Faux Finish

Sometimes I feel like a fraud. I may have had one or two good pieces of artwork but just by chance, a fluke. It is as if someone has mistaken me for someone else and I am too afraid to correct them. Partly because I really wish I was that person and also because I think that maybe if I identify myself with them I will become them. Though the times when I do try to correct them with the truth, people call me modest or I assume they think I am fishing for compliments. When honestly, I wish I were a true artist: a painter, a photographer, a singer, writer. I may show some sort of ability in some of these areas but nothing too promising. Instead of being inspired by the masters of the arts, I become depressed knowing I could never live up to that sort of standard. Sometimes I think I should just ride this ride and enjoy it while I can until the shtick is up. When everyone realizes I had a few bouts of luck and that I really am some sort of a poser or “wanna be.”

My fraudulent lifestyle doesn’t end with art; it is in all facets of my life. I rue the day when my closest friends will realize that I am not in fact cool, smart or even clever. They will see that they had a lapse of judgment and call it quits or maybe wean time spent with me. I will then nod my head in agreement and amazement that it lasted as long as it did. Everyone else will have no one else to blame because it is so blatant and obvious. Perhaps too obvious and therefore they didn’t see it coming.

I don’t know how to be unique. It is like trying to remember how you usually hold your fork and then no position feels comfortable or right. If you could only do it subconsciously you could see how you would normally do it. Though when thinking about it, the entire concept escapes you. You start holding the fork in your fist and stab your food like a caveman. That’s just it though, it is almost a subconscious thing that you don’t try to do, and you just do it. You don’t try to be unique or creative, you just are. It comes out almost as some sort of byproduct of who you are. It is the release that is the hardest thing about it.

I think my best photography was when I was experimenting with light and didn’t care if I failed. I wasn’t trying to make a standard or to please anyone else, because it was an experiment. Art pieces that were never meant to be shown to anyone are the best pieces, because there is freedom. Freedom to fail, freedom to succeed.

In the course of writing this, I have realized that I don’t really care if I am a fraud or not. I enjoy things in life like singing and painting. I don’t have to be the best or have a following of people. I just love creating and doing and being, regardless of anyone else.