No. 67 – Your family makes a lot of faces

Some light fare after my hard sell

Welcome to the latest issue of Feed the Monster, a monthly art journal for the creative and imperfect. Come as you are.

Click on the ❤️‍🔥 above if you want to help this publication grow!

You can read more about FTM here. If you like it, please consider subscribing.

The olden days

MA FAMILLE ET MOI

The following is an archive dive from January 2019, when Feed the Monster was one year old and not yet on Substack.

This month I'm totally going to rip off my daughter and present a book that she made 24 years ago in Grade One, at Sir James Douglas Elementary School in Victoria, BC. Granted, she likely got some help from yours truly at the time but, to state the obvious, her mark is all over it. It's long... but easy on the eyes.

Needless to say, she was enrolled in French Immersion. I’ve added English captions.

Revisiting this book hurt a little. Maybe more than a little. It documents a time in my life that I can’t regain, involving a sweet little girl who I'll never meet again. Sob. “She gruesome,” as my mother used to say.

My family and me

Here are my Mom, my Dad and I at the beach

Here I am with my chocolate bunny. My Dad painted my face.

Here are my parents

Here are my Mom and I in the lake. Tuppy, my grandmother's dog, is with us.

Here's me and my Dad—we're making faces.

Here’s me with Tuppy.

Here’s me and my Mom.

Here I am with Spooker, Sally, and Noiry

Here’s the sun.

Here I am on the swing.

My dad and I are making faces again.

Here I am with Spooker and Bun-Bun among the trees.

My Mom does the same thing.

Here I am in the pool.

Here are my parents with Sylvia, my Mom’s cousin.

Here’s Sylvia again.

Here I am in Nanaimo.

Here’s my Mom.

Here I am making a face.

Here I am with my parents.

On the appointed day, I came to the school to see Chloe present her book to the class. Her teacher, who was not my favourite, had but one comment that she delivered in a disapproving tone: "Ta famille fait beaucoup de grimaces" ("Your family makes a lot of faces").

AND…?

YOUR POINT BEING…? 

Some people don't know how to live.

Pssst… I’m interrupting our regular programming to let you know that this post is too long and will be clipped at the end. Click on the link where it says “(message clipped) view entire message” at the bottom of the page to continue.

Affirmation from a past journal

PROGRESS REPORT

1. AS YOU KNOW, David and I will be having our backyard art sale on August 5th. Click the link for more info!

2. I’m hard at work on my Hardcore Journaling workshop. It seems to have supplanted Life’s Work as Graphic Memoir as my occupation for the time being, but that’s because I want it to be ready by fall and there are only so many usable hours in a day.

   I want ALL the things to happen. I hope that they eventually will.

THREE THINGS

Wherein I present to you… three things

• I really enjoyed Tim Ferriss’s interview with Jerry Seinfeld.

• Permission to be creative. I’ve avoided this Ethan Hawke Ted Talk because I find him a bit hard to take, but it’s only nine minutes long and he does make some solid and important points.

• Swan mates are reunited 🦢❤🦢

Bye! Thanks for reading. If you find value in my posts, please consider supporting me and my work by becoming a paid or free subscriber:

Or please like this by clicking on the little heart, share it, or make a comment—that helps support my work, too. Go on, take a chance—CLICK A HEART WHY DON’T YOU? Or LEAVE A COMMENT!

Buy my Collage Class—$35 CAD for a one-hour prerecorded download

“Thank you for making the video! It’s so easy to follow and understand. I’ve never felt so inspired, seriously” - Lauren Wilde

Listen to my interview with Sheryl MacKay on CBC’s NxNW here (starts ten minutes in). It’s all about Life’s Work: A Visual Memoir

Visit balampman.com

There's always Instagram