It's no bigger than this. I just wanted something in my hands while I watched the new season of Downton Abbey last night. He just had to say "great love comes with great heartache" or somesuch.
We were talking about tattoos today but instead I'm making badges..
Sometimes, once these things are finished, I'm startled at how they can be both extremely personal and completely universal. I guess love is just like that.
We are tuckered out and hunkered down. Another Snowmageddon is bearing down on the vicinity but it's going to be ice this time and the potential for losing power is great which is worrisome because we keep cosy here with little room sized electric heaters. We cook with gas here but I no longer have a stove top coffee pot. I wonder if they still sell those squatty pyrex ones where you could watch the miracle unfold.
The Badges are all mounted and signed..many thanks to the collectors who snapped them up...there are more in the pipe if the lights stay on.
This writer is mentally wrung out. The last rewrite (I swear) was finished this morning. I feel like I've been on a trip which is a very inside joke. So, for restoration (even if the power goes) there are three new books, "The Glass Castle" by Jeanette Walls, "the Secret History" by Donna Tartt and "Dear Life" by Alice Munro. I pulled a new tarot card too, just for good measure.
...is getting an upgrade. (In case you don't know, my Dixie Mink is an oversized, denim workshirt.)
Salem has taken to hiding in my cloth closet, nesting up in a small basket that held a few almost finished badges. I took them out, taped off the cat hair (she's a first-class shedder) and I'm in the process of stitching my own gang colors on each sleeve.
For the moment, I've abandoned the robe notion. All these weeks of isolation, I've been wearing a few long, sleeveless gowns that I cobbled together from scraps. That wonderful, soft Provence cotton. The last thing I need is another "my eyes only" garment.
If I'm to keep living I want to declare a few things in public. Still contemplating what to put on the center back.
I live in a suburb of Atlanta, which I'm sure you know is in turmoil, along with other American cities, in response to the murders of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and George Floyd.
Wearing " I Can't Breathe" is what I feel, but do I have the right?
The only thing that gives me any hope is VOTE.
We ventured out yesterday. Charlie has a pretty good grasp of what's going on and was eager to be my masked Ninja. He's really too big to be riding in the cart, but for both of us, it's safest. Inside the front entrance of every Publix, there is a bench that he climbs to get in and out of the buggy because I can no longer lift him.
This reaction came when a man who was not wearing a mask, cut in front of us as we observed the Please Stand Here tapes on the floor. Charlie is still five and he gets it.
The woman waiting on us in the deli knows us well enough that she doesn't have to ask what we want. We all watched the man as he walked off. She shook her head. I said it for her, not quite loud enough for the man to hear because I was with Charlie.
"Asshole".
Saving this one for later. I start a new shift today. 5pm to 1:30am. The sweet spot of the night. Most of my adult life, I've chosen to work lates. That's when interesting things and people are happening. I don't know how nine to fivers can stand the boredom.
BUT, at the moment, there has been an influx of calls from the most selfish, entitled and rude people I've had to interact with since I was a telephone operator for AT&T. It's been a long time since anyone has opened a conversation with "Listen, bitch." My easiest reply is no reply at all. A supervisor once called my silences "New York Deadly". Sometimes I remind people that they are being recorded. That gets me a hasty hangup or both verbal barrels in a new volley of abuse. Either way, I win.
I'm always grateful that I don't have to go home to that person whose life is in the shitter because their gym is still closed and I can't tell them when it will reopen.
On balance, many people ask how I am faring. They are glad to hear that I work from home, and generally want to engage in any kind of conversation beyond the business at hand. We laugh to hear each other's cats or dogs demanding attention. We aren't supposed to, but I do. It's the night, after all.
What did I know of this Red thread? Nothing. All I knew was that when I got him off the bus yesterday it was so warm we left without any kind of jacket. This morning for the ride home, I dug this shirt out of my closet. How old? The badges are from Jake's cub scout days. I was a den mom for a season. Jim did the overnight camping thing. I was happy when he quit.
It's a really cozy fleecy stuff. I might have worn it once. If I chop off half the sleeves, it will make him a nice bathrobe.
I don't wear red. Some hot pinks and rust once in a great while, but red? Nope.
I use it very sparingly in my work.
I think I OD'ed on hot colors in 2007. Every time I take this one out and unroll it, I'm shocked.
I caught a break early morning. Voodoo decided to camp out in the chair instead of my lap which left me free to work at the computer without feline interference.
I pulled up the bones and hair of a short story I have been working on and all of a sudden it was after noon and eight pages were crying out for a rewrite.
I can't wait to paint this room stark, blinding white.
Faithful readers have asked if and when the badges will go on sale.
Yes, I hope to post the ones that will be for sale on the "buy art..." page..tomorrow if the sun cooperates with this photographer.
"River Deep, Mountain High" has been sold. I like it well enough that I will probably make variations.
Now all I have to do is mount all of them and put them in the store. My iron will be coming home over the weekend.
A series of commitments to myself and others will be putting stitching on the back burner for a while.
I went to a local writer Meetup last night and read about eight pages of a work of fiction that I've had simmering for some time.
The reactions I got were satisfying. The lack of "pointers" from published professionals was interesting. Giving and getting criticism about words on a page is a very different experience from the kind of feedback we give and get from other artists about the things we make.
More importantly, the time I spent selecting, editing and proofreading a chapter for this exercise took me right to that sweet spot when I was writing in the first place. Another time, another place and that other me who operates outside of all time and place. It felt like good drugs with no hangover and hey, I just realized it's Friday.
"True Love Ways" should be arriving at its new home tomorrow or the next day.
The proceeds took me for a much needed day away from the ranch. However prosy you might think squatting in IKEAs cafeteria from breakfast though lunch might be, it was just the ticket for me and my friend.
The food is just meh, but the time and space with no one hurrying you away from your table is a luxury. And then there's the store. I'm not much of a shopper, but this place does it for both of us and that in itself is amazing because our tastes are so divergent.
Janice pointed out that I have been squeezing this same pillow every time we got there since the place opened. I finally threw it in the basket.
And for the first time in forever, I was paying attention in the toy department and it's a wonderland. Charlie likes faces.
I went back in to the studio this morning and started a new badge, adding on to the series I started two years ago.
Finding those UFOs yesterday and digging into their history has proven to be a catalyst for a much-needed mental rest, although, while in the design phase of the project, I'm finding paralelles to writing that I never did in the past. I think it's because I focused on this one..."the Heart of Life", a personal favorite that sold pretty quickly.
I found the post about the genesis of the badge project which includes a good shot of this piece in progress.
I can remember selecting and rejecting cloth, then cutting and folding and moving the shapes over and over until it was right.
Selecting and building the blended threads, choosing and executing each stitch. There was no hurry and no room for "whatever". I gave this little thing my all. That's what it takes, no matter what I'm doing or I'm not going to be satisfied with the outcome. This one will get finished soon and I'll mount it to a small canvas. They will all be for sale.
