Drawing Through Time

How Therapy, Charles Addams, and a Time Machine Sparked My Latest Cartoon

I’ve stopped worrying about whether a cartoon lands or flops. Honestly, if I sat around waiting for a perfect idea, I’d never make anything. The only real path to improvement is repetition—making things, putting them out there, and doing it all over again.

Cartooning is a strange beast. It’s equal parts art and punchline, and both require regular workouts. Study the greats, practice often, and eventually the muscles grow.

Recently, I had one of those serendipitous moments that keep me going. I came across a Charles Addams cartoon and nearly dropped my pen. The gag? Almost identical to one I drew many, many years ago (which has been lost to time). The setup, the payoff—everything was the same, except mine had a modern twist (the sign, to be specific). I had no idea at the time, but apparently I’d been channeling the great Addams without knowing it. That kind of accidental parallel thinking made me weirdly happy. Like, “Hey, maybe I am on the right track.”

Now, my latest cartoon was born somewhere less glamorous than a haunted mansion or foggy graveyard—it came from therapy.

I was mid-rant, complaining that the design of life seems fundamentally flawed. Why is it that the younger versions of ourselves—naive, hormonal, broke—are the ones making decisions that define the lives we’re stuck living later on? It’s madness. My therapist chuckled and said, “You should draw that as a cartoon.” Challenge accepted.

So I drew it.

In the cartoon, the older me confronts the younger me via a time machine. (And yes, if you’re a nerd like me, you might recognize that the time machine is the same one from a classic Far Side cartoon. My little nod to Gary Larson.)

Anyway, that’s the origin story of the latest cartoon. It’s a weird mix of Addams, therapy sessions, and time travel. Hope it makes you laugh—or at least mutter “Yeah, that checks out.”

On to the next one.

—James