ksxhoetaek:
“see, that’s smart,” hoetaek says, pointing the end of their borrowed pencil in jaebin’s direction. “do the architecture thing and not just the art thing, potentially more job security and all that,” they continue with a nod. it’s something that’s come up in conversations for hoetaek before, with their dad, with unhelpful career advisors on campus, with themself when they can’t help thinking about their future, the idea of a “proper career”. hoetaek’s always found it kind of dumb that general society doesn’t seem to take being an artist as a serious career option (though, to be fair, there’s a lot of things society thinks that are dumb in hoetaek’s opinion). it’s the only thing they’re good at, the only thing they can see themselves continuing on with in the future. but at the same time, they understand that it’s hard to make money off art, and they admire people who have the motivation and interest in more financially beneficial career paths. “it’s kind of what I want to get into tattooing, you know? I mean it’s still doing the art thing, but there’s a little more stability to it then just trying to sell artworks. though at the end of the day, you’ve gotta be doing something you enjoy, that’s really the most important thing.”
they smile at what jaebin says about carving your own path. it sounds a little cheesy but hoetaek likes it—and god knows they’ve given out their fair share of cheesy advice in the past. “carve your own path sounds like a very me thing to do,” they say with a chuckle. “I try to carve my own path in pretty much every aspect of my life. never do what’s expected, that’s the hoetaek way.” maybe once upon a time they’d tried to change themself to fit in, but at some point they’d realised that was not going to work out very well, which is what led them to have the confidence to be what they are now, which is to say, themself. “although, you did expect me to have forgotten my pencil today and that’s exactly what happened so maybe I still have some work to do on that front,” they add as an afterthought, chuckling lightly.
“well, it did start off as a backup plan,” he admitted with a small shrug, “i wanted to take the art a little more seriously, but then i realised that I wasn’t making any progress with and i needed to make sure i could get a job and earn money because my parents couldn’t support me forever”. well, they could if he asked nicely, but he didn’t want to have to keep living off them while he waited for his break in the art world. besides, his real plan was to become a professional athlete with his taekwondo. he’d already represented his country and was an international athlete competing at a high level, but you never knew what could happen there. he could end up having some serious injury before he got anywhere. it was the same with the art, so it was always best and safe to have plans. “when you open up shop, give me the address and i’ll be your first customer,” he offered with a slight grin. not that he had ever really thought about getting a tattoo, his parents would probably still kill him even though he was twenty one years old and was hardly a child. but he might in the future if he could come up with something he wanted and wasn’t going to regret later down the line.
“then you shouldn’t have any problems if you do it already,” he just told them with a small smile and nod of his head, “it’s not so easy for some people.” especially those who were so used to just following what other people did instead of doing things their own way. but jaebin had never been one to follow other people or do as he was told, otherwise he wouldn’t be here right now and would be at some special needs school his parents wanted him in. not to mention he wouldn’t be doing taekwondo, either. “wouldn’t really say that being forgetful and not remembering to bring your pencil and not carving your own path are the same thing.”
