AUTOBIO COMIC: Recognizable

Patreon breaks every time I try to use their image captioning feature so here's all the text:

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I'm very recognizable.

The last 20 years I've spent building a career off of my image.

I did this to myself.

I had planned on shaving my head well before I enrolled in the Intensive Outpatient Program at the hospital.

My supply of contacts ran out around that time and I had to update my prescription before I could order more. The task was too monumental to handle. 

I shaved my head the same week I graduated the program. Honestly, the timing was a coincidence, that's just when my hair was sufficiently shaggy.

I didn't know what I wanted to look like.

I just wanted to not look like the Me that is recognizable, the one that strangers stop in the street, the one that is fair game to trash, the one that hates every cell in her body.

I figured I'd let my hair grow long enough to schedule an appointment with my regular hair dresser, to get her input. Who knows, maybe I'd wind up going back to my standard cut in the end. It does suit me. 

Then the pandemic hit.

All the businesses closed. 

I couldn't get a haircut, I couldn't get more contacts. (Needless to say, this was just a minor inconvenience in the face of the global disaster happening.)

I've had to learn the basics of long hair maintenance. (It's long to me!)

It's weird! It's weird having to use conditioner, it's weird combing out tangles, it's weird to remove my stray hairs from the shower walls and drain after I wash.

This isn't me.

This isn't what I want to look like. 

Matt: Who is this stranger?
Erika: Hey!

But I don't know what I do want to look like yet, either.

Matt: Where is my wife? Have you seen her?
Erika: Hey!!!

I'll figure it out. There's no rush.

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To draw this comic, I dove through the many, many reference photos I've taken since this current hair cycle began. I take these pictures so I can draw from them, which is why you're gunna see some weird faces and poses /:)

January 2019 (My hair at its most On Brand™, both dyed and shorn) ⬇️

September 2019 (With bonus Kerstin A. La Cross [left] and Lucy Bellwood [right]) ⬇️

February 2020 ⬇️

May 2020 ⬇️

July 2020 ⬇️

September 2020 ⬇️

I have no idea what to do with this mop, so I just keep it tied up in pigtails all day every day 😬Here's a picture from literally right now ⬇️

Oh! You can see the blocks for my 2020 diary quilt behind me! Remember that? Auhg, I need to give you all an update on my progress. I'm all caught up through September! It's turning out real cool, I think :)