Life as an art major largely consists of being told that I will never be able to eat anything but ramen noodles.

I am constantly asked "did you draw that?" regarding the sketch that I am toting around at any given time. As if it is a surprise that someone would be proud of something so useless.

I am asked to give people art for free for any number of reasons. It's not polite and it's not courteous, but people do it anyway.

When I was younger even my own mother insisted that if my friends said they liked one of my drawings that I should give it to them. Or if someone asked me to draw them something that I should do it for free.

Today I instinctively warn people who are commissioning things from me that if they have a budget they should stick to certain mediums or smaller sizes, because I've been taught that my work isn't as valuable as a programmer's.

I've been taught to sacrifice my quality of life for fear of losing business.

I've been taught to smile and wave when customers don't tip. News flash: creative services are like any other service and you tip. Would you skip out on tipping a kind taxi driver or a friendly waiter? No, but many people today have no idea what is going on when it comes to dealing with photographers and artists.

Not that every customer is lucifer incarnate, though. Some have tipped me 100%, but it still doesn't help to balance out the number of small pieces I've done that have gone unpaid. Perhaps the issue is just that I trust people too much. If you read my article on What Not To Say When Commissioning An Artist then you're a step ahead on helping to improve the quality of life we artists have, and I would like to say thank you.

Life as an art major is not learning how to create good art, it's learning how to deal with customers and still make a living.

Whether it's painting or photography, music or theater, artists get the short end of the stick in life. Mainly because people don't realize that we provide them with everything they have.

The chair you're sitting on? An artist designed that. That laptop you're reading this article on? You wouldn't know about that laptop if it weren't for an advertisement that a videographer shot. Ever bought a fancy birthday cake? Prepared by a culinary artist. The music you sing along to in a car. Even the embarrassing baby photos of you that your parents have hung up in the kitchen for everyone to see were taken by a photographer.

Everything you enjoy was created by the people you so ignorantly scorn.