upcoming madness

I spent an hour fiddling around at Prochem this morning, making lists. Checking them twice. Since I couldn't come to any hard choices, I'll forfeit the coupon that expires at midnight. I'll live.

It's a real struggle for me to NOT choose my perennial favorites and move a few degrees warmer or cooler in each instance and still stay with the pure colors, not the crazy-assed blends, which I do for myself thanks, PC anyway.  I even found that five-pound box of soy wax that I bought over a year ago.

my heartbeat

It's Charlie Monday and this is where family and friends will find us going forward. Social Media has just gotten too ugly. We'll keep our sweetness close.

He wasn't a happy camper today. Croup kept the whole family up last night and he was off his game, but happy I was there today, for the most part. Directives were scorned, blocks were thrown, but only once.

TMI - potty training temporarily suspended. #$it happens, right?

Just when I thought I might be in....

...they push me out.

 I just gave a close read to the rules for Fantastic Fibers and, sure enough, I'd deluded myself that there was no "age" rule about the work submitted. It's not a new thing and I can't even think of how to challenge rules that devalue and dismiss the entire body of an artist's work. What other medium does that?

"All work submitted must be original, completed in the last three years"


My heart kinda sank because I haven't done any major work since I finished these in late 2013, give or take a few months. I guess looking for shows that don't focus on the freshness of the work is fool's errand. Fuck 'em.

Karma V

vigil cloth

-

and furthermore

The impulse to hide.

Today was exceptional as compared to the last few. Fuck that nasty shitweasel in the Whitehouse. I will no longer allow him space in my thoughts. May he choke on his vile tongue in his sleep.

Today, I swapped and edited pages with another writer and it was all good.

Today, I shopped for colors at ProChem. Just looking, mind you. But I was looking. And there's cloth to be picked up across town next week. Dyeable cloth. Somewhere around here are several pounds of soy wax. I hope. There are designs in my dreams and stories that have cloth.

anyway I can

I had forgotten how much I like doing text, but it always has to be words that matter. Nothing matters more these days.

.

the bounce

Even as I come to terms with the realization that, for a while, I've been just waiting to die, I can turn on a dime and say "No" because there's still so much to do. (Stitchers know this instinctively which is why we always have a backlog of UFOs.)

There's this! Saving for the convention last year taught me buckets about budgeting for luxuries. Sell the silver? Why not. One way or another I'm gonna sell all these comic books. Jim would approve heartily.

the Liberty Clipper

Next week there will be a much-needed change of pace. A few days in the mountains with a few fellow artists. Art supplies, food, drink, and good company if we all don't wind up in jail.

In addition to unfinished fiber art, I have outlines for three more books clamoring for me to finish the one I've been working on, a house in mid-dilapidation that needs a miracle and a family who needs me. Much worthy shit to attend to. No time for whining.

condition dark

  When all you want to do is talk to someone and you can't so you talk to yourself, but it doesn't help.  You run out of words and tears after a while and go still.

Then you listen. In the stillness, there is music and voices from your heart and you go on.
.


(this wonderful photo by Lynn McCarthy)

ennui

"a feeling of listlessness and dissatisfaction arising from a lack of occupation or excitement."

I took enough French in high school to know what "le mot juste" means. They usually have a beautiful word for something shitty. "Ennui" is one of them. I'm not usually prone to such nonsense. I guess, at this time of year, it's better than the flu.

I know I've been awol here for some time. Little to nothing to report on the fiber front other than I'm still in the process of repurposing the studio. Not phasing out fiber entirely. Just looking for a clean slate I guess. The

Closet from Hell has been sorted and ordered, mostly. My biggest issue if dealing with the storage of finished work. 

I have made the decision to do any further reporting here, doing everything I can to get away from the depressing quagmire called FB. And I used to think that online scrabble was a time suck! Instead of bitching I'm going to mine it for the good stuff and provide the linkage here, even if it's only for my own amusement. 

So, stand by, things will be picking up around here shortly. What and how remains to be seen but, I'm going back to being my own best audience, regardless of what  

fresh out of kumbaya

Thinking about ways cloth speaks. Banners, uniforms.

If I hang this in my front yard, there would be serious repercussions. The same if I were to hang the confederate flag. Passions run high when people are afraid.

Bonny blue

This color is being confrontational with me lately. "Bonny Blue" was discontinued some years back. It refuses to disappear. Ok.

the dregs

A cold and rainy day was a great excuse to not start my daily walking routine. Who really wants pneumonia?

There was a long-promised piece of repair work to do. Of course, mending called for the great annual cleanout of the river basket. I found things in there that have been missing for months! My favorite knife. A book of stamps. Lots of unspooled thread in nests. No mice.

So I bagged and sorted and discarded and relocated for a while. Got the mending done.

These bits were floating around under everything else. I'll keep them together and see if they strike up a voice.

That mending? About forty tiny, blind stitches.  white on white. It looks like I was never there.

2016, it wasn't your fault.