Late March. I’m a projectionist for a film class. K.N. is taking that class. I ask her out. She gives me her number. I call. It’s the wrong number. Finally get it right the next week. Our first date is at this dive. We drink quarts; I talk about how much I hate people. Real charmer. She dumped me a few weeks later too. I was heartbroken again. Couldn’t do nothing right. Alone in this shithole pad, feeling sorry for myself.

My big job was entering the submissions into a database. There were hundreds of packages in the middle of the floor… they flooded in each day. I struggled to keep up. It was mind-numbing work but I liked reading all the synopses. Usually got a laugh out of how serious they were. Had no idea who any of these people were. Didn’t care.

That summer I took over some gal’s downtown apartment. It was paradise compared to where I was living. One night I was passed out on the couch. I got up to piss and, as I passed by the kitchen, I noticed a glow from the fire escape. I ignored it and pissed. I came back and moved closer to the glow… and there was someone attached to it. K.N. was sitting there. She said she missed me. She had climbed the apartment’s fire escape stairs to see me. We never really parted from that moment on. I forgot about how secure and happy that moment made me feel.

All the entries were in. Now there were five animation people coming to town to watch them. Karen Aqua, Ellen Meske, Chris Cassady, Mark Langer and Joyce Borenstein. The festival had a small budget. Apparently the previous director had crippled the place financially. This left this Not guy with little room to work. So these five would also be the jury. Some animator’s association didn’t like that. Turned out that my job would be to take these people from their hotels to the viewing area every day and sit with them while they watched all the submissions. I had to get them breakfast, lunch and dinner. Some of them thought I was their houseboy. Fuck them. Wonder if it’s a coincidence that they never got a film in Ottawa after 1996? Heh, heh. Just kidding.

Anyhow… I had to put the tapes in and out of the machine and cue the projectionist. There wasn’t much video so most days were spent in the cinema. We watched submissions from about 9:00 am till sometimes as late as 9:00 pm. I seem to remember that they pretty much watched everything right the way through. But there were maybe 600-700 entries. They had time. I really didn’t know anything about animation films. Like most, I’d seen Disney films. On Saturdays, I’d watched the Bugs Bunny/Roadrunner hour. But beyond that I didn’t know nuttin’ about cartoons. I vaguely remember anything from that selection period. There was Stimpy’s Invention. I remember that being an early favorite. A bunch of shorts from something called Liquid Television. Really crazy, different-looking stuff.

But the film I remember most of all was this German piece called Crossroads. It was black-and-white and basically had stick figures. The drawing was really simple. It looked like anyone could do it. I remember a character approached a crossroad. There are three other guys — all reflections of the same person. And somehow no matter what road the guy traveled down he would end up back at the same place. The way this animator used the space was incredible. I’d never seen anything like it. How did he get so much depth out of these black line drawings? It was like a 3D film. It was magic really. But more than that there were these themes. The film was maybe six to seven minutes, but in that time it dealt with this existential crisis in a very smart and funny way. I was big into Bergman and Buster Keaton at the time and this film seemed to have it all. It was one-stop shopping. It fused Bergman, Keaton and Beckett into this short cartoon. I got such a buzz from this film. I just had no idea that cartoons could do this. It was the right film at the right moment.

I didn’t like the committee all that much and I don’t remember much about the ‘92 festival except arguing with a French woman who ranted and raved about my lack of French. Most days I sat at a table and went home at 5:00 pm. Maybe I went to a party or two. Can’t remember. Only thought about K.N. Just wanted to be with her. I wasn’t there yet but that big small German film by some guy named Raimund Krumme had put me on a road that headed toward the door of the tent.

Chris Robinson is little more than a man. In his spare time he cares for the elderly. www.animationpimp.com.