The practice

From a playful sketch to a rainbow heart over a rainy weekend. Trimming, turning, and stitching are next. Another patch. 

Somehow, these have to be distributed. Maybe I'll have people meet me at the library with their denim and I'll stitch the hearts to them. Illicit a story or a promise. 

 The last of the Dirty Thread inventory has been posted.  

I'm hoping there will be enough warm weather left in September and October for one more dyefest this year. 

Into today, September 11

 I would have preferred to avoid the internet altogether today.  9/11 remembrances affect me more as the years wear on, and there are fewer people in my life who were actually alive and sentient twenty-five years ago. Many New Yorkers my age would either like to forget or sadly, they have. 

I also wanted to know as little as possible about the Shitweasel's swill fest in Dallas. He wasn't joking, and he is guilty of the crime of bribery. And somebody better tag and bag Mitch McConnell soon. There are enough zombies in Congress without the real deal on the payroll.

But there was business to attend to and more patient portals to navigate. I hate that shit. I can't imagine having no option but to deal with that crap while being sick with whatever. I have no patience for it. Fuck them. Hire a human. 

The weather took the promised turn - hotter and more humid than yesterday, but every ten minutes another burst of blazing sun alternated with oppressive cloud cover. The animals were acting out. Flipping me the bird.  

On my way to the doctor's office, I checked the mail and discovered the gardenia is coming into it's second bloom. With any luck or rain, I'll have Christmas gardenias again. Only one bloom, but lots of buds. The office visit just a formality so I can continue having some high-powered pain meds on hand should anyone need them. My back is as good as it's going to get with her care. The rest is up to me.

Everyone at the post office was in top form (your orders are rumored to be arriving on Monday). I actually followed through with the survey on the receipt!

Late in the afternoon the clouds lowered and thunder rolled, and we got a good long drenching. I tucked up with the threads and worked on those scribbled sketches from yesterday. 

Yesterday

Lately, I've been warned against making plans. The gods have been rolling in the aisles at my audacity.

My ten am appointment at the tire place - usually so punctual it doesn't pay to take any stitching along - dragged on until 12:30. 

I sat on the bench outside in dismay, watching fat, towering clouds bustle on through an incredibly cobalt sky. Still hot enough to sweat in the sun.

The "I'm starving to death" headache had made a nest in my left eye, so I succumbed to the BK right night door. Nothing they make actually smells like the air in the drive-thru line. It still surprises me that I can only eat half of whatever. The coke was tasteless enough to make me wonder if I had a case of the 'vid.

Feeding accomplished on the fly, I was still in a state of high dudgeon once I got home, wallet lighter from an alignment I hadn't anticipated and a serious case of the bloat setting in. As much as I hated the notion of wriggling into a damp bathing suit, I knew the cure was in the water.  

 

It was. Even though the sun was sharp, it was brittle and the water cooler by some degrees from the last swim. I deliberately left my phone upstairs, taking nothing but my hat. 

No music. No messages. No calls. No feverishly checking to see if he was dead yet...just giving my head a blank canvas to rest on and letting the buoyancy take the body.  

There was some "no-think" meditation, and if I had been in the floaty, I might have fallen asleep, the peace was so profound except...by the angle of the sun, the depth of the shadows and whisper of browning leaves, I knew it was the last swim of the year. Some years it's a guess. Not this time. 

Back upstairs, I slathered on aloe vera and settled into the stitching chair with Sophie. Her short, dense fur is like velvet. On the way in from the pool, I walked on some sprigs of thyme growing along the walkway, and Bong thought my feet were emissaries from heaven. Yes, this is an AI edit of the original photo because pictures of real feet, even my giant flippers, get unwanted attention from foot geeks. I still might put out a tip jar. 

Later, after coffee ice cream on ginger snaps, I sank into a few hours of some very quirky TV, mostly for the music (because I've watched the whole five seasons before) to backdrop some mindless doodling.

It's good to rest mind and body at the same time. 

I need to do it more often.

Heart on Fire

 

This heart is going to be stitched onto a denim vest I bought a while ago. Tart it up and sell it. 

I feel some beadwork coming on too. Fringes and frogs. 

He brings us the skies

 

To the Makers

 A toast!

If nothing else--thread or cloth--came from the most recent dyefest, this simple damask napkin would have been worth all the work.

"She rode a fierce black mule into the afterlife, a banner of wonder tied over the animal's eyes so he wouldn't be afraid."

~○~

Some of the newest cloth and thread demanded immediate action.

Working in the first strong morning light, provoked a return to the word train, too.

Think of it coming down the track at you, a measured, grinding pace. The rhythm of pen on paper, inviting you to take the leap, catch ahold up onto rough boards and unknown destinations. 

Wizards, we.