I don't care for apathy

For the last couple of months I have been taking a photo a day to create a kind of visual record of this year. Sometimes something interesting presents itself, like the day I met Rachel who owns a fantastic Amazon parrot that is 25 years old and the day I discovered a massive spider dangling above my head in the shower. Other days the most interesting thing I can find is the sharpener on my desk or the water pipe running along a wall. Then there are days like today that I can’t think of anything to photograph at all. The problem is that I don’t feel like making the effort to take out my camera, let alone take a picture. I couldn’t be bothered anymore.

This sudden apathy towards my photography project worries me because it has similarly obliterated other important things to me for no reason at all. Last year for instance I became very conscientious about my diet and made a point of staying fit and healthy. But just when I was back in shape and feeling great I lost interest in working out and reverted back to my old eating habits. Now I carry about half the weight that I had lost and I struggle to get back into that winning eating and exercise plan that I inexplicably abandoned.

By far the most frustrating case of apathy I have has to do with making art. In my heart I still carry the absolute conviction that I could make it as an artist if only I would get off my arse do it, but I don’t. It is as if I am a barrel of oil able to go up in flames, I just lack the spark that would set me off - and what makes it even worse is that I have a box of matches right in my hands. Instead my creativity lies welled up in me like a dark secret. It should be the thing that defines me, distinguishes me, lights me up and brings me happiness but it is not. If anything it makes me feel ashamed of myself for not caring enough to act on it.

So I have decided to take a photo for today even though I don't feel like it because I have to stop this feeling of apathy where it creeps in. For the same reason I have also decided to resume my exercise programme (in earnest) and to follow the simple rule of eating only healthy food. I figure that a small victory on those fronts will give me the courage I need to take on the real challenge of being an artist again.