![some pencil drawings of myself, crying, and then not crying with a desultory thumbs up, and a scribbled caption "I used to be better at drawing crying people [me] and I think overall that's a good thing"](https://hannah-mccann.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/TBUB2404.jpg)
Welcome to the second post about my experience of the Sunday of Thought Bubble 2024! Spoiler alert: I cried a lot. But that was less to do with the convention itself and more to do with my frayed nerves, partly to do with ongoing personal difficulties. Let us not overshadow the fun of the fair too much, but my first drawing of the day was basically about crying on the train to Harrogate…
After parting ways with my partner at Leeds train station, as he was travelling down south again, I decided a bit last minute that I would make the most of the free weekend pass a kind friend gave to me, and hop on the train to Harrogate.
Parting is such sweet sorrow, as they say, and I found myself crying on the platform, crying at the pasty shop while I ordered a big cappuccino and pain au choc, and crying a bit more as I settled in for the short journey northward. I tried to draw myself as I felt a bit foolish and dramatic, and I think that makes for good subject matter.
In this series of quick self-studies, I realised with some mild sense of positivity that I am not as good as drawing my crying face as I used to be. Hence the slightly more content-looking full body study. I’m puffy-eyed and weary, but overall in an OK mental state all things considered.
I arrived with time to catch the 2nd half of the panel discussion: Akira Toriyama’s Legacy, with David Brothers, Gary Maloney, Hamish Steel and Crom, chaired by JV Chamary. Now, I would be a liar to say I’m a big Dragonball fan. I found the cartoon extremely repetitive and meat-headed (in a bad way) when all my older brothers and cousins were watching it on telly when I was really quite small. However, over more recent years, I’ve found my interest sincerely piqued in exploring this universe. I was given Manga Theatre for my birthday last year <3, and I am painfully slowly crawling through it as someone who fears the end of a wonderful experience.
I love his art style, his goofy characters, his vehicles, his humour, big foreheads, chunky bodies… Everything is so much fun. I love learning the story of his life as a mangaka as told from his freakish little avatar, Robotoriyama. So although I didn’t know much about the Dragonball-specific chat on this panel, I loved hearing so much love for this amazing creator and how much influence he had on the brilliant panellists’ work too. I do want to have a go at Dragonball now I’m a bigger human too, we’ll see how I get on.
Good luck reading these notes & guessing who said what!
I really got loads out of this panel: Small Press Take Over! Chaired by Mama Lips, this panel featured Silver Sprocket founder Avi Ehrlich, Black Josei Press Founder Jamila Rowser, and Breakdown Press editor-in-chief Tom Oldham.
There was so much love and enthusiasm on this panel, serious passion for small press & getting important work out there. I thought everyone’s advice was so sound, and so practical. I always get simultaneously inspired and intimidated by the notion of putting my own art out into the world in talks like this, where I know I need to make myself more proactive with it.
It also made me feel quite proud of our little distro at Footprint. We do not publish other peoples’ work, but we are super enthusiastic about providing a platform for our print customers to reach a wider audience.
I think for me, I need to take on board all of the excellent advice from these wonderful panellists, and put it out there. Thanks Small Press heads! This was amazing!
And then I needed a bit of a break.
I got a chamomile tea at the cafe, and sat down to make this comic.
I was really not in a very good headspace on Sunday. All the mean, sad and scared chickens felt like they were coming home to roost.
I never know what I should be seeking mental-health-wise. I know there are things that go a bit wrong in my head, and I don’t think they are going to magically stop going wrong, but I’d like to perhaps have some simple words to describe it.
Going to big, busy conventions is hard in and of itself – so many people to connect with, and a sense of not knowing how many I should, how many I can cope with, how much stimulation will be too much. I have the regret too, of neither tabling as myself, or as a Footprinter. And I have the horrible murky shadow of being perpetually skint hanging over. The two feelings merging together as proof of my inadequacy, of my fault in the matter. If I had a table: would I then have money to spend? for example.
Well, it felt nice to be at a comics convention making a comic in the cafe about how flipping miserable I was feeling at said convention. Very apt. And then I felt a bit better.
But apparently not well enough to do another panel. I was interested in the Erotica Comics panel, but could not summon the will to sit still in a room full of people, so I had my meal deal, had a last wander round and chatted to one or two familiar faces (thanks if we chatted – I appreciated the grounding effect of a little convo).
My last sketchbook page is from the train ride back. I liked these faces and their big jumper features.
Thought Bubble is amazing, and I hope next year I won’t be in such a fraught and frightened little state of mind. I hope this post wasn’t a real downer to read!
x
