Sometimes happy, sometimes sad

A few weeks ago, I was assigned in my art class to write a page about a "significant event" in my life that I would later incorporate into an art piece. I couldn't think of an actual event and decided to search through my blog for any writing that I could copy and paste into a word document and call an abstract representation of my "significant event". Easy enough. Since I was left with the option of doing this assignment digitally, I left it to the very last day to actually work on it. I chose a piece of writing that I had written a few days before and layered the text with two old pictures of mine. I did all that nice editing stuff, blah blah. I turned in my piece for critique and received mostly positive feedback from my classmates (except the kid who said that something about my piece "irked" him.....uhh, what?). I was given a moment to say something about my piece and since some people had said that they wondered what my significant event was, I explained that it was a representation of my "coming into terms with the way that I am and the fact that I'm better off alone a lot of the time".  On the way home, I started thinking about the million betters ways I could have said that. 

It is something that happens to me a lot. I figure out the deeper message of my photographs in hindsight 90% of the time. I'm not that great at coming up with concepts and sticking with them. I don't know if that makes a bad artist, a fake, or something like that, but I'm not too worried about figuring that out just now. With all that said, here is the final piece that I turned in:

The premise of my writing consists of the realization that I'm painfully introverted and that I am alone most of the time. The conclusion: It's okay. My significant event ended up being more of a significant concept. It is something that has been a part of me for a very long time and will continue to be a part of me for all of my life, probably. I am not made for massive amounts of socialization. Being alone is something that I enjoy and that fact is nothing to be ashamed about. Not having tons of friends does not determine my ability to build good relationships with people. I am normal and I am able to be happy, even when I'm all by myself. That's that.

Finally, I was able to put the pieces together of what this piece means to me and here it is: 

The self-portrait and the hand symbolize my aloneness. Me. The writing explains everything I already stated above. The more visible writing that overlaps my hand says "Sometimes happy, sometimes sad" and it simply represents the inevitable fact that sometimes I will be happy and sometimes I will be sad. That's the balance of life. Right when I thought of this, I realized that the self-portrait encased in the white circle vaguely resembled  a yin-yang. Perfect. Happiness and Sadness naturally coexist in the world and they naturally coexist inside of me, too. That's it. Oh, the composition has no symbolic meaning whatsoever. The blues tones were purely accidental and though I suppose that they add a gloomy feeling to the piece, only I would know that the story, indeed, has a happy ending! 

(Even though it isn't an actual ending. You could even say it's a beginning...)

To top it all off: I'm happy!