An empty notebook

Patterson, a bus driver, wrote poems in his notebook every time he had time until his dog Marvin tore it into pieces. Depressed, he goes on a stroll in which he meets a stranger who gifts him a new notebook. He starts to write poems again. 　

I have been working on a full-length cartoon. There is no due date or a publisher that wants to publish it when I finish it. It may be because of the uncertainty. I lost my passion long time ago and I have been forcing myself to work. I drop by a café on the way to work, thinking that I need coffee in my system to get the work going. I scribbled on a sketchbook as a warmup while drinking coffee.

One day, I read my cartoon again and felt like it was drawn by someone else. There was no dog to tear up my cartoon scripts in my workroom. But it felt like I lost something I once had. The scripts looked like an empty notebook. Only then did I realize that I slacked off for too long. I wanted to tear off everything I drew and start again.

But the repeating cycle of life took me again to the workroom and made me sit in front of the desk. It would have been the same for Patterson. He would have had a dull conversation with his wife every morning, driven a bus, eaten lunch by himself and walked his dog. To him, the notebook was his workroom. Even though his cherished notebook was gone, his poems existed in every corner of his life. My story is also hidden in the repetitive cycle of every day. That is why I am not afraid of the cartoon scripts that sometimes looked like an empty notebook.