and then show the piece of jewelry I designed based off of it. I'm taking that idea and running with it, but I also hope to chronicle behind the scenes things regarding the growth of my little store, artwork I'm working on and progress on the book I'm writing. I hope whoever reads this will enjoy sharing in all the things I love and I look forward to updating this on a hopefully weekly basis. Being that I love writing, I'm hoping that will be an achievable goal.