the treadmill

I've got that "be careful what you wish for" feeling.

Just walked up the street to the openings, and looking at art made me depressed. Looking at people's resumes made me more depressed. Talking to the gallery owners made me exhausted and depressed.

I took all this on with excitement, not really thinking about how much work the new space would be, how long it would take to make the transition, and what I would do in the meantime. But it's hard, I'll admit. The work load is crushing me. And I've over-scheduled in order to make it all work out financially, but the burden is going to kill me. I need help, and I need it yesterday. And all the while I'm asking: is this what I really want? Is it?

I think I'm a pretty good artist, but I look at the things happening for everyone else's careers, and I wonder. I don't have the time and energy to put into being an artist that I had when it was my full-time job, and I'm really afraid that I've sealed my fate. When will I get more than an hour in the studio at a time? And when I do set out studio time, how will I keep from being exhausted and drained? How will I have time to manage my career? Do I still have a career, or have I destroyed it with my hubris and overinvolvement in outside things?

R tried to warn me. He did. And I love him for that, above all else. Sometimes I think I should have listened. I do get excited about the community I'm building, and I know that one day it may nourish me, too. When I spend time hanging out with other artists, I feel more at home. Even though I own a gallery, I'm not one of them, they know it, and I know it. And I don't want to polish up and put the energy into being like them, either -- it's a shallow waste of time meant to appease the rich, meant to let them think that they're buying art from one of their own.

I know what did it, now. What got me into this funk. When L, the exhibiting artist, introduced me to his friends as a "gallery owner". And I guess he's right. But the rub is that I'm really an artist, masquerading as a gallery owner, or businessperson, or whatever. And I have a physical pain from the ideas that are straining to reach paper. How did I let this happen to me?

Hubris. I've created a monster with it. In my zeal to create this "perfect world" I've left nothing in it for me. The workload for the things that I am doing, things that I want to happen, is crushing me. I've no time for my real work, no time for my poor, beautiful, patient husband, no time for proper meals, no time for art, no time to go out with friends, no time for housework, no time for nurturing my soul, no time to just be, quietly, and do nothing. I cannot survive this way for much longer, and we're at the beginning. What have I done.

And then there's Denver, too -- do I want to stay here? Am I deluding myself that it's changing? Have I wasted my options, my career, my future -- which is quickly dwindling, I might add? M said the other day that I was "too old to move". But I still feel the pull... this place has never felt quite right, since childhood. But I'm still trying to "make it work". When is the right time to give up?

Is there any way to find some balance?

I miss my old life.