What Would Bigfoot Do? Part 1: The Inspiration

I have been a believer in Sasquatch for a while, since first camping in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in July 2007.  There's so much forest there - anything could hide in there pretty easily. Then my friend Dan Miller gave me The Locals by Thom Powell last Christmas, which is all about investigations done of reported encounters with the Bigfeet as he calls them. It is fascinating and it gets me thinking... 

This past spring I get the idea to do a small book about Bigfoot. I play with the idea of doing a comic, and take a comics basics workshop at the IPRC with my friend Dylan Williams. Dylan encourages us to do our own thing in our own style, and I realize - drawing isn't really it for me, it's printing. But can I do a whole printed book? It seems daunting. 

My birth mother, Elizabeth, comes out to visit in July. We go camping near Mount St. Helens and have the good fortune to camp (for free) on the property of a cool kitchy gift shop near the mountain - there's a giant Bigfoot right by the shop. It is the best campground ever! We don't see any Sasquatches besides the statue, but have a great time anyway. I am inspired to really start the book. It is a larger letterpress project than I have ever done, but one of my intentions with my art is to stay on my learning edge, so I decide to go for it. 

I have done a few sketches in the months since the workshop, and I start sketching in earnest. It all goes fine until I lose my sketchbook. I don't know what happened. My parents come out to visit in early August, and we have a great time exploring Cannon Beach and Seaside. (They have never been out here before so are completely blown away. Now they finally understand why I live out here!) I last see my sketchbook in the hotel room in Seaside, but don't realize it was gone until over a week later. I turn the apartment upside down, call the hotel several times, but it has disappeared without a trace, just like Bigfoot himself.  

I am disheartened and unsure if I will be able to do the project or not now. Drawing is not my best skill, and the thought of starting it all over is a bummer. And I am really upset that I have been so unfocused on my art that my sketchbook is missing for a week and a half before I even realize it. I halfheartedly start redoing the sketches, which I don't completely remember since it has been a while since I first them. And I am still just working out the ideas anyway - what Would Bigfoot do?