A column by any other name.

For a long time I’ve been undecided about what I’m going to be as I grow up. On the surface I’m an illustrator. That’s what I want to be. I draw things for people and brands. But underneath it’s always been a little more complicated. Originally I was an editor for Blister Review. Then I worked as a carpenter, taking a day off a week for illustration. Then a short stint as a PR associate with a long commute, then back to carpentry, some mountain bike coaching, and a whole bunch of SEO writing. Some months, stuff I draw pays my bills. Many others, it’s things I built, or wrote, and kids I taught.

My longest-running gig through all of this though, has been a column at the Jackson Hole News and Guide. During a float down the Snake I commented to a group of journalists that I really missed the writing I’d done for my student newspaper in college. My diploma does say “journalism” after all, and while I’m not cut out for reporting, I love the challenge of writing something worthwhile on a deadline. A few emails later, one rejected piece on phallic landmarks, and I had a column published every two weeks in a real, live newspaper. 

My editor let me write about whatever I wanted, as long as it fell under the general category “Mountain Mumbles.” I used an old, beardless photo to maintain some level of anonymity and I got to write for the N+G for three and a half years. I wrote about skiing, biking, running, eating, whatever really. I even got the greenlight to run a ridiculous eating and running combo challenge in the paper. I put out a bunch of mediocre pieces, and a few good ones. Sometimes I’d fall on the crutch of using overly descriptive language to try to manipulate my readers into artificial feelings. Other times I’d get lucky, hit on a topic that resonated with the community: douchey mountain bikers, or selfish pass skiers. Once I annoyed a few folks with poor reading comprehension skills who thought I was writing about how much I hate old people. (I wasn’t)

Last summer I got a new editor, one who asked that every piece come with some kind of visual component. I quickly tired of submitting iphone photos, and resolved to add an illustration to each article. Sure, I wasn’t getting paid enough to really justify that, but it seemed like a worthwhile challenge, so I threw in a free illustration with every column.

The highlight through all of this was the News and Guide’s Christmas party. It was an opportunity to hang out with the adults, thel people who work tirelessly to report for our community. I never went into their newsroom, my contact was limited to that column every couple of weeks, so being in the same room with all those real journalists was always a little surreal. I’d drink their wine, pitch them absurd business ideas, trash talk about the superiority of Idaho, and hope the branded swag was good. (Thanks for the Yeti mug!)

But when hard times come, newspapers get hit immediately, and around here, if you’re not allowed to ski or travel, what’s the point in advertising? So I got cut for the time being. Which is good. In times like this, we need the reporters, the editors, the photographers who are doing the hard work of covering this crisis to have as much support and budget as possible. This is not the time to be paying to publish my often empty platitudes.

So last week, for the first time in three and a half years, I didn’t sit down to crank out a column for the newspaper. I didn’t lay on the floor, talking to the dog as I searched desperately for any inspiration for an illustration. Instead I picked up a paintbrush and started trying to teach myself guache.

It feels like it’s been ages since I haven’t had any writing deadlines on my calendar. And actually, it really has been. Since middle school I’ve had some sort of piece due, at least every two weeks. And right now, I don’t. Nobody is expecting a pile of words from me. Nobody is expecting anything creative from me really. Illustration work has dried up a little. There’s too much snow on the ground to coach mountain biking. Newschoolers and the News and Guide aren’t waiting for my columns. I haven’t gotten my next batch of SEO articles yet. It’s snowing too hard to go build dirt jumps. Luckily the carpentry hasn’t dried up. I’ll go hang some closet doors this afternoon, maybe swear at some drywall. I’m a lot better off than a whole bunch of people right now.

I always wondered if I’d keep writing if I wasn’t incentivized to, how fundamental a piece of my identity it really was? I wrote this piece a day after my normal deadline for my column, so I guess I’ve got an answer now.

I’m not a huge fan of this blog. I’ve never loved to write for it. I always had “better” outlets, ones that actually paid, so it’s been neglected. But hey, times they are a-changin. So I’ll be doing my best to throw a piece or two a week up on here. Come read them if you want to.

And if you’re just here for the free coloring book, or the paintings to poop to, that’s fine too.