As Disability Pride Month is nearing a close and I wanted to insure I get one more post up here even if I didn’t find the energy to be more active this year. Though that in itself is something as a disabled person I’ve had to come to terms with time and time again. However while my goals to educate have fallen to the wayside, I did take time to take care of myself this month which is also a suitable way to celebrate the month.
in the name of coming to love yourself fully and living authentically I wanted to share a self portrait of sorts. Red Dead Redemption 2 is a game that is very special to me and in a way it helped pave the way toward me becoming confident in myself. This is technically a character I created for a fanfic I was inspired to write to help with coping with the trauma of being disabled during the pandemic. I also just wanted more time with my fave characters but, I digress. Being such a big fan of RDR2, and as an artist fascinated by Rockstar games’ art style I took on the challenge of rendering Matt in the style of the promo material. Which is quite a undertaking when you’re color blind. This ended up a mark of great growth for me. I drew a human that looks right, I did an act of self love by drawing my full authentic self voluntarily for the first time. Matt also has my connective tissue disorder and blindness which I used to never do with my characters. I drew a horse well for the first time and I’m still beyond proud of what I’ve accomplished both artistically and personally. Self acceptance is hard at the best of times but, however the path you take toward it, it’s worth the journey even as that becomes something you need to practice versus expecting it to be one and done. I hope you find some media that you connect with as throughly as I connected with this game.
