I must admit, I'm kind of bitter about artists. Not that they as a whole have somehow personally affronted me, but because that they get away with so much more crap than the rest of us, and they get paid for it.

Examples: In the windows of the art school I pass on the way to work everyday, there are several new exhibits. One is merely a bunch of individual tulips (I think) in square glass pots, arranged in a big square on the floor. Anybody could have done this while simply decorating their home!

The other exhibit that irks me even more definitely took a little time and effort on the artist's part, but has little in the way of "beauty" and no valuable expression whatsoever. S/he took an old chair, set a handful of coffee cups and saucers on the seat, then covered them with wax drippings.

So why couldn't I do that? I can't draw or paint worth a wad of ABC gum, but I can sculpt and assemble interesting projects, ones that are visually appealing and that, more importantly, speak something. As a kid in Junior High I made some great little humanoid sculptures out of the wire from curtain hooks. In my college dorm's annual art competition, I frequently won "Honorable Mention" or "Most Original" awards for my mixed-media sculptures. One involved a broken and disassembled steam iron pieced together with cracks running through, and was accompanied by an artist's statement about the fracturing of the family. Another noteworthy project included computer parts, a Lone Ranger mask, handcuffs, and a mirror; and spoke to the murky dangers of the Internet.

But because I can't draw, I could never get into art school. And because I didn't go to art school, I could never be respected (and paid) as an artist for making crap like that. Er, I mean, for making art like that.