As a sophomore in college, I transferred to the University of Texas specifically because there were openings in the Daily Texan for student cartoonists, and I had a deep-seated need to scribble cartoons until my fingers practically fell off. Collage was my first strip, and it ran for two years until I was blacklisted by the student editors (more on that later). Looking back, I can see how painfully crude the artwork in the original comics was. And though the art — and the writing — got stronger over time, I hadn’t yet found my own truly unique style. But I still love the strips because they taught me far more than any of the Fine Arts classes I was taking at the time. Making this strip gave me the discipline to turn out finished work on a schedule; it taught me to push my own personal boundaries and to look for inspiration everywhere; and most importantly, it showed me the true heart of an artistic career — that every daily project should be an improvement on yesterday’s work.