Keepin’ On

            Sometimes the only thing you can do is to keep moving forward. You let your body take over, you let your mind drop into autopilot, and you keep on truckin’. During these times, that’s sometimes all you can do. The stress of the politics, the pandemic, our social strife, and then our lives.

On and on and on.

But we can’t give up.

We can’t give up because ours has to be one of the lights that cuts through this darkness as humanity moves forward.

Our hope, and love, and empathy.

The future needs us.

It needs our minds, our hearts, and our art.

Yeah, our art.

Through art we can connect with one another.

We can address things that people don’t want to talk about openly.

Art is the heartbeat we all feel, in one way or another, and it’s through art that we can connect and remind ourselves that we are one family in more ways then we are multiple enemies.

The world needs us.

The future needs us.

And all of that sounds ridiculous, right?

In the face of all this fear, and rage, and uncertainty?

To declare that the world needs us!

I get it.

As silly as it sounds though it’s true.

The monsters of our world won’t live forever.

The darkness cannot last forever.

But unless someone is here to fight, and moreover, to hope, then all of this struggle was for nothing.

All of us are part of this world and all of us have something to say.

We all have something to offer.

We can never imagine the impact our lives, our hopes, our dreams, our loves, and our passions have on this world.

We see it all the time with the negative, the damage that is done by hate and anger and fear and cruelty, but the opposite is there as well, and it can have even more lasting effects.

For me, this these past months have been about creating. About trying to be creative. As I have mentioned before I am like a shark in that way, always creating, always ‘moving’ or I feel like I am dying.

Not everyone has had it that easy though.

But that’s OK.

Because you were still creating, even if you did nothing at all, because you were absorbing it all, taking it all in, and when the time is right you’ll put those thoughts and ideas into motion.

You’ll give them life.

The art that comes from this time will be fascinating.

Will be transformative.

And will be bad as much as it is good.

And that is awesome.

Because all of it comes from us.

And all of it will have been informed by this moment in time.

And all of it will inform the future and inspire the future and tell our stories.

Things are being created and will be created that will set minds ablaze, will remind people of the power of love, and will inspire them to share their own passions and view of the world.

That’s a heck of a thing, isn’t it?

A heck of a thing.

Maybe that’s the rainbow we can find at the end of this nightmare.

Maybe that’s the light we can cling to as we move forward and carry our light forward.

Even if all you do is write a silly story about a monster in the woods it is still a product of this time and is inherently informed by it. It doesn’t have to tell the story of today or encapsulate the era but it is still a child of this era.

We are still telling this story.

That’s a pretty powerful thing.

Keep, keepin’ on, friend.

Whatever you do, however you shine that light of yours, keep on.

We need you.

Hang in there, friend.

The future needs you.

…c…