Sometimes It’s About Massages and Brain Size

It’s not in my nature to waste fabric. Well, yes, I take big pieces of fabric and cut them into smaller pieces and then iron and sew them back together. It’s already a strange concept. But I don’t like wasting what I’ve got. It’s my palette. I don’t even like throwing out the tiny scraps left over after I trim the ironed pieces. But I do. Because it would be crazy to keep that stuff (I do keep it until the quilt is done, in case I need a tiny piece of something…because if I’m gonna lose a piece, it’s usually a little one).

So although I finished the newest quilt on Tuesday night, I hadn’t thrown out the scraps yet or put all the other fabric away, because I knew I had the leftover pieces from when I cut the head out backwards. Now I also cut out the bird and the sun/cloud conglomerate backwards, but I ended up using them in the quilt anyway. I couldn’t do that with the head because of the shoulder orientation. It wouldn’t fit right. But I saved those pieces. I had spent time cutting out the Wonder Under, ironing them to fabric, and trimming them. Dammit if I wasn’t gonna use them. (Yes. I am currently channeling my Depression-era grandmother.)

So I did. Here’s the bin. It’s even labeled Backwards. The question was which pieces did I pull from here to finish the other one (answer: cat ears, cat top of head, cat eyes, cat eyeballs, and human eyelid…plus two smaller pieces that seemingly just disappeared)?

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The real problem was ironing on the back of the pattern. I couldn’t see it. So I had to redraw it on the back. Now when I look at this, it’s obvious to me that there’s another problem…flipped letters. I didn’t actually realize that until later though, when I was on the phone with the girlchild and she said I should just leave them backwards (I didn’t…but I do have one quilt where everything is backwards because I traced it all wrong and couldn’t bear to retrace).

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So here it is backwards…in process…you can see the box of scraps there. I had to fill in a few things…small pieces. And I decided to make the words right way round. I didn’t cut new ones. I used what I had.

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Backwards head…

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Regular head…

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Creepy, huh? And honestly, I’m only doing this because I hate to waste stuff. It only took about an hour to iron it together. Not bad.

So yeah, I’ll quilt it etc. and stick it up on Etsy. It’s not tiny, actually, because of the hair. And it’s weird. Then again, everything I do is weird.

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As evidenced by this drawing done during a teacher training yesterday that I was a bit irritated by having to sit through. I hate when the voice in my head is yelling “No DUH!” the entire time.

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So first of all, the statement at the top is not what I think…but what some kids might think (funny, I’m always careful to explain I don’t believe that…that smart people do some really stupid stuff. I could insert names here if I wanted to.). Then the stuff about brain size/weight…I actually wanted to check that out, because I remembered that Einstein’s brain wasn’t particularly large, and I always thought that it was the connections that were more important than size, although even those can be regrown to some extent. And this morning, I found this…confirming that (as we all know) size isn’t everything. And yes, if you haven’t figured it out by now, drawing is my safe space. The Affect not Effect was because the damn program needs an editor. I hate it when apparently educated people can’t edit their stuff. It’s one thing to get it wrong. It’s another to not realize you get stuff wrong and have someone who is better at it check your stuff. We’re teachers, dammit.

I probably scare some people in trainings. Generally I try to sit with people who won’t be scared. In the old days, when we got a paper agenda for staff meetings, people used to try to sit next to me (because it was more fun to watch me draw than listen to the principal). Seriously, though, it entertains the part of my brain that otherwise gets me in trouble. Plus it keeps me awake. And any angry or pissed off or bored parts will have something else on which to focus.

There is a cat currently sitting on my computer mouse. OK. Moved her. Lab day today. Too tired for that. Oh well. It’s not like I get to ignore the tired stuff. I did get my first ever massage yesterday, in an attempt to move the joints in my neck and back that have been semi-frozen about a month. We got all but one of them. But more importantly, holy crap, massages are wondrous. I can’t afford how wondrous they are (seriously, I could get addicted to that). But it was a positive thing. So there we are. You learn something new every day. Sometimes it’s stupid stuff, like how much vomit a Golden Retriever can gack up. But sometimes it’s about massages and brain size.

Wherever There Is

Hello Monday after a week off from school. Hello tired eyes…my fault for staying up too late working on a project that is trying to fight being finished on multiple levels. And then the coyotes’ fault for howling and yipping and generally driving the puppy bonkers. He does howl, that little beast…while Calli snores on. They’re coyotes, dude. They’re outside. They’re not coming in. We can sleep through that shit. (I personally cannot sleep through puppy howling…or coyotes half the time…but with puppy howling, there is no way I’m sleeping.). So I’m sleep short, for sure. I did manage to finish almost all of my grading last night, leaving the evenings free for artmaking (well, around the other stuff I’ve gotta do, but mostly)…at least until Friday, when they will turn more stuff in. A blissful few days…as it were…because we’re doing some monster labs this week. ‘Twill be a messy few days at least.

So once I figured out that there was no way around the retracing of the head and the cat at least, I did that on Friday…and then Saturday, I did a bunch of Christmas shopping (small business Saturday…hitting all the art events) and started cutting out the new pieces…

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I didn’t get very far, because I went to see Dr. Strange (definitely worth it). See, I’m not totally antisocial. I do stuff.

And yesterday, I worked a good chunk of the day before I was allowed art time.

So what I had to do was lay out the already cut pieces to see what fabrics I’d already chosen, then lay out the corresponding Wonder Under pieces traced the right way round, and then figure out what went where. Pretty easy, actually…

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Once I had them all ironed down (and I had two or three I had to retrace…I had some that I just stole from the other-way-round pile. So if I do make a quilt that is just her head, a small one, I would need another eye piece and cat ears and nose, plus top of head, I think.

Then I sat down and cut them all out. Usually I do that on the couch, but I was in the middle of an episode and it was easier to sit here…

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I just looked at the clock. Shit. Gotta book through this. I laid out all the pieces that needed ironing…

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Found all the scissors I was stockpiling in there and got them together (it’s not even a quarter of the scissors in the house)…

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And I started ironing. Now I probably should have stopped here. About. Because this was midnight.

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Ah well. There goes midnight. Kept going.

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I love the face fabric. Ironed the eye separately…

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And put it where it belonged.

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Head done. Not ironed to body yet. Whole mess not ironed down to background yet (things that were supposed to be done last Wednesday). Tonight…iron together and start stitch down. Tomorrow finish stitch down and maybe pinbaste. Quilting by Wednesday. Binding on over the weekend. Need to email photographer.

I did stop to throw balls for dogs. Simba left his at the other end of the hallway and is too scared of Calli to run by her and get it because Calli (despite that goofy smile) growls and then tries to steal the ball from him. Meanie.

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So that’s where I’m at. Significantly behind still, but getting there. Wherever there is. No music this morning for some reason (I was on hold with one of the college payment plans…woo hoo!).

This Ain’t Gonna Work*

Well. So. I ironed for about 7 hours yesterday until I realized I’d made a major mistake two steps back. I’m not even sure how I pulled it off. It’s funny, though…I can go back through the blog and see when I made the mistake…it was the day after the election. For some unknown reason, I flipped the drawing over and kept on tracing, but now everything was backwards from before. I have a light table because you have to trace the Wonder Under upside down so when you iron it to the back of the fabric, everything will be facing forwards again. So I did it right until I got to the head. And then I flipped it. For no apparent reason. Wednesday the 9th. Wow. OK.

Anyway, I didn’t figure that out until last night around 9 PM. When I was so close to done. Sigh. Giant ass sigh.

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Uterus in purple and red…legs going into the water…

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Kitten in one of her sleeping spots…

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Prosthetic arm balancing the ever-present cup of tea…and trying to catch that lost eyeball.

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There’s some weird stuff in this quilt…

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The other arm has a giant cell on it…

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And around 9 PM, I started the hair and went. Wait. Fuck. That’s backwards.

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Dammit. I’ve done it before. In fact, I have one entire quilt that is backwards. A full-size one. But to do it midway? Shit. So I was sitting there, head in hands, trying to process. Because it was the last 300 pieces. I hate to waste fabric. And time. So I ironed the sun/cloud combo…

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And I ironed the bird. So the sun would still work on the left side of the body…it was a little different, but I would be the only one who knew. Well, except I just told y’all.

The bird though…not gonna work. Orientation is all wrong. So that’s another 150 pieces or so…I mean, the head had to be retraced because the shoulders and hair wouldn’t work going the other direction. Same with the cat. So that was already 100 pieces.

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I didn’t want to retrace the bird. So at the moment, this is the plan. Flip the bird and cloud locations. I don’t think that will be an issue.

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But I had to retrace about 100 pieces…

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And I did that. And cut them out. Last night. Today, I’ll iron them down to fabric…and cut them out and iron them together. Dammit. Because I was going to be done with the ironing yesterday. Shit. I guess it makes sense that a quilt about time would fuck with MY time. And now you know how much the election affected me. Yeah. Well.

You know what sucks? Colleges deciding midyear to change housing/food costs, so you need to come up with an additional $700 right after the holidays. With no warning. Dudes. This is why I do that payment plan thing…so I can PLAN for it. Fuckers.

Speaking of a plan. I need to do that. For my quilts. It’s in my head. I just wrote it on the whiteboard on my studio door. I’m crazy. You might as well know that now. I’m hoping for four new quilts for the show…which would be fine, if they didn’t need titles, sizes, and photos by April 28. Yeah. I’m working on it. That’s about one a month.

Still trying to get the dogs to be cozy together. Previous to this, Calli was smelling Simba’s privates. Which dogs do. And he lets her, because she’s big and scary. To him. She’s a Golden…she’s really not that scary to most living beings. She’s scared of the cats.

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Yesterday morning, we worked on these trees. Which are on my neighbor’s property, but up on his slope. We’ve trimmed them before, with his permission. But they’re putting the house on the market, so that’s fun (both houses on either side of me selling in one year’s time after 18 years of the same neighbors). The trees block my view of the mountains…so we try to trim them to deck railing height every 5 years or so. I think it’s been longer this time.

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Now when I say we, I should really admit that my job is to stand on the deck and say “cut that. No, there.” while throwing balls or sticks for the dogs. My ex climbs into the trees and I ask where his health insurance card is and make sure the phone is ready to call 911. Because that shit scares the crap out of me. Yes. He has a chainsaw up there. He’s fucking nuts.

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And then we hauled it all back to my property…but here’s my view! The trees will bush out again…and that one roof is ugly as shit…but there’s the mountains! Yay.

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So that was productive. We also took out a volunteer tree that will never be a real tree. It’s a tree weed. But now I can hope the new neighbors are not loud noisy assholes. The guy above me and his cigars. Sigh. I hate that people don’t realize their bad habits affect their neighbors. Then again, I sew in the middle of the night.

Trying to make up for the stupid head stuff that messed up the quilt. Well. I will deal with that. And then start drawing. Well, there’s that school shit I need to do too. Ugh. And Christmas gifts. I started early, which is good, but it’s never early enough.

I guess it’s a good thing I didn’t put all the fabrics away that I used in this quilt, because I’m going to need them again. I hope I have enough of all of them. Eek. One of the flesh fabrics was pretty devastated…hopefully not the face fabric. I think all the grays are OK.

And yes, I will probably iron the wrong-facing face together and do something with it. Like I said, I hate to waste fabric. Those Depression-era sentiments passed down from Grandma through Mom…although I don’t save my tin foil. I do save rubber bands and twist ties though. OK Kathryn…focus. Yup. That app…read the quote. Sometimes I think it knows me.

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Because the mistake isn’t the end of the world, now is it? It was just hard to take last night. And now that I know where my head was when I made it, I just want to give myself a hug.

*Glass Animals, Gooey

Everything’s in Order in a Black Hole, Part 2*

Running late again. I started this earlier and then deleted what I’d wrote…don’t even remember why. I am NOT shopping today. No way. Got art to make, shit to grade. I’m way behind. Don’t want to deal with people for a while. Sorry people.

That said, I did start ironing yesterday and it was good. Sure, it was Thanksgiving as well and I did head out for dinner, but most of the day was here…grading stuff…and ironing.

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A hundred pieces laid out in piles of ten.

Look. It’s a mole. I think I did a mole once or twice before, but this one is particularly cute. And tiny.

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So many of my quilts start down in the dirt…

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This one is a little different because of the hole in the middle…I think I got all this done before I left for dinner…

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Kitten sleeps in my studio/office with me. She’s back in that box again today, but facing the other direction.

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When I got back from dinner and laid around for a bit (because that’s what Thanksgiving dinner does to you), I started ironing again…some water…

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And then I pulled that whole section up off the ironing sheet and rolled it up and set it aside. I’ll come back to it.

Then a volcano with a dinosaur.

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And legs…from the part in the water up to the hips…

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That’s where I quit…at around midnight. I didn’t want to start on the next bits because it would get complicated. So that’s where I’ll start this afternoon, I guess. I wish I could say I’d be done with the ironing today, but I think that’s a long shot. Maybe tomorrow…then stitch down. This thing is gonna be tight. If I can get it done in time at all. Ironically, it’s for a show about time. OK, then. Yeah. This time of year, between Thanksgiving and Christmas, it just kicks my butt.

Here’s puppy waiting for a tummy rub…he doesn’t usually show his belly…

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Sorry about the private parts…his are fairly well hidden for a boy though. He’s a fairly atypical boy dog. He thinks he’s half cat for one, and I’m not sure about the rest.

OK. Well. I’m going to go carve my personal turkey (I made one for turkey sandwiches) and then come in here and iron. I’m debating walking the dogs as well, but I’d probably have to make that decision pretty soon. Ugh. Not in the mood for making decisions even. How you KNOW you need a real vacation. Funny. Someone asked me last night about vacations, but those are so outside my reality right now. Sigh. Some day.

*Arctic Monkeys, Fluorescent Adolescent (I love that I picked the exact same line in this song…)

Please Don’t Bother Trying to Find Her*

The reality is that if you leave me alone long enough with the furry beasts, I will start having long philosophical discussions with them. I’m particularly perturbed that none of them thought it was their civic duty to vote in the last election. I believe I have chastised them appropriately and that will not be the case in 2020. Of course, it’s too late now. They understand that. They are sorry. They will do better next time.

I have to admit that I’m not getting much but art stuff done. I don’t feel like grading things. I don’t feel like yardwork. I don’t feel like anything.

I did about 8 hours of artmaking yesterday, in between…um…what? Well I ran two whole errands. And I cooked a little. But that’s about it. Thanksgiving break is always like this…it’s not really long enough to recover from school AND be a productive human again. So we try to recover and manage all the family stuff, which this year, isn’t much. Last year, I was in Seattle this week…so no artmaking then. I could have gone there again this year, but honestly just needed to hunker down, finish this piece, and start the next five. I think it really is five too. Crazy.

I finished ironing the Wonder Under down to fabric in about 13 hours…way longer than it should have taken for 800 pieces, but whatever. I’m sure there was a good reason.

I made a small body cell in the last piece…and I used ALL the colors.

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The last thing I ironed was the cat…

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The fabric cat…not a real one…

Here’s all 117 fabrics…also more than I would normally use in an 800-piece quilt.

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Not a lot of blue…a lot of gray and brown.

I guess I did clean up the light table. And then I went through the drawings to see if there was another bathtub drawing in there (yes…but I don’t know if I want to make it next…I think it should wait.). And I cut a 24-inch square of paper for a piece that needs to be done in March or April…can’t remember which. I need to look at the calendar and make some quilt plans too. Maybe I will do that today. It’s finally sunny. I could sit out and draw today. Maybe.

It was cold last night, so when I finally sat down to start cutting pieces out, I had three animals at one point…some WAYYYY too close.

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They kept moving around. Occasionally dog parts would be on my lap.

Simba needs a bath…but I’m waiting until it warms up a bit during the day before I do it to him.

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Like maybe today.

So then I cut stuff out for hours…well, 4 1/2 hours anyway. Which explains why my hand hurts this morning.

I got a lot cut out…although it never looks like much, does it? Trash in the top one, stuff that still needs cutting in the middle one, and cut-out stuff in the bottom one.

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My goal today is to finish that and start ironing it together. Finish ironing tomorrow and get to stitch down? Maybe? I hope so. Quilt Thursday? I should check the batting stash, huh. (check. Got batting.) The binding will be another issue, but hopefully that will be Friday. Maybe. I’m still debating the weekend. The copyediting job got kicked until mid-December (not looking forward to having three fewer weeks to complete it)…so Saturday might be a drive and a dinner and another drive. Still debating that.

I’m totally taking the dogs for a walk today though. A long one. Out in the middle of nowhere. Because they need it and so do I. Although the one outside barking at me is currently standing in a pool of water…like that makes sense. I suspect I should also do laundry. I did buy a turkey. I’m going to start brining it today I think. Maybe do that and then walk the dogs. I got a lunch invite. Not sure I’m in the mood for that. I’d have to find the part of my brain that socializes appropriately. Not sure where I put that. Mislaid for the holidays.

*The Zombies, She’s Not There

Blue, the Color of Our Planet*

My brain wakes up at 6, panicking because I forgot to set the alarm for school. Then it slowly realizes, as the cat mews at me, that it’s not a school day. Relax. Go back to sleep. It’s amazing how fast that happened. The re-sleep part. Really I need some major sleep catchup this week. My brain is tired.

I’m perturbed by the crap in North Dakota. In fact, any time some white person complains about immigration or immigrants or refuges, I wanna slap them across the face and explain how we weren’t here first, you dumbass. Peaceful protest…pouring water over them in freezing temperatures. That’s torture. Nobody in the US should be doing that. This is their sacred land. More importantly, the pipeline will inevitably damage their water supply. But hey! The Texas company will get their oil. Screw the damn environment, right? Sigh. Frustrating to watch and know how little I can do. I think that’s the biggest problem right now…feeling like you can’t do anything that will cause major change.

This quilt…Earth Day…I drew it years ago. Something about Earth Day and how we do it one day a year, celebrate the planet, while we spend the rest of the time trying to destroy it. And Earth Mother is yelling, Knock It Off…like that’s going to stop in the next four years. I think this was just after the Japanese earthquake and tsunami…there were two of them (quilts, not earthquakes).

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So we art on. We post shit. We send postcards. We march. We sign up. We fill out polls. We talk. We argue. We art on.

I did about 3 hours again yesterday, I think…no, closer to 4…I’m about 10 hours in on the ironing. It’s taking longer than I expected…or planned for. Oh well. It takes what it takes. My time management app is no longer being updated, so it sucks phone battery like crazy. I’m still looking for a replacement, one that doesn’t charge me monthly…because I’m not a business. I did pay a fee for this one, but just once. I guess once businesses got in on the time tracking idea as an app, the market rose to the occasion. So I’m still looking for one that will do what I want and not cost me a lot.

Here’s what ironing a heart looks like…one of two in the whole piece.

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There were a lot more of those inner body pieces than I thought. I ironed a heart, lungs, arteries, a mammogram, a metal arm, a watch, her hair (there was a lot of that), the sun, a cloud, some rain, a uterus (like you do)…but I still wasn’t done.

Here’s the pile of stuff ready to be cut out.

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I still have a giant tattoo of a cell, some tools, a teacup, an eyeball…well, more than one eyeball…and the bird up in the sky. And a cat. It’s at least another 3 hours, I think.

Here’s the pile of stuff I used before I cleaned it up. Added some more reds and purples and oranges and greens and grays. Lots of gray in this.

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Then I cleaned up, so I could see them clearly today. I added some yellows too. Forgot them.

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So I’m still working on it. It’s raining here today. I was hoping for some nice pretty, semi-warm days of sitting on the deck and drawing…it seems I might get that later this week, but not today. Today is a hunker-down in the studio day. We need the rain. It’s good.

Simba did not appreciate having the plumbago removed from his tail last night. Grandma is very patient with him…

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I’m actually spending most of my morning managing animals today. Gonna change that.

*Regina Spektor, Blue Lips

Gonna Go to the Place That’s the Best*

I know. I usually post Saturday morning. And not Sundays. But I was working with (aka following around like a puppy trying to figure shit out) the internet fixer-upper guy for over an hour yesterday to get all the pieces of equipment to talk to each other politely and consistently. He was worth every damn penny, because now everything works. Well. Until the kids get home probably, although we tested kid scenarios as well. We ran videos and Netflix in three rooms at once. So. For now, it will work.

And then I thought about writing, but I had made absolutely no art since Thursday night, so what was the point in writing about nothing? Or writing about the fact that I was on vacation, a whole week off the crazy. Honestly, I flailed about for a bit, and then managed to get my butt in here and iron stuff for over three hours. So that was nice. My brain appreciated it. Such a relief.

It took about 30 minutes before my brain fully kicked off the fuzz and detritus of school (I do still have shit to grade…let’s not kid ourselves. School cannot totally be written off, but I can certainly try to ignore it for a few days).

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Ironing the flesh and bones was a bit more complicated. There were scars and cracks, all the purples. There were only 5 actual flesh colors. And then three bone colors. I lay them all out, pulling from multiple bins, until I have all the fleshy bits on a fabric. It takes a while…I think the flesh pieces started in the 100s and finished in the 600s.

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And then I iron all of them down. Which takes a long time.

So although I’m in the 600s on the bottom part of the table, the two top rows are all the things on or near the body that aren’t supposed to be flesh-colored…like hearts and lungs and a mammogram and a bunch of other crap. Eyeballs. Teeth. So all those need to be ironed down, and that’s usually pretty time-consuming.

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So as much as I’d like to say that I’m up to the 600s, that’s not really true.

These pieces used up almost all of what I had left of this fabric.

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There’s what’s been ironed so far. I think I need a bigger box.

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And everything I’ve used so far…

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Kitten’s got it right. This is some of what I did yesterday, until the phone rang. Some survey. Nope. Not unless I can nap through it. Think I need another one today. Nap. Not a survey. I don’t ever really need a survey. Although I did this one; you should do it too. Interestingly, there were a couple of things where I actually agreed with our future Asshole-in-Chief. Like childcare and eldercare. But mostly he’s crazy. Nucking Futs as one friend says.

Sleep, Kitten. I’m sure he has issues with calicoes too, but I will protect you when they try to send you to an internment camp for your differences.

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My sarcasm abounds.

My goal is to iron more tonight, hopefully all of it, but probably not. Depends on how efficient I am, I guess. Finish ironing tomorrow and cut stuff out. Try not to read anything political for a day. Ha. Yeah. I know. Well women aren’t smart enough to understand what they’re reading, right? (Hello, Breitbart, I’m talking to you.) Oh holey moley. Sometimes it’s hard to just have a conversation with people without everyone getting angry or sad. Amazing that an election can do that.

OK. Gonna iron. Not gonna nap. Will drink more tea instead. I can nap when I’m dead. I think.

*Norman Greenbaum, Spirit in the Sky

Into the Sea of Waking Dreams*

It’s a survival day. I’m tired, I’m emotional (for a variety of reasons, none of them particularly clear or definitive), the kids are psychotic (anyone who’s ever been on a school campus the day or so before a week off knows what this looks like…it’s worse than the day after Halloween), and I just want it to be done. I want everything to just stop for a while and leave me alone so I can think. And maybe read my book. Because it’s good but really long and I want to finish it before the damn library steals it back from me. It’s digital, so they can actually do that, instead of my just holding on to it for an extra few days to finish it. There’s over 1000 pages in it, so that doesn’t help.

I had an artists’ talk last night…I know my brain slowed down enough that I couldn’t remember the phrase “free association”. Amusingly. Some guy came up afterward and asked if that’s what I had meant. Sure. Yeah. Couldn’t free associate free association. It was a hard lesson to teach yesterday, mostly because I knew I was being observed in my last period, which is notoriously one of my worst, but also because some days I only barely have an understanding of what I’m teaching (as I’m quickly googling sublimation because I kinda know what it is, but not well enough to explain it to 7th graders). By the end of the day, though, I had reminded myself of stuff I used to teach that was related to what we were doing…and it helped.

But exhausted. That’s the place I was…and still am. So tired it hurts to hold my eyelids up. And I can’t get the puppy to come inside this morning. He just wants to be out and running around and digging at something that was out in the yard last night. I can’t leave him out all day because of coyotes, so he’s got to come back in. Fuck.

I’m nowhere near where I wanted (needed?) to be on this quilt dammit. And that basically means I need to finish everything before Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday. Yeah. I know. That’s crazy talk. OK, maybe I can still have binding to hand sew at that point. So Saturday through Thursday. Probably another 8 hours of ironing, then say 6 hours of cutting, another 10 hours to iron it together, then stitch down of about 4 hours (I am totally making this shit up), then sandwich and pinbaste for an hour, then quilt for 6 hours. Sew binding on is another 2 hours for the non-handsewing part. Ha! 36 hours. OK. That’s only like 7 hours a day. Shit. OK. Sigh. It’s good to see that out in front of me.

I did iron a little bit last night…added some purples and yellows…

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Found those silly dirt pieces from the night before.

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Still need to decide what color the dinosaur is going to be.

I was tired.

Thing is, on a good day, I can work on art for 10+ hours…so maybe I just need to aim for that. And ignore the fact that I do have stuff to grade. And the house is a mess. And I have a copyediting job that’s showing up. Minor issue.

I’m still trying to persuade the dogs that it is warmer together (yeah, I had two cats with me last night in bed), but they are both wary of each other…

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Simba loves Calli’s bed and wishes he could sleep on it all night (he can’t, because he’s a destructive barky asshole at night). If Simba’s on the bed, Calli comes running to me to complain about the interloper. I try to tell her how BIG she is and how she should just lie down next to him, but it takes me forcing the issue for it to happen.

OK. 1. Survive today without crying in front of students (wow. That sounds pitiful.). 2. Make art like a crazy woman. 3. Meditate regularly. 4. Go out in nature and hike around with dogs. 5. Sleep more. 6. Fix and clean everything. Seems like a good plan for the week off.

*Sarah McLachlan, Possession

Saying It’s Not a Catastrophe*

I think my brain just stopped. I woke up to news (again) of internment camps and registries, woke up too early because I have to be at school to help with a rewards breakfast, probably for a couple of Muslim kids, as well as other types of kids…honestly, if we’re going to do internment camps and registries, let’s start with those who kill the most in our country: white males with guns. OK. Once we have that camp going (which probably includes a goodly number of my neighbors and even probably my dad, although not my brother, hallelujah), THEN we can talk about the next largest group who kills people here in the United States. And just a clue…it’s still not Muslims. How does any of this make sense? Is there a white male politician internment camp being planned? I say we pick a state who wants them and put a wall around it. I’m pretty sure I could write an fairly entertaining dystopian (except NOT so unreal and in the future at the moment) novel about this.

I know I’m not the only one waking up every morning at the moment dreading what’s being reported next. I guess there is solace in that. I’m gonna go hug some kids today…ALL of them. I talked to one kid yesterday who hates (with a passion) the US military. You know why? They bombed his town. He lay in (under?) his bed at night listening to glass break and bombs fall, he heard how our soldiers talked to his people, and he hates them. I don’t blame him. We had a good discussion. He doesn’t hate America. He doesn’t hate all Americans. He just hates the military. He’s incredibly intelligent…and I talked to him about finding a place for that anger…about processing it. Meanwhile, very few kids want to say the pledge of allegiance still, and there are days when I feel the same way about it. You want white supremacists and women-haters and Jew-haters and Muslim-haters and let’s just break it down here…HATERS in charge. I don’t get it. I won’t pledge to that.

I made art. Slowly. Tiredly. I went to the gym and the chiropractor before that…so it was already late. I keep forgetting how much I like the gym. I should remember that more often.

You may not know that I have to escort (with flashlight) two dogs outside multiple times a night. They’re both scared of the dark, and one doesn’t like water either (sometimes that shit falls from the sky). I’m not sure I understand why she likes to stand in the ferns, but she does. She’s not peeing. She’s not doing anything but standing in them.

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Weird dog.

Here’s all the fabrics I used last night…lots of browns. I just realized I cut out all the dirt except for the dark part around the hole, and I put all those fabrics away. Dammit. I was tired last night.

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And I didn’t even use that pink one on the right. It was too much trouble to put it back though. I need to install a light under the desk so I can see the fabrics under there better. Home Depot trip in my future.

Here’s everything I’ve ironed down. I haven’t gotten very far…I’m in the 100s. But it’s taking me forever. Deciding which browns and grays…I stared at the grays for about 20 minutes last night trying to find a lighter brownish gray to go with the other two I’d already picked…this for a mole who is about 2 inches across. Sometimes my brain doesn’t work well. It probably didn’t matter THAT much, but eventually I found a third fabric that worked.

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Today is a long day…and I’m not sure I’m ready for any of it. Too tired really to handle it well, I think…and yet I will have to. True for all of us, I guess. Although if you’re one of those who is currently fist-bumping the air over the internment camps, I’d tell you to piss off, but maybe, really, maybe what you should do is come visit my classes for a day. And meet some of them. And tell me why those kids (or their parents) deserve to be harassed. Or you can just quietly decide to stop reading my blog. I really don’t care which you choose.

*Aimee Mann, Humpty Dumpty

I Ran So Far Away*

I’m having a hard time with the artmaking process lately. Most of it is about finding the time, but also just wondering if there’s a purpose to it. Will it solve any of the shit that’s going on right now. And I know in the long run that art and music and drama (the good kind…not the kind I see at school) will be part of the solution, but certainly there needs to be some yelling and protesting and organizing that needs to happen. Just as an antidote to the stupid shit we keep seeing. It’s not enough to just shake our heads and go back in our houses, close the doors, and hunker down on the couch with the TV. You can go check this website out…yeah, it’s a little jokey at first, but there’s some real info on there. It’s a place to start…but acknowledging where many of us are right now. Marching in January is cool, yes…and don’t be one of those haters who thinks it’s childish for us to protest. It’s the American way. We can and you will just have to suck it up and let us. We don’t want anyone to be unclear on how we feel. It needs to be loud and in your face and right now. For as long as it takes. Until my future president disintegrates in a 3-AM Twitter rant about it? Nope. Even after that. But something needs to be happening now and every day without let up until 2020. Maybe after. Maybe forever.

So with all that in my head, I’m working on a piece right now that was started before all that. And it’s got some things that are sort of relevant to how I’m feeling, but it seems a little light and easy when facing the future. Which is fine. I’m not going to stop working on it. It needs to be done. But the next batch of pieces is going to be a bit different. I got some of the solo show worked out in my head last night…and there’s opportunity for me to work some of this out in fabric. And that’s a start. I’ll figure the rest of it out. The politics…the protest…how to make the best change…and that might just be in my classroom, but I think it has to be more.

Meanwhile. Art. I hung the drawing…it’s tall. More of those long skinny ones coming your way in the next few months. You can see some portion of my crazy fabric storage. I cleaned up in there for about an hour before I started last night. It needed to be done.

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The triangle of ironing board, iron, and table where all the pieces go…and more fabric storage. Really, this room is all about efficient storage.

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From the door…the ironing board gets in the way of computer work during this stage, but I deal. It’s not a huge room.

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I laid out the first 100, which were all in the dirt and water.

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And I ironed a bunch of dirt fabrics. Although I found one piece in the hallway this morning. Just the Wonder Under. I know puppy ran off with something last night, but I’m not sure how he got it (I must have dropped it), so I’ll have to figure out which fabric it is supposed to be and iron it down.

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There’s a lot of brown in the bottom of the quilt.

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Dirt.

I didn’t get very far last night, but I did get somewhere. And that’s progress…movement in the right direction. And I also know that it will make me feel better, calm down the brain that keeps waking me up in the middle of the night with worst-case scenarios…I’m still looking at the tax scenario NPR put up and going…fuck…really? My taxes go up significantly. You know why? Because I’m not married. And my kids aren’t in child care. Because they’re cheap right now? Holy shit. That makes my stomach tie in knots. I’m already stressed about paying for college.

OK. Stop thinking about shit that hasn’t happened yet. I mean, don’t stop, because you need to protest that shit in art and in writing and in groups and in politics, but don’t let it take over like that.

Yeah. So. Chiropractor today. Oh hallelujah. It hurts.

*Flock of Seagulls, I Ran