I hesitated, hovering my curser over the ‘share’ button. For five weeks, I sequestered myself inside my Mainframe studio sketching, finessing, and decorating my desk with the fine coating of eraser crumbs. Now, after uploading the completed work to Dropbox I paused. From pencil marks to pixels and every step in between, this story, A Hug for Theodore, was the summation of my five past weeks in quarantine.
For more than a month, I sought refuge in my studio and the blank piece of paper I set before myself, day after day. It was what I fell asleep thinking about at night and woke thinking about in the morning. When my mind started to swirl with anxiety, when my fingers itched to hit ‘read’ on just one more COVID19 news flash, I thought of Theodore, the stuffed animal rabbit and eponymous character of my current children’s book. Yes, I, a 27-year-old woman still takes refuge in a stuffed animal rabbit, who though imaginary does bear some resemblance to the stuffed critters that bolstered by bedside as a girl.
“Theodore remained my constant, a wellspring of creativity to stave off both the darkness of a global pandemic and the brightness of the blank white page before me.”
But it’s not Theodore’s plush belly and floppy ears that lent me comfort as life as we knew it turned on its head. For me, Theodore was one thing at least that I controlled. From quick, gestural character sketches to fully rendered spreads, Theodore remained my constant, a wellspring of creativity to stave off both the darkness of a global pandemic and the brightness of the blank white page before me.
Last week, as I resumed one of the two jobs I lost back in March, I felt a new sense of grief. Grief that I would no longer have as much time to work at my own studio. Grief that I didn’t have another page of Theodore to illustrate. Yet.
What I shared via Dropbox with my family (always the first beta readers for my work) is only a first draft. The first of many. Theodore’s story is far from over. Even as the world changes around me, my work will remain my constant.