if you're going to be a lump, be a happy one

So the thing about Sarah Anderson and her Scribbles is that she feels small and insecure and flawed, and she takes all that and puts it into an adorable comic, and those of us who can’t express ourselves as well as she can all look at those comics and see ourselves. Big Mushy Happy Lump is filled with these moments, of honesty and clarity and irony and self-consciousness.

These comics take on a lot of different topics, like a self-esteem roller coaster, the importance of female friends, procrastination, stuffing your feelings, cats, flirting, periods, sexual harassment, nightmares of high school, and social anxiety. The comics are spirited, showing her willingness to make herself the butt of a joke and her skill at self-expression. And she’s just funny.

In this book, she talks about her struggles in social situations and how sometimes she finds being around others exhausting. Introverts can certainly relate to that, and to understand the opposite of that, when we pull away so far we let ourselves get isolated. The struggle is real, and Anderson opens up about trying to find that balance between the anxiety of being around too many people and the depression of being alone too much.

She also talks about bonding with a kitten and learning why the internet loves cats the ways it does and how she is a serial sweater stealer.

I love to reach for a Sarah’s Scribbles book when I need a pick-me-up, when I want some company to be alone, when I want someone to be weird with, and when I want to smile. Big Mushy Happy Lump is a sweet reminder to be kinder to myself, to take risks, and to be strange whenever possible.