Daily Inspiration Quote by Lynda Barry

“Cartoonist” lands here like a label that doesn’t quite fit the body it’s been slapped onto: a job title that feels both too small and too exposed. Barry’s little wince at the word isn’t modesty; it’s a snapshot of how creative identities get socially coded. “Cartoonist” sounds goofy, unserious, maybe even childish, and that’s exactly the problem. It carries the faint stink of dismissal, the way people file drawing under hobby or whim while reserving “artist” for the properly museum-lit.

The sentence structure does quiet work. “The weirdest name I finally let myself have” frames the profession as something granted internally, not conferred by the world. She “let” herself claim it, suggesting years of self-policing: the fear of seeming ridiculous, of taking up space, of saying out loud what you do when what you do looks like play. Then the punch: “I would never say it.” That’s not about vocabulary; it’s about legitimacy. If you can’t speak the name, you can’t easily ask for pay, respect, or attention.

Barry also exposes the cultural trap built into cartooning: it’s an art form designed to appear effortless. The drawings are approachable, the jokes quick, the lines “simple” in a way that hides labor and craft. Her “awful word” is a critique of the whole hierarchy that makes certain kinds of making feel embarrassing to claim. It’s also a sly reclaiming: naming the discomfort is how she starts taking the name back.