the penny from heaven

This past Tuesday while I was waiting to pick Charlie up at school, I looked in the mirror and realized my earring was missing.

I don't have a lot of jewelry. Never buy for myself so anything gifted to me is precious. Jim bought me these when Colin was born almost forty years ago. He hid the JC Penny's bill from me all summer. I wear them day and night, rarely changing them for something else.

I had the strangest pang when I saw it missing because the night before, I dreamed that I'd lost it and in the dream, I was unaffected. I usually go nuts looking for something like this until I find it.

It had been a busy day - a half dozen errands. Me getting in and out of the car with a new scarf on that seemed to catch on everything. I made a few calls, stopped off at the place where I had coffee. Nothing. I remained emotionally removed. By the end of the day, I was resigned that it was gone forever.



Jake just sent me this message. He found it in the very busy parking lot in front of his apartment building. For this simple thing, and a few other more important ones, we are being looked out for. We have an Angel.

the work in progress

I've been contemplating what to do with fifteen (you read that right) years of babbling here. All of these bits, bytes, and pixels are as ephemeral as a cloud rolling across the moon. One blown transformer somewhere critical, one bored hacker and all of it gone as it if never existed. I've downloaded a few posts here and there, but my recent computer crash - the hardware sort - has given me pause about this electronic life.

Right now, I'm just grateful that I didn't have to dig too far for the provenance of "Cave Dreams". It's still a long way from finished, but I know what I want for it and how to go about getting the effects - mostly a lot more hand stitching. 

Until it's completed, here are some links to its evolution:

From the earliest raw cloth.  Compositional fumblings here and here. To a more solid starting place.

Digressions  and   displacements..this is about when the Black & White series took over my studio life. All thing color got put on hold for a very long time.

self pep-talks are good.

(from  Tuesday, March 17, 2015)

nailing it

If you are any kind of creative every now and again you'll step back from what you are up to and go “Yes!” or “Good!” or, in my case “Fuckin' Aaa!” and you'll throw down the tools and get that little chill and be thirsty for a celebration because you nailed it. You won't even feel the need to drag anyone into the moment for their agreement. This moment is for you alone.

Last night I was pondering the demise of the writers group that I've been going to for a little more than a year now. The two founders have drifted away. Life, of course, must take precedence over follies like gathering over bad food with snotty waiters and embarrass ourselves and each other with our attempts at writing and so the group has floundered. It's been a learning experience and my only semi-social connection to the world since my husband died. I will be looking for another bunch of similarly plagued individuals and if I can't find what I'm looking for, I'll found my own.

So I made the mistake of looking over a bit of the book I've been working on for almost a year. I worked on it constantly while I was at the FOF retreat last year in FL. 

The writing was puffy, awkward and self-indulgent. I was bummed thinking how I thought I was closing in on a rough draft when all I really had behind me was clouds crap. I sulked and went to bed. The last thing I remember was that there were a couple of lines out of some twelve pages that were really good. Keepers.

In the dark hour before waking, on a day when I didn't have to get up, I turned that chapter inside out in my head. I had a sit down with each of the characters. Assessed their needs and their wants. Established who knew what, when and why it mattered. Addressed the problems and found answers, all before ever putting my toes on the rug.

I've got this and knowing it feels great.

Heart's blood

I was just starting to get the hang of text on cloth when I stopped making these badges.

I ran out of red cloth.

Never a favorite, I'm as hard to please red-wise as I am black. It has to be just the right shade or I won't use it.

That will be a dye project in the upcoming season.

Blood on the tracks.

Some fresh air and sunshine