the two sides of comics.

2 1/2 days apart, I've had two of the most powerful - in very different ways - reactions I've had to writing in a while, and they're both blogs about comics. Kind of.

Saturday morning, I spent about an hour and a half reading The Comics Curmudgeon, and I don't know the last time I laughed that hard, that often. Possibly TALLADEGA NIGHTS. It's funny with a capital FUNNY, I tells ya!

And then there's the other side of things. Tonight, I read this blog from an unnamed female comic creator, who, having got really fed up with the whole industry on any number of levels, spent three days writing one of the most raw, powerful, and simultaneously well-written memoirs I've ever read. And it left me with two powerful lessons, lessons I probably should have learned by now but have difficulty internalizing.

1. Be careful of what you give of yourself to an industry you're passionate about, because it feels no obligation to give back.

2. The ideas, the thoughts, the images we put into the world have more of a ripple effect than we imagine.

I started to elaborate on the second point, and then second-guessed myself. Suffice it to say that I'm thinking a lot about what to work on next at the moment, and that it's certainly informed my thoughts.