“Bubbles 2.0” | 1/29/26 | crayon and pigment ink on bristol | 8 x 6 in
From March 13th, 2013
In the last year, I learned to use art as a tool for emotional health. Since I’ve been out of treatment, I’ve been doing well in that area, but my counselor insists I still need to improve my social health.
One day, I accidentally went out to lunch with some people. I crept around until I found the restaurant’s stock of crayons and paper. I didn’t have anything in mind when I started (other than removing myself from the world around me so I wouldn’t have to interact awkwardly with other human beings) so I just chose a color that appealed to me and drew some shapes I liked. At some point, I decided what the shapes were, added to them to form the image of a kid blowing a bubble, and then captioned it with the first thing that came to mind.
This little drawing has no unique significance to me, but – like a lot of what I do – it’s evidence of how far I’ve come. Granted, one could suggest that – ideally – I wouldn’t feel the need to escape reality at all, but I think drawing is a big step up from shooting heroin. And – while I can see some validity to the opposing point of view – I don’t think social interaction is all that much more important than doing something that helps me feel productive and (in a very real sense) valuable.
For years, I’d wake up with a sigh, as I contemplated another day of being alive and – even worse – being me. Sometimes I create things that have a deeper meaning. Other times, I just draw little cartoons that I think are cute or clever and are little more than they appear. Both of these kinds of art are important because both are pieces of what makes me happy to be living and breathing as Sam North. A lot of people could do what I do, but a lot of people don’t. For whatever reason, I do – and that’s something I’ve been rewarded for in innumerable ways every day. What I once considered a terrible fate, I’m now incredibly grateful for. I’m pretty excited about being me.
From January 29th, 2026
The earlier (now retired) digitally manipulated print
When I first started making art, I didn’t know it was important to get good captures of my finished work. Getting a decent reproduction of “Bubbles” required digitally manipulating a blurry photo to the point that it didn’t really look like the original drawing anymore. I sold a bunch of “Bubbles” prints but it never sat right with me that they looked so different.
Lately, I’ve been more focused on presentation. That’s meant raising my own standards. To keep “Bubbles” in my print inventory, I’d have to redo it. So I traced the original photograph onto bristol, re-colored it with crayon, and did the outlines in pigment ink. Hence “Bubbles 2.0.”
It’s probably a consequence of the specific “world” I grew up in but I don’t really know too many people who are succeeding. A lot of my friends struggle. Some aren’t especially happy.
I don’t envy my friends that put in 40 hours on shit they don’t particularly like, to make some dipshit (that’s dumber than they are) richer than they are.
And then they pay rent. To a LANDLORD. Because he owns the properties. Inherited, or bought with money most of us will never have.
The system is fucked. AND WE’RE (mostly) WHITE KIDS. (Or more recently/accurately, white “adults”). We’ve got SOME DEGREE OF PRIVILEGE.
Then again, like attracts like; my friends are like me. And being a working-class, too-smart-for-your-own-good basketcase isn’t exactly a recipe for UPWARD CLASS MOBILITY.
There’s this lyric: “the decks are stacked and the house always wins when the dealer’s crooked … but we’ve been counting cards. We’re fucking fed up; shit’s gone too far.”2
I love that line. The world’s gonna cheat us and we’ve still gotta play the hand we’re dealt, so fuck THEIR rules. We’ll play it our way, with every trick we’ve got.
I often describe my art career as “A PRETTY GOOD SCAM.” That’s honestly what it feels like.
I wake up every day and do whatever the fuck I want. I write about myself and paint funny facesin ridiculous colors – and then I getpaid for it. I’m not rich, but I’m not poor either. In the last year, I’ve loaned or given money to friends and family that have fucking jobs.
When I started down this path, I had zero technical ability as an artist (AND I’VE NOT GAINED MUCH SINCE THEN). I’ve refined my eye for color and composition, but what I have most of all is a personality, a worldview, and the ability and willingness to articulate it (in a way that other people find funny, insightful, and resonant). That’s been the key ingredient in my success. I’m the only person in the world who can do exactly what I do.
But my broken brain, personality, worldview, and INABILITY TO EVER SHUT THE FUCK UP also led me to heroin. And heroin has eaten years of my life and taken me to horribly traumatic places that I’d tell you about IF I WANTED TO START CRYING RIGHT NOW.
Ultimately, heroin led me to expressive art therapy. Which I hated because I was bad at it. But I really liked the way the other mental cases responded when it’d be my turn in group to talk about what I’d made. They laughed when I wanted. They were affected when I wanted. And they fed me praise.
Returning to the world, I needed an income, but I’d never successfully held a job. I’m INSUBORDINATE.
Though I didn’t have the first clue if it was even possible, or how to go about it, I decided to see if anyone would buy my art. Turns out it was possible right outta the gate.
Three years later, I experienced the worst trauma of my life, fell the fuck apart, relapsed for 8 years, and resigned myself to failure and addiction forever. Until my girlfriend decided the future might look better with someone else. So I got clean (TO SHOW HER) and started painting again. I anxiously anticipated it blowing up in my face, but didn’t know what else to do.
Wanna know the really fucked up part? A year and change later, I’m happier than I’ve ever been. I wake up excited each day. I’m excited for the future.
Monday through Thursday is a lot of writing, inventory, accounting, logistics, booking, website and bus maintenance.
Friday through Sunday, I set-up a killer display of THE BEST FUCKING ART EVER MADE and I work on my latest painting while singing along to all my favorite punk rock, as strangers give me their money in exchange for the products of my mental illness, my personality, my traumas, and my victories.
A lot of my life’s been pretty miserable. I’ve got some dark stories. I’ve lived through dark YEARS.
But “The Luckiest Little Shit in the World” is a victory product. It’s a victory lap on 2025, when I relaunched my art career, killed it, and had a fucking blast. It’s really not even fair how much fun I’m having and how much the world rewards me for it. I really do feel like the luckiest little shit in the world.
FOR NOW. Fear and anxiety are never far from my mind. These good feelings are fairly new and I’m still sorta broken – I’m still me – and thank fucking god for that.
It’s the key ingredient.
I’m sure there’s some degree of recency bias, but this just might be my favorite thing that I’ve ever painted. I think I mentioned in my blog entry for “So Smart”3 that I had a sorta epiphany in October, when I realized that I was happier than I’ve ever been. That’s when I came up with the concept for this painting and I couldn’t wait to finish “So Smart” and get to this one. It pleases me to no end that it turned out every bit as well as I could’ve hoped.
Virtually all of this painting’s statement appears right on the canvas [starting in the square-headed, rainbow-toothed figure at the bottom left]. There’s some additional text scattered about too though. Some of it’s stuff that also appears in the statement/main body of text but some’s totally different. I’m not gonna transcribe all of it here but it includes:
Embarrassing, insecure, spur-of-the-moment journaling after two girls separately propositioned me, and how that felt validating even though there’s only one girl I really want attention from right now. (90% of this is written on the top edge of the canvas so can only be read from the actual painting).
The realization that I’ve somehow never had to get a job to pay bills.
The recognition that – even if you took away everything else that’s good in my life – the unreasonable amount of joy I get from miserable punk songs still gives me an unfair advantage (toward being happy) over everyone else on the planet.
“Is the universe FUCKING WITH ME or looking out for me by giving me two disappointing weekends right after I start a painting about how I’m SO GOD DAMNED #BLESSED?”
And some other random stuff about not making enough money – then immediately making more than enough money – plus some anxiety written in a moment when I stopped being stoked on this painting, thought it wasn’t gonna be good enough, only to quickly figure out how to make it better and get stoked on it again.
On Monday night, I was rejected for some group exhibition at a gallery, for which I’d thought I was a shoe-in because I’ve become too self-assured when it comes to my work. I wrote about that in more detail here.
Yesterday, I was accepted to (what I understand to be) an art festival held in particularly high-regard. I’m putting in applications to lots of similar events in the coming weeks. I’m excited to see how those all play out.
There’s a lot here that calls to mind earlier work. The other paintings featured in this blog entry are the ones with statements I’ve hyperlinked in the body of the text. ↩︎
The song I’m referencing is “Countin’ Cards” by Escape from the Zoo: ↩︎
Nope – it’s in the statement for “All the Time Lost,” which I’ve not yet published online. ↩︎
I share a LOT of my life through my art and through social media (which – whether art-related or not) I consider to be for the purposes of promoting my art. There’s one part of my life that I rarely, if ever, touch upon and it’s a pretty big part of my life. It’s the reason I’m still in Sarasota.
My grandparents moved to Sarasota to be closer to their eldest child, my dad. And then, shortly thereafter, my dad suddenly died. That left me as their only relative in the area. I’d never been particularly close with my grandparents (I’ve not even been particularly close with my parents) but when my dad died, I decided that I should try to be closer with my grandparents. So I started seeing them every week. Then twice a week. And – in times when something was wrong – everyday.
Maybe I haven’t shared that because it conflicts with the ORPHAN IMAGE / ABANDONED BY WOLVES narrative that I’ve clung to my whole life. Maybe it just felt uncomfortable to include them in my story and my work when they aren’t of an age where they’d even be aware of it or know how to feel about/comprehend it, even if I tried to explain it to them. To this day, I’m still not sure they really understand my life.
You guys remember when I made a series of vague posts about being overwhelmed and “the world beating the shit out of me” last month? (The first video was the one where I noted that a HAMMER had even hit me in the head?) Well those were really about shit going in with my grandparents. I had to continually postpone my outta state trip, cutting down 5 weeks to just 17 days by the time I actually left – at which point things seemed mostly okay.
When I got back last week, things were less okay. And today, my grandpa died. I was prepared for it. I knew it was coming. But not now. Not today. I thought he still had a couple weeks in him. And, honestly, I thought he’d likely hang on even past that – past the point when it made any sense. That did not happen.
I think I’m dealing with it pretty well. Not well enough to make a video without crying but – Y’KNOW – I’m not in PERPETUAL anguish. I am only INTERMITTENTLY crying.
I wanna say a few things about my grandpa in recognition and appreciation of the life he lived.
He spent his life as a criminal defense attorney and he FUCKING LOVED IT. His idea of fun was to go sit in courtrooms and just watch the mundane/daily courtroom shit that happened.
I didn’t go to law school to make him proud. I didn’t give my family a single thought when I made that decision. But he WAS proud. And when I graduated by the skin of my teeth, strung out on heroin – taking my exams at the absolute last minute long after everyone else (thanks to special arrangements made by the school registrar who was sympathetic to my addiction) I didn’t find out I’d passed my exams until about 36 hours before the ceremony. He was on a plane as soon as he found out. I didn’t walk high school or college graduations but I did that one for him.
I don’t remember if he even knew yet that I was a drug addict. My dad might have given him some other reason why we didn’t know about my grades or whether I’d be graduating until the last minute. But he knew by the end of that same year. And he paid to put me in one of the best inpatient dual diagnosis/rehab facilities in the country.
The painting I’m working on right now is called POOR FOREVER. And it’s not about being poor forever, it’s about the attitude I have about money and how frugal I am because I don’t want to be POOR FOREVER. I don’t often spend money lightly. That comes from him by way of my dad. My dad kinda was poor forever. But my grandpa made a good living but still chose to live as if he didn’t. But when it came to getting treatment for his shitty drug addict grandson who hardly ever called, that all went out the window. He SPENT THE MONEY.
And then five weeks later I got kicked out of treatment. And two days later, he paid ANOTHER (expensive) facility to take me. And then five weeks later, that one kicked me out too. And then I ran the streets for a few months, being a drug-addled, dishonest fuck up until I broke down crying, on a bench, on the side of the road, in the rain. And then he paid a THIRD rehab to take me.
Seven weeks later, can you guess what happened? I GOT KICKED OUT. But this time, something in me was a little different. And I worked to convince them to take me back. And when they agreed to it two weeks later, my grandpa dropped thousands of dollars AGAIN to get me readmitted. He spent thousands of dollars to get me checked in FOR THE FOURTH TIME. I stayed for 8 months. And while I can’t say that I’ve stayed clean ever since, it was what I learned in that last stint of treatment that’s the reason for the clean time that I got upon leaving and any/all of the clean stints I’ve had since, including these last 17 months.
As WE ALL KNOW – I am IMPERVIOUS TO DEATH/CANNOT BE KILLED, but (dropping my shtick for a minute) it’s super unlikely that I’d still be breathing if not for him.
These last few years, his Parkinson’s has fucked up his brain and dementia has taken over. A lot of my time with him has not been of a super high quality. I didn’t really get to know him and he didn’t really get to know me as much as I’d have liked. But – if nothing else – I know he appreciated the way I’ve shown up for him and my grandma (to whom he was married for SEVENTY FIVE YEARS). And I know he loved me.
One last thing about my grandpa. It’s a story I only heard recently. One year, he had a client who was sitting in jail simply because he couldn’t afford the bail. It wasn’t a major crime or an expensive bail but it was still more than this guy could swing. This was right before Christmas and – though my grandpa was Jewish – that still didn’t sit right with him. It’s illegal for lawyers to pay for their clients’ bail (for a number of reasons I won’t get into) so there was nothing he could do about it himself. So he went into every synagogue in the area and told them, “Hey – please post bail for this guy and I will make a donation to your synagogue for the amount of the bail and then some. And then when he shows up to his court date, you’ll even get that money back.” None of the synagogues would do it. So he went around to all of the churches in the area until he finally found one that took him up on his offer. All so this random low-paying (possibly never-paying) client wouldn’t be locked up over the holidays. That’s the kind of person he was.
The world is worse off for having lost him, but it’s much better for having him. The positive impact he had will carry on in more ways than I will ever even know. He was 96 years old.
‘Tis a sad, sad day for Sammy thrashLife collectors. The original “I’m a Fucking Artist, Guys” drawing is officially OFF THE MARKET.
I’ll confess that I did come down from the $1,000 asking price but I assure you it still sold for enough to enrage anyone upset by outlandish prices for scribbles on scrap paper. 😝
THAT SAID, this is the drawing featured on all my cards and fliers (arguably my TRADEMARK DOODLE), it was one of the very first things I ever made on my own (as opposed to – at gunpoint – in expressive art therapy group), and I think it’s as close to a HISTORICAL ARTIFACT as anything I’ve ever made so… I’m both happy that it’s found a home and a little sad to see it go.
Also sold this weekend: another piece that means a whole, whole lot to me (and had actually been sold once before but came back to me through A SERIES OF WACKY CIRCUMSTANCES): “Have Sex with and/or Buy Art from Me” – arguably the best/most accurate piece I ever made about my self-esteem and the subject of VALIDATION.
The last couple months have been especially great and I just wanna, again, thank everyone that’s been so supportive. It was exactly one year and one week ago that I tried to kill myself because I couldn’t imagine my life ever getting back to (essentially) where I am today. I’ve still not proved myself wrong on my 2016/2017 theory that my life peaked in 2013-15 and I’d never again be that happy or successful, but I certainly seem to be ON THE PATH and, for the first time in years, I think it might be possible.
my current work-in-progress – not done yet but getting CLOSE
Small aside: I recently got pro panels/pop-up walls so that I could show at art festivals (and use them at my little weekend/pop-up events) but I’ve already put them in storage because I only currently have three unsold originals that aren’t currently up on display somewhere (I’ve got nothing to hang on my walls!) It’s not a bad problem to have.
And if you’d like to exacerbate that problem by purchasing one of them, you know how to reach me.
“Peeing in the Pool (of Tears (You’re Drowning In))” 1/4/25. Acrylic paint. 18×24″“”Christian Love (The Grace of a Mountain Goat)” 10/22/24. Pigment and alcohol inks. 8½x11″.“The World Revolves Around Me.” 8/21/15. Acrylic paint. 4×4′.
And just ’cause, let’s say $20 off in the webstore this week when you spend $50 or more. Use promo code STLapril.
Thanks as always for your time and attention. You guys are the best.
After packing my entire life into my car, stashing it on the fifth floor of a parking garage, and preparing to go to my grandparents’ ALF to wait out the hurricane (‘cause the building is “hurricane-proof” and has generators), my ex got around my many blocks (phone, email, social media) and begged me to give her ONE MORE CHANCE. And I brilliantly allowed her to come with me. It was fine (even GREAT) for that first night and then – the day of the hurricane – it became clear that nothing had changed and I was trapped in there with her.
It was torturous. To love someone so much, know it won’t work out, and then be stuck someplace together. And she just doesn’t get it. She still thought we were going to sleep together that second night, cuddled up, spooning on the couch. (There was no bed in the room we stayed in). I don’t know if she’s a sociopath or just has the emotional intelligence of a five year-old but I also know it DOESN’T REFLECT ESPECIALLY WELL ON ME that I was ever in love with this person or thought I wanted a life with her. I know I say this all the time but “we are attracted (and attractive) to people with similar levels of emotional health/maturity.” I would like to believe that my reluctance/refusal to engage with this anymore means that I’m getting better.
Anyway, it turned out that even though the hurricane made its initial landfall RIGHT HERE IN SARASOTA (less than a mile from my place), everything was alright. And nothing happened to my car. So I spent all day putting my life/home back together (just finished this minute) and I can LICK MY EMOTIONAL WOUNDS from the comfort of my home.
Things could have been worse. I need to remember to be grateful for what I’ve got. Friends (that helped me unload my car and then FED ME PIZZA), a home that I like, people all over that care about me, I’m clean, back to making art, and I don’t need to rebuild my life from scratch simply because of a natural disaster/GOD HATES ME. (Or maybe he doesn’t, seeing as how it worked out). But he PROBABLY does.
This was originally written simply as the caption for a TIKTOK VIDEO(I wonder if those words will ever not sound ridiculous to me?) because I’m currently operating under the belief that TikTok is my best shot at marketing myself/rebuilding my career, especially as long as I’m still just living in Sarasota. Here are the photos from the post for anyone that doesn’t wanna use that app.
Photo I took from the garage where I parked my car.That’s one of my dad’s sculptures front and center. He died in 2021.Where I write, draw, and do any computer-kinda work.Where I paint.Me, in bed, with a print that I stuck over my head, just to take this photo and make it more interesting. Because I’m both vain and self-promoting.
When I was first forced to participate in “expressive art therapy group” while in inpatient treatment, I thought it was a joke. “I can’t keep a needle out of my arm and I’m fucking dying and you want me to color?? You’ve gotta be kidding me.” But once I started to actually put a little bit of effort into it – and sharing with the group what I had made and the reasons I made the choices that I had – I got my first little taste of self-esteem. People liked my art and they thought my explanations were funny and insightful. It made me feel good about myself. Eventually, art became something I really enjoyed and – later – my primary occupation. Not only did it save my life but it’s my primary tool in maintaining emotional balance and it pays my bills and enables me to spend most of my time doing what I love most: making more art.
A lot of my work looks like a lot of my other work. I have a distinct style and I don’t really stray outside of the box too often. I’ve tried to experiment here and there but – when I do – I’m usually not too happy with the results. It’s only when I get back to doing what I love (drawing/painting funny faces with bright colors) that I start to feel better.
In September of 2014, my friend Paul paid me to draw something for him. He didn’t give me any instructions but I decided to visit a record he’d released when he first started his label, Radius Records, for a bit of inspiration. The lyric that popped out at me was from The Smoking Popes’ “Theme From ‘Cheerleader’”: “Every song sounds like the last one.” It made me think about how my art is all pretty much the same but how I’m okay with that. Just like how almost all of the songs I like (in the fairly rigid genre of pop punk) are all essentially the same. It reminded me of something I’ve often said when talking about music: “I don’t care about innovation or breaking new ground. A band can do the same thing over and over again; what’s important is that they do it well.”
It’s the same with my art. It doesn’t matter if I do the same trick again and again; so long as I do it well.
That’s what was on my mind when I did this. That and the fact that I had come to like my own art enough to stand behind it in spite of any criticism – but that I was still grateful to have fans and friends, like Paul, that liked and supported what I do. I wrote just a little bit about it on the left side of the drawing.
Every time I pick up a pen, a brush, [whatever], I risk failure, risk repeating myself. I’m not afraid. I like what I like, do what I do, and every time I pick up, I’m saying so. I believe in myself. But I didn’t always. Other people had to believe in me first. And if they didn’t continue to… I don’t know that I’d be able to either.
It’s taken me more than a year to write out the statement for this piece. Thanks for your patience, Paul!
“Every Song Sounds Like the Last One.” 9/28/14. Ink. 14×11″.
On an unrelated note, my second NPR story of 2015 aired a few days ago, this time courtesy of Ryan Benk and the Jacksonville affiliate, WJCT. You can read or listen to it on their website.
Riding around in the back of Mikey twoHands’ truck yesterday, trying to find a new tire for the van, having the time of my life, and listening to Sundials’ “Derek Shelton Birthday Party” on endless repeat.
Today is the day I finally bust across the state line to start meeting with galleries and setting up exhibits outside of Florida. I’m not allowed to drive in Georgia but – now that I’ve got Spillane with me – I’m able to make Atlanta the first stop. Cities are cities to me at this point though so priority #1 is to get out of the heat. To that end, we’re gonna try to get everything we wanna get done within the span of a couple days – maybe stick it out through the weekend just on account of gallery hours – and then get heading further north.
Right now, we’re en route to get the transmission on the van serviced but we should be on the road by 6. This stop in Jacksonville was only supposed to be a day or two and turned into ten. I’m happy to be moving on but that’s nothing against this city. I’ve been in and outta Jacksonville for the last few months now but, in that time, it’s started to feel more like home than any other city out there. There are a lot of people that made it that way: Tim, Shanna, and everyone else at Sun-Ray Cinema; Christina and Ian at Rain Dogs; Mandie, Rosaly, and Richard of Wunderground; the whole crew at Burrito Gallery (with a special nod to Julie for getting me in the door); Janet Harper and Folio Weekly; Regina and The Silver Cow; Pugsley and Ian at Dark Side Tattoo Gallery; (most recently) everyone at On Point Ink and Ryan Rummel at Club TSI; Heather Pierce; Alex Zalo; and all the friends I’ve made and supporters I’ve found here, who are so many in number that (as much as I wanna) I won’t call out by name ’cause I’d hate to leave somebody out. You’ve all been so excellent to me and I’m not gonna forget it anytime soon.
And that goes double for Mikey “twoHands” Kelly, who’s been the best fast friend I could have ever asked for. Half the shit I’ve done here would have never happened had it not been for you, buddy. I’ll miss Jacksonville and I’ll miss you.
![Apparently Proverbs 5:19 says: “Like a loving doe and a graceful mountain goat, Let her breasts satisfy you at all times; Be exhilarated always with her love.” So… Christianity is fucking weird, you guys. Then again, I sure could go for a nice girl with ]THE GRACE OF A MOUNTAIN GOAT and, like, really cool tits. Anyone know how I’d go about getting baptized?](https://samnorth.art/wp-content/uploads/Grace-of-a-Mountain-Goat-751x1024.jpg)
