Live long enough and you’re bound to look back on the landscape of your life and mourn things long gone. The sting of losing loved ones goes without saying. Ditto for beloved pets.
There are times when apropos of nothing, memories of my childhood home and early life come to the forefront of my mind.
Nostalgia, the vice of the aged. We watch so many old movies our memories come in monochrome. -Angela Carter
They’re sometimes accompanied by a fleeting sense of displacement. Like I’ve slept walked into the future, and don’t recognize where I am now.
Before long, I realize it’s just a touch of nostalgia, and I get on with my life. Until something comes along to remind me, yet again, of the things I miss.
I love cartoons
Growing up in the 1970s, newspapers were prolific and so were editorial cartoons and comic strips. My parents lived in the hills of Los Gatos, California. They didn’t take the paper, but fortunately, my piano teacher did.
Every Friday after my lesson, my piano teacher presented me with a week’s worth of editorial cartoons cut out of her newspapers. As a boy, I didn’t understand politics, but I loved the drawings.
I like physics, but I love cartoons. -Stephen Hawking
Friends of mine used to snip out and save my favorite comic strips. I loved studying the artistry of Calvin & Hobbes, the sketchy lines of Shoe, and the silly humor of Bloom County.
Visiting bookstores and libraries was a joy because the humor sections had all kinds of cartoon books and comic collections. These days, if you can find a bookstore, the humor and cartoon sections are anemic. You might get luckier in a library, but they’re struggling too.
Just a few of my cartoon book collections.
Yes, there are anime and graphic novel sections in bookstores now, and occasionally I peruse them. But the work is different than the old school, editorial cartoons and comic strips I admired.
Words and pictures are yin and yang
What caused the death of editorial cartoons and comic strips? Mostly, the dawn of 24-hour cable news, the Internet, and social media.
Fewer people turned to newspapers, advertising dried up, layoffs began, and talented writers and cartoonists fled to other media platforms and online opportunities. There used to be thousands of staff editorial cartoonists, but they were the first to get laid off, followed by reporters.
Words and pictures are yin and yang. Married, they produce a progeny more interesting than either parent. -Dr. Seuss
Yes, there are still some editorial cartoonists and comic strip artists left, but they are dwindling. Comics in today’s remaining newspapers are nearly the size of postage stamps. There’s no space for the lush cross-hatching and detail that gave weight and dimension to yesterday’s comics.
Chicago Tribune full-page Jeff MacNelly feature. MacNelly won the Pulitzer prize three times for his cartoons.
And so I turn to my book collections of editorial cartoons and comic strips to sustain my creative inspiration. The experience isn’t the same as when I opened those old newspapers, where the pages were huge and the cartoons leaped off the page.
Sharpen the focus
Things change, but the past sometimes haunts us. We yearn for the way stuff used to be. Not the bad stuff, just the good stuff. However, the past also inspires us.
Check out this short but incredibly poignant video animation. The title is, “Make Time for What You Love.”
A girl and her snowman teach us about making time for what we love.
The late English novelist Angela Olive Pearce, who published under the name Angela Carter, referred to nostalgia as “the vice of the aged.” But nostalgia can also be the salvation of the aged.
Looking back is a way to sharpen the focus on the things you want to change in your life. I think there’s something about nostalgia that really puts a fine point on the here-and-now, and that can be incredibly fascinating and interesting and engaging for the mind. -Sarah Paulson
We can’t live in the past, but we can draw inspiration from it. We can study what made the old stuff great, and then apply some of those lessons to today’s work.
A 2001 editorial cartoon about nurses’ strikes.
I used to be an editorial cartoonist for several newspapers back in the late 1990s and early 2000s, just before newspapers started to fold. I remember the energy of the newsroom, those editorial board meetings to hash out opinion page content, and the stress of deadlines.
In the year 2000 I attended the annual convention of the American Association of Editorial Cartoonists, which I covered for the Santa Cruz County Sentinel newspaper.
Fast-forward to today, and now I’m a blogger who illustrates my own stories and articles. Where today’s cartoonists rely more on photoshop and apps to ply their trade, I aim for that old-school, editorial cartoonist style.
I spend a great deal of time fleshing out my cartoons with cross-hatching and detail. I prefer the clarity and contrast of black and white cartoons (and photographs) rather than the distraction of color.
Perhaps I’ve romanticized those old editorial cartoonists and comic strip artists, but looking back at their work, I keep finding clues to improve my work today.
Passion is energy
I abandoned cartooning for a number of years. Newspapers were dying and my primary career was in law enforcement. I didn’t see much point in drawing cartoons anymore. I turned to fine art and landscape painting as my main artistic outlet.
But the cartoons wouldn’t have it. They wouldn’t let me neglect them. They found their way out of my pen. Usually during meetings at work, in the margins of my notes.
Passion is energy. Feel the power that comes from focusing on what excites you. -Oprah Winfrey
Then I started adding little cartoons to my letters and correspondence. Before long I was publishing law enforcement cartoons in various police periodicals. I did some commissioned work for a few authors.
Recent holiday cartoon for the Scotts Valley Police Department.
While I loved fine art and painting, I realized how much I missed my cartooning. The more I flipped through the pages of my comic strip and editorial cartoon collections, the more I got inspired to reinvent my cartoons.
My nostalgia for the cartoonists of the past, and love of their old school artwork, reignited my passion for cartooning. I embraced that passion and married it to my other passion for writing.
I began illustrating my blog posts, short stories, and articles with my cartoon illustrations. Sort of a cross between those old editorial cartoons and today’s graphic novels.
The work started to take off. Where other writers used stock photos for their essays, I crafted original artwork. I gained thousands of followers who enjoy my articles and scratchy, old-school cartoons.
What began as a bit of nostalgia led to a cartooning reinvention, and it has brought me immense creative pleasure.
Don’t let it fade away
What about you? Like the little girl in the video animation above, is there a snowman in your past? A passion neglected or forgotten? What have you left tucked away in the refrigerator of your childhood?
Maybe you had a love for writing poetry, but your parents pointed you toward a more conventional career. If so, why not revive your poetry? Find a way to infuse it into your work or family life now.
Perhaps you had a passion for black and white photography, but abandoned it when you got into branding and advertising. Because in today’s flashy Internet world, it’s all about vibrant color. Or is it? Why not revive those black and white photos, and stand out from the crowd?
The point is, make time for what you love. Don’t let it fade away, or sit forgotten like the little girl’s snowman. You may think the thing you love is a relic of the past, no longer suitable for today’s world. But that would be a mistake.
For a time, I thought old-school, editorial cartooning was dead. Newspapers were dying, and who looks at scratchy, black and white cartoons anymore? But then I thought, why not? What’s the harm in reviving a little vintage artwork?
Make time for what you love. Leverage some of that nostalgia, the “vice of the aged,” and bring it back to life in some new way. It’ll make you feel good, and you might be surprised how many other people share your passion.
Before you go
I’m John P. Weiss. I draw cartoons, paint, and write about life. Get on my free email list here for the latest writing and cartoons.
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This post was previously published on Medium.com.
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Artworks by John P. Weiss
