It sounds a bit pretentious to me if I say so but I think I am an artist. I like to create things for other people’s enjoyment. I have fun working with certain things to make something that pleases me and later makes other people smile. Sometimes, after feeling particularly satisfied with my results I think to myself, I could be a (insert artist profession) if only I took the time to develop my skills further.

I hear it from people sometimes. “You should be an actor,” or “you should be a comedian.” Yes, well being entertaining before one or a few people is not the same as making a living from your gags and antics. But it is a good feeling to receive such praise.
So here are a few things that ‘I should be.’

I should be an actor. During my English classes or when visiting with friends I often use acting to illustrate my stories or better explain the meaning or sentences. I will stand up and mime actions while playing one or two characters, speaking a monologue or dialogue as the situation requires. Often my audience (sometimes only of one) laughs and finds my physical illustrations amusing and more importantly, easy to understand. They tell me I should be an actor. In fact, I was in the drama club in both junior high school and high school. I enjoyed creating skits and also acted in the school plays. In 10th grade I was awarded the drama award and in 11th grade I won best supporting actor in a high school drama competition. Can I act? Maybe I have a basic sense. But it has never been developed professionally so I can’t say that I could walk into an audition and have the producer say, “He’s the one I want!” But my theatre experience has taught me a few things which I was able to apply to my Santa Claus appearance at a recent grand Christmas event for a prestigious private kindergarten. I considered my gestures, my expressions and words, blocking, and so on. The children were seated on the stage behind me to my right and I had to make it look like I was looking at them from time to time all the while speaking out to the audience. I was there not so much for the children but to appeal to the parents in the audience.

I should be a comedian. I went to lunch with a former student last weekend and a friend of hers came along. As the friend couldn’t speak English well we conversed mostly in Japanese. Sometimes I said things without intending to be hilarious but the girls cracked up and said I should definitely be on TV and I should check out a casting agency in Tokyo that specializes in foreigners who can speak Japanese. I do sometimes think of humorous sketches to write down combining both English and Japanese but I don’t write them down and I forget about them. That’s okay though because I don’t intend to try to juggle an evening theatre job with my teaching job. It would not be possible since I work late some evenings. I know there is a theatre company that hires people who can speak Japanese and English and make Japanese people laugh. I could be a part of it but I think it’s not in my calling. Not now anyway.

I should be a musician. I have enjoyed playing around with the guitar since I was in junior high school but it wasn’t until my mid-twenties before I began making up my own compositions. I was in love and I wrote songs and practiced singing and playing them. My best friend and I got together sometimes and played guitar, making our own original compositions and as he could play the keyboard and piano, he sometimes did so while I played guitar. We recorded some of our efforts on cassette with his home stereo and as a joke some pieces were not bad. Now ten years later I have composed three pieces with a computer music creating program and I think they sound, well honestly very amateurish, but pretty good considering I composed them all within a week of getting the program. I also have started playing about with the school keyboard and I have composed a piece which I programmed into the keyboard and recorded on MD. I have since developed a guitar solo to be played along with the music and I will perform it for the school Christmas party on Sunday – my first public performance on guitar! Once again, I am not Jimmy Page when it comes to composing music for guitar but it sounds alright and I think once again that if I only spent the time developing my musical abilities I could possibly have made something of them.

I should be a writer. Well, in a way I am. I have had my written work published and been paid a few times. Throughout my school years I always got good marks for my writing and I enjoyed imagining stories and writing about them or telling about events or experiences I had. I don’t have a well developed vocabulary nor do I have a very mature or deeply insightful sense of writing. But I can tell about my latest mountain adventure or make up a story and put it to paper, or in this case magnetic ink or whatever you want to call it on a computer screen. In the New Year I will submit more works for hopeful publication. Maybe someday with enough persistence I can get somewhere with it.

I should be an art book designer. Through self publishing companies I have now produced a number of small books in small quantities of my photographs and two books in lager quantities, which I am selling at my exhibitions and presentations. It is a great deal of fun choosing the photographs for the book, designing the cover and arranging the layout. I have received compliments on my choice of cover photos and, in the case of my more professional projects, the cover design has also been complimented. Deciding what photographs to use is not just a question of choosing the best ones that fit the theme. The trip through the book should be considered as a walk through a gallery with the photos flowing and harmonizing. Which photos are stronger on the left page and which ones on the right page? Which photos pair well together on the opposite page from each other? Or in the case of putting more than one photograph on a page, what relationship do they have and why should they be together. Should one be bigger than the other? Which one should be on the left side or the top of the page? And so on. The order of the photographs and the photograph selection may be changed several times before an aesthetically satisfactory arrangement has been decided. With many low-cost self-publishing options in Japan there are plenty of people who compile their images and throw them in a book without any thought of harmony and flow. I’d like to think that I have some sense of creating a beautiful book too.

I should be a photographer. That I am, and have been for over a decade. But I am still a small-time camera dude who gets published only a few times a year and maybe sells a few prints. People like my photos. I like my photos. But I have not made any big crash onto the market and I am nowhere near being haled as a modern master of landscape photography. But I am still young, though not as young as ten years ago, and if I persist in my efforts I may have a chance. Again, I am looking forward to achieving more success in 2007.

There are so many things I could be if I only tried to develop my embryonic talents more. Are any of you hiding a latent talent that could bring you fame or greater satisfaction in life?


Thanks to bloc, secretlife and dailyachesandpains for telling me how to post from a copied Word document. Have a great one, guys!