Wasabi Sunshine

We arrived in the post-partem room (kind of like a hotel room but with a nurse and you never really leave it) after normal food delivery hours. I was so focused on the birth that I didn’t realize I was hungry. The vending machines at the hospital were like a magical wonderland once 11pm rolled around. All sorts of frozen microwaveable things, and each machine took credit cards.

One of the machines had a single frozen Johnsonville smoked bratwurst in a soft bun (like a pig-in-a-blanket) and I noshed on that so hard. It was so immensely satisfying, I instantly declared it the best thing I have ever eaten.

Even the normal hospital food has this effect. No matter what kind of semi-microwaved, partially-processed blandness I order, I scarf it down like a Dickensian orphan. Here are a few of my meals, which I will probably look back fondly upon despite their relative trashiness.

Sleep came eventually. We all hit a wall. But nothing can prepare you for how amazing it feels to watch the ones you love gently fall asleep from a full day of intense and rewarding work.

Small comforts are important when you’re at war. And that’s absolutely what having a newborn to take care of is. Not a war of you against the baby, but of you against expectations and your capacity to adapt.

Whatever you pack in your go-bag for your stay at the hospital, you’ll skip 90% of it. It’s the small things that matter. In my case sometimes it was just having a large, clean handkerchief stuffed in my back pocket for when I needed to blow my nose. And after weeping from exhaustion, nothing felt better than breathing in deeply the smell of our fabric softener, wiping my eyes and blowing my nose as hard as I could. It was luxurious compared to the pathetic little thin squares of tissue the hospital provides.

You won’t be able to tell what you’ll value most.

Once you fully allow yourself to be vulnerable with someone who does the same, you form an emotional tether. Not only do you feel “attached” in a sense, but they occupy a permanent space in your brain.

Once I saw my son emerge from my wife I felt a new tether being formed. It was completely palpable. I switched directly to reptile-brain caveman mode. I *needed* to protect him. More than anything I’ve needed in my life. Wide-eyed, terrified, snipping the physical cord, I was bonded with an emotional cord and won’t ever let go.

I shut my emotions off once. I am a painfully empathic person. I feel people a little too much, to the point where sometimes it feels like their state of being is a bright light shining directly into my eyes. Sometimes I even play dumb, pretend I don’t know what is really up, just to avoid seeming creepy from the intense connection I feel to pretty much everyone I meet.

I shut off my emotions because they make me vulnerable. And I’ve been burned by that white hot light too many times. But love is about opening up and being vulnerable around someone who is also willing to be vulnerable around you. I never understood that before I met my wife, Jinny.

That vulnerability came into full focus when we stepped into the OR for her c-section. They said our baby was going to be 11lbs, and had to come out. When she went under the knife I realized how much I genuinely cared about the outcome of the situation! It sounds callous or weird maybe, but detachment is a reflex for me, and to stare directly into the light terrified me.

But I stared, and I felt.

My wife and I welcomed our son, Avery Dax, to the planet a few days ago. Being a new dad is a strange experience. I’ve always lived my life in a constant state of flux. The most reliable thing about life is change, but nothing can prepare you for this.

Every one has a different experience, though you can certainly empathize with the experiences of others. One or two things could be just like your experience, but you can’t possibly know what it’s like until it happens.

My wife had to have a c-section, so during her recovery I threw myself into the task of taking care of what needed to be done. Sleep and rest and food be damned, my family needed me. Then, once I had my first night of real rest (4 hours of nightmares and partial wakefulness) I woke up and wept. I wept harder than I’ve wept in a long, long time.

I wept for at least an hour straight and couldn’t stop. It was exactly like becoming a vampire. The transition was too much to bear. So I decided to try and cope by drawing comics about my experience.

My friend Maré does wonderful journal comics. They just feel like they come from the most natural place in the world. They are pure expression. In the moment, relevant, personal, beautiful. I’ve been making comics for over a decade, but I’ve usually made them as performance. I am biting Maré’s spirit of free expression as a jumping off point, to help me let go. Making comics for myself has been very therapeutic. Here’s the first one.

I’m still here at the hospital. Probably discharged tomorrow. I’ll post them as they come, as well as on my twitter. (@chrisfurniss)

Chameleon pope?

(Source: theairtightgarage)

idrawnintendo:

Drew this last night for Chris Furniss’ 30 Days of Zero Suit Samus compilation book. It should be pretty rad. I know this isn’t ZSS, but I never really played those games and I love the older power suits.

Heck. Yeah.

mareodomo:

guest art for Chris Furniss’ “31 Days of Zero Suit Samus” book

Pencil on bristol. + Photoshop. Upped the contrast/dankness.

!!!!!

ZSS book looking pretty sweet…. (Taken with instagram)

XBOX, NEXT EPISODE

This is us, pretty much every night. Voice commands via the Kinect don’t work as well as advertised, unfortunately. You just end up yelling XBOX NEXT EPISODE at your TV at least three or four times before it works. 

coryschmitz:

Zelda Zine 1 ON SALE NOW (by cory schmitz)

Hey guys, you can now (finally) buy Zelda Zine Vol 1 for only £3.00 ($4.70) + S&H. (Thanks to Lee Nicholls for setting up the Big Cartel shop)

Order here.

I’m in it, Maré’s in it, Ashley’s in it, Kyle’s in it, Kris is in it, the other Cory’s in it, errybody in it. Get it.

(via iamcarneiro)

radiomaru:

“Thin White Duke” David Bowie, 2007

Drawn for Sean T. Collins

#archives