Hey. I made art. I know. It’s exciting. No really, it is. Being sick sucks. Being sick and being an artist really sucks, because you still have to do laundry and cook and go to work…it’s the art that suffers. And it’s the stuff that keeps you sane, so then you get less sane. And you’re already sick, so that’s already a less-sane zone. Not good.
So last night was an artmaking clusterfuck, but I did better today. I sat at school a lot instead of my typical nine miles of wandering the classroom. I didn’t do another 12-hour workday. I actually remembered to eat breakfast, even though I still am not getting hungry like a normal person.
All I’m doing is tracing Wonder Under though…most boring pictures in the world…
But here’s the deal…I’m about 550 pieces in, so more than halfway. Only 350 to go. And I’ve been tracing for close to 7 hours, so I figure I’ve got another 4 at the most to go. So maybe by Friday night? It’s possible. I might be able to do it.
I did realize that this thing has about a million feathers…seriously, I’ve traced hundreds of feather pieces so far. There’s at least three birds, maybe more…the wings are good for filling in weird spaces. Plus birds are cool. Next, I’m tracing a cat. Can’t have a quilt without a cat in it. It doesn’t have feathers though.
See, I’m looking at Spring Break, which is now less than 5 weeks away, and my plan was to have this one ironed onto fabric and trimmed by Spring Break. PLUS, have the other recycled one at that stage too, if not further along. No, I’m not crazy…why do you ask? If you don’t make goals, you’ll never get anywhere. I don’t mind having goals that I don’t quite meet…I’ll be close (unless I get pneumonia again…remind me to get the damn shot next year).
To that end, I sat on the floor on Sunday (in my delirium yesterday, I totally forgot I had done this) and sorted blue fabrics.
Blue was the biggest pile. I sorted them by fabric pattern…Mariah had all these long strips and weird triangles and squares of all sizes (she pieces quilts), so sometimes all I have is a bunch of 2″ squares…but I could piece those and use them as one piece, like I did with the other one. I still have a bunch of other color piles in there, but for some reason, the blue was the scariest. (It was the biggest, by far.) So I started with it. Only 10 more piles to go. Ha! Once I’ve cut out the other quilt, these will go into my regular stash to be used for a million more quilts…so that’s cool. She has some fabrics I have but in different colorways, and lots of fabrics I just wouldn’t buy, because I’m not making the same types of quilts that she is, but that’s a good thing. It stretches me…stretches my palette. I should let other people buy me fabric to make me work harder sometimes.
It’s good to do this. It gives me a place to bury my work frustration. As we near the end of the trimester, kids are panicking and trying to beg for grades. But if you blow off the entire trimester until three days before I close the gradebook? Um? There’s nothing you can do. I’m irritated by the whole process, and they know it.
And here’s how I know I’m really getting better…I had ideas for drawings today…lots of them. None of them are pretty, of course. Lots of stuff about being an old woman (I know, I’m not really old, but my body is being a brat and I wish it would lay off)…I need to find time to spend with my sketchbook and a nice black pen. It’s calling to me…the skritch scratch of the pen on the paper surface. The smear when it’s not quite dry. The look of the line, not quite not wobbly. I do love being an artist. I mean, it’s hard to be one and be everything else you have to be, but the fulfillment and satisfaction I get from making a piece, even from just completing a drawing…it’s amazing. It brings me peace. It calms the anger inside me. It curls up around me when I fall asleep. It soothes me when I’m sad. It makes me feel more…or maybe because I feel more, I am an artist…hard to say. Anyway. It’s a good thing.
I started this Sunday and then completely forgot about it.
I think the hardest thing for someone like me to do is to just stop and rest. I suck at it. I tried a little Saturday and Sunday, but I have so much stuff to do that I can’t do it for long…although I’d really like to take a nap right now. I’m writing right now in order to procrastinate going to the grocery store…because I don’t really feel up to that…and it doesn’t really matter, because I have to do it. If I were just taking care of me, I’d probably blow it off and go take that nap, but it’s never really just me, is it? So no, I didn’t take time off work, which might be why I kept getting sicker, but as a teacher, it’s really difficult to take time off work, especially if you have to come up with a lesson plan that furthers the content you’re already teaching, but that a non-science sub can actually handle, and that’s just not easy to do. So it’s a wasted day (or two or three), and then you’re behind, and I’m already behind because grades are due in about a week and a half, and I’ve spent two weeks falling asleep at inopportune moments (like right after work), which obviously I needed to do, but there’s no backup on the teacher’s job…there’s no one who’s trained to do your thing and handle your kids and take over until you get well again. You just bully through. So I’m taking my meds and coughing like a fiend and trying to boost my energy and immune system and take care of myself and feed the family and get grades done and not collapse.
Really, I should take that nap. Sigh. Or go to the grocery store and get it done and in the fridge and THEN take the nap. I don’t know. Ask for more help probably. Text the girlchild and ask her if she’ll help with the shopping. Maybe.
It’s now Tuesday. You might be wondering what happened? Well, I did nap…after the grocery store. And then I worked some more and fell asleep on the couch. Eventually made it into bed. Yesterday, Monday, I actually felt pretty good. I worked all day, went to another store for stuff they don’t have at my grocery store, then came home and worked (for hours) to get caught up. Then the toner cartridge died, and unfortunately, it was something I really needed, so I drove to the store, because my app said they had two in stock, and then they couldn’t find them. And once they found one (where some asshole had hidden it behind another one), they wanted to charge me $21 more than the website. Anyway. By the time I got home and got through all the crap that had to be done yesterday, because we have one student who is going to be gone for three weeks, so I had to plan out until Spring Break and then revise a bunch of stuff because she won’t actually be IN the classroom (oh my god), it was after 8 PM. Twelve-hour day. It’s OK. I came out of the dark dismal den that is my office (OK, it has fluorescent lights, so it’s not really dark, but it also has a very demanding cat who wants to stand in front of the computer screen and sit on the mouse, so I was beyond frustrated at that point), and I sat with the girlchild, who unfortunately has prom on her mind. I offered her my prom dress (which was my aunt’s prom dress, so circa 1956?), and she cried. OK, she didn’t. She might have if I had forced the issue. It’s a very nice dress. I can see why she doesn’t want to wear it, though, because if you look at current prom dresses, they are made for girls who are obviously going to swanky cocktail parties with the rich and famous (WTF?). I suggested more of her body might be covered than the one I saw her friend buying, which looked like a bra with suspenders holding up a long skirt. Yeah. I am so out of it.
Then I finally thought I could trace some Wonder Under.
I made 23 minutes. Pure exhaustion. OK. I’m listening. I made it to bed eventually after tracing a whopping 40 pieces (well, it’s 40 pieces I didn’t have the day before), and realized that normally I wouldn’t have put in that many work hours before…well…sometimes I do, it’s true…but it’s getting better.
Unfortunately, about 10 minutes into my trying to actually fall asleep before the dead of night (see, my body is exhausted, but my brain won’t play along), girlchild comes in to tell me about the bomb scare at their school (it’s becoming a regular occurrence in their district…no real bombs…just dumbass kids who don’t want to go to school) and how one of the coaches (who is probably now fired) sent out a text to all his players telling them about it. When she left for school this morning…yes, I am the MEAN mom who makes their child go to school with bombs…she grabbed a bunch of snacks in case they went on lockdown (she wasn’t a Girl Scout for long, but damn, I did train her well), and I told her I loved her and not to let the terrorists win. Sigh. She’s texting me from school (it hasn’t started yet), and nobody is there. Great, she can get some one-on-one instruction! Yes, I’m a little crazy. I do think we Americans panic easily though. I don’t know how on Earth our ancestors made it here and survived (well, I guess the first few batches didn’t) all the hardships here without panicking and running back to from whence we came. It seems like all the kick-ass survival instincts were bred out over the years.
So this is obviously a philosophical post. I could show another picture of the 40 pieces of Wonder Under I traced. Or not. I do have pictures from Senior Night for girlchild’s soccer…but apparently WordPress is being bitchy and won’t let me load anything…oh wait…NOW you’ll let me do it. Technology. Lame. So obviously in this picture, my ex has something derogatory to say about the coach, who is standing maybe 10 feet away…
All the other parents and kids were weeping, but no, we were making jokes while the girlchild threatened to kill us and we set voodoo curses on the coach so he would get boils all over his ass (no, I’m not vengeful at all…why do you ask?). I have promised the girlchild that we will do nothing to burn her soccer bridges, but that doesn’t mean we don’t talk about all the things we COULD do.
They’re in CIF now, so winding down to the end…three games more maximum. And then we go back to the relief of club soccer and a good coach and parents that only drive me half nuts instead of completely nuts. No more freezing games on bleachers…just freezing games on chairs instead (somehow it is more bearable on a chair…although I don’t have a chair…mine broke after 10 years and now I have to buy a new one for the last 4 months of soccer? Kinda lame, but I’m sure I will use it somewhere…at the beach? Huh. I’m not really a beach person. Maybe I should become one. I mean, I’m sending the last kid off to college. I can become a completely different person now. Once I’m done recovering from pneumonia. And I pick a job that doesn’t suck up all my waking…and nonwaking hours.).
AND…my doctor’s office just called to check up on my cough and make sure I’m not dead. That’s nice. “Are you taking your meds?” “No, I LIKE having pneumonia.” Yes, I’m taking my fucking meds. Duh. No, it’s nice to have them call.
My last commentary? Obviously my brain is functioning…it’s just my body that’s having issues…bows on bras? Why? I always cut them off. But what is the purpose? I do not understand. Yes, I am not a normal girl. I also don’t like pink. Except my pink fabric stash is huge…not as huge as my black and white stash, but huge nonetheless, because I do a lot of human figures, so the flesh tones run into the pinks, and they fill up a ton of drawers here. But there’s a good reason for that.
Wednesday night, I felt OK…kept tracing…
It took a really long time to trace all the little apple tree parts: stems, leaves, apples. Tiny little beasts. I’m over 330 pieces in…and 4 1/2 hours. There’s 891 pieces, if you don’t count the 4 or 5 pieces I found so far that weren’t numbered. So another 560 pieces…another 6 hours? I’m done tracing the eentsy-weentsy pieces…so the rest should go faster. I hope.
Meanwhile, the coughing was getting worse though…
I had quilt class Thursday night, and I can’t trace a big drawing elsewhere, so I started cutting pieces out.
When I’m tracing, I often have animals helping me by lying in the way…thank you, Calli, for being mostly out of the way…
Babygirl has been coming out and socializing…which is funny, because she and the girlchild have a bizarre relationship. They didn’t really like each other in the beginning, but they seem to be developing some sort of relationship…
I guess when you’re down to two humans and three cats, and you’re a cat in need of attention, you can’t be too picky…which means it will be interesting when the girlchild leaves next year.
So yeah…I did go to the doctor…and I have pneumonia (whoops). I did actually suspect that back around Tuesday or Wednesday, and I already had an appointment for Friday morning, so I’m on antibiotics and will probably stop coughing up my lungs soon…I hope. And hopefully I’ll be more productive next week…
So there’s really only one way to prove I’m feeling better, that I’ve finally gotten over the nasty hump of this illness:
Yup. Making art again. So even though I was still running a nasty fever Sunday night, even though I thought I was better Saturday, even though I spent most of yesterday wondering if I’d be well enough to go back to school today with only half a lung functioning (I’ve coughed up the other half…into the sink…I saw it), I am finally on the mend. I’m still coughing. I’m still not well. I’m still not completely physically back (there’s no way I’m hiking in the next week…I’m aiming for the gym on Saturday morning, and taking it easy), but I can stand to trace Wonder Under. So that’s where I’m at…and some angelic soul found me Season 5 of Walking Dead, the bits that aren’t on right now, so I’m watching that while tracing. I got in a good two hours tonight…not how I really wanted to spend the hours, but it will do.
I should have been grading papers. But I went to work today AND I graded for like 6 hours yesterday AND I spent an hour and a half tonight moving files around and sending them to my students, so I don’t feel bad. I worked more hours in the last two days than I got paid for, as usual. The universe owed me a couple of hours of artmaking. And now I feel better about progress on these quilts.
Kitten even came out and held down the paper for me…
cuz that’s really helpful, Kitten. Really helpful. I had all three cats in the room at one point. Not bad.
They weren’t easy pieces to trace…two hours to do just over 100 pieces…most of them flames and waves, very convoluted and complicated pieces. I do like me some flames and waves, that’s for sure.
Girlchild was allowed back on the field on Friday (long story…she’s a bit of a thug, apparently)…I think I was mostly conscious during that game…
Tomorrow night is Senior Night, so her dad and I have to stand out on the field and listen to them read the statement I wrote (after the ex sent me a starter paragraph to destroy) about the girlchild…and she said I should make her cry. Unfortunately, it means I probably will too…dammit. It’s strange knowing it’s the LAST season…a relief in some ways, especially with high school soccer, which has just been an incredible trial to all of us. The coaching…the girls…it will be a relief, truly, to leave that behind. But realizing that next year at this time, she won’t even be around…that’s a little harder to stomach, and that’s what will make me cry out there, plus the part about how she refused to put her hair in a ponytail for the longest time, just cuz she was a stubborn little girl. Don’t know where she got that from.
So I guess with one day of actually feeling good, I’m a little crazy running a lab tomorrow (it’s an easy one) AND going to soccer afterwards…but it’s not like I have a choice. This is life and it keeps coming, and you can spend days and days in bed (I did), and life will still be there…and so will the art. My FFAC quilt made it to Florida and I received one from Jette Clover, which I am infinitely pleased with, and need to get a frame, so I can get it on the wall, along with a bunch of other art that just needs to get hung. I do feel bad that I kinda lost two three-day weekends to being ill, but so be it. Moving on. I received applause today from my classes for announcing that I refused to grade anything over my birthday weekend, so all their makeup work was due next Friday…I don’t know if they were applauding me for putting my foot down or for reaching another birthday…it’s hard to say. And most days, I can’t remember how old I am anyway…which is truly sad.
So back to our regularly scheduled art events…looking forward to making more. Which reminds me, sounds like I will have a show at Grossmont College with one other artist, a sculptor, in 2016…my first…um…it’s not a solo; is it a duet? Hard to say…so you locals will have to come to the opening and support me, because this is going to be kind of scary for me…I have no shortage of pieces to fill the space, of course. Someone asked me how many quilts I had made, and I said “over 50″…but you know what? It’s 94. And there are a couple that are made but not “finished” for a variety of reasons…and yes, that includes all the birds and some other smaller things, but that’s a lot of art quilts. Those are the art quilts…not the baby quilts or the ones that hang on my kids’ walls or the landscape quilts that I made for a variety of bridal showers and donation events and my sister-in-law that I never really cataloged. They’re not all awesome…but there’s a lot of them. So here’s to making 94 more…
Yesterday in class I explained the whole (very controversial) topic of right-brain/left-brain, and we did a fun little quiz to get kids to think about what they’re good at and why and what might control that and how that might help them study (yeah, I’m mean…I relate it back to doing better in school). I test right down the middle, whether it’s relevant or not…which makes sense because I’m an ex-editor and science teacher who makes art when she should be sleeping. One thing we talked about was writing to-do lists (very few 7th-graders do that) and setting goals (their goals are often crazy, like buy a mansion by the time I’m 19…I don’t think I ever had that as a goal). But I told them that I set big long-term goals in my head, and then I have shorter-term goals, like stuff to finish by June (quilts), and then really short-term goals, like what can I get done this week or tonight. If I didn’t do that, then yes, I’d probably sit on the couch all night and watch a lot more TV. Hell, I still watch the TV…I’m just never NOT doing something else at the same time.
For example, I have quilt class tonight. I have it one Thursday a month. Knowing that motivates me to get shit done that I can work at while I’m there, so it’s not a waste of time. I do like hanging out with my quilt friends, but I need to get stuff done. I can’t waste two hours and do nothing. So I was grading all these videos last night from the last project, and after 11 videos in a row that weren’t more than 17 seconds long and weren’t all edited together like they were supposed to be and didn’t even make sense, because I think all three of the girls had heart attacks for no known reason (pandemic! OK, no), I couldn’t look at any more videos. I made it through one tablet, trying to find them all and send them all to myself or whatever, and at the end of it, my head was hurting and it was 9:30 and I needed to be doing something that wasn’t painful.
Fabric!
I guess cancer cells are green today. I’ll have to think about what background fabric these will go on.
I used the same fabrics on them, mostly. I actually crawled under the desk where all the new drawers of pink fabrics are…I think I need to install a light under there…seriously.
It’s too hard to see the colors under there. I have to pull the drawers out. A light would be cool. Yes, I’m still watching The Walking Dead while making art. I don’t know that it’s had an effect…I already make quilts about body parts.
When I was done, I thought first of all, it’s not very late, maybe 10:30…second of all, I don’t know that these few pieces that now need trimming is enough to entertain me for a whole 2-hour meeting. I remembered that I had Wonder Under that needed trimming from one I traced Sunday night, but I still had one to trace…so that’s what I did…
It took a lot longer than I expected, and then once I had started, it’s so small, that I just wanted to finish it instead of being responsible and logical and going to bed. So I did.
Really, if you’re sitting there berating yourself that you don’t get as much done as I do (I hear this all the time), pat yourself on the back for getting enough sleep and being a responsible adult, because getting enough sleep protects you from heart disease and diabetes, and I suck at that.
It’s just how my brain works, though. It was a long, shitty, difficult, exhausting day and I needed to feel better at the end of it. And I did. I felt like I had achieved something, and now I have stuff to work on tonight, and hopefully this weekend I will make a decision about what I’m making these two smaller quilts out of, because I’m not a fan of the upholstery samples, but I think I’m just gonna try it with one…maybe. I don’t know. Annoying.
Probably this is where someone should remind me that grades are due by Tuesday, and I have to get all the projects graded even if I think it might kill me (that is NOT important…you are a teacher and your job is to work yourself into the ground for minimal pay). Like today. It’s OK…the kids are getting a video today, and I remembered my headphones, so I can watch the videos while they are taking notes about the brain. I’m no dummy. I’m a multitasking queen.
I also want to get the top part of the Earth Mother torso drawing done (yes, Julie, you’re right…it will have 13 trillion pieces in it) so I can decide if she’s allowed to have legs. Probably not. Maybe she’ll be in a mountain. An erupting volcano! I read somewhere that the way I’ve been drawing magma coming up from the core is incorrect, that instead of these long tubes carrying it to the surface, it’s more like a lava lamp, with big blobs of magma heading close to the surface through the crust. This is not what’s in the 6th-grade textbook that I used 7 years ago to teach honors 6th-grade science. So maybe she’ll be sitting in a lava lamp. (Yes, I totally simplified all that science…I have to do that all the time. You should see me re-enact DNA replication in the classroom.)
OK, it’s highly possible I could be using my time more wisely right this second. By the way, the boychild is back at college and refusing to answer texts again (ah, communication). It’s OK. I just won’t send the box of stuff he left behind until he answers. Because I’m evil like that. Girlchild is on her last day of finals, so hopefully screaming will subside to below histrionic levels…for at least a day or two. And I have a new stove…so I can cook things without thinking about HOW I cook them or what I cook them ON. That makes life easier. But it’s white, so I’m thinking about taking a Sharpie to it…like henna for appliances. Now that’s setting goals. Not crazy really.
So yeah, I’m back. I’ve actually been here all along, but as I’m sure you realize, that whole holiday-with-family thing kind of eats up your free time. So I sleep even less. And at 1:30 AM, I’m not willing to START writing a blogpost. And mornings have been fraught. So here’s what happened.
On Wednesday, I spent a lot of time cutting out Wonder Under for the new quilt, which is for a theme of Women at War, with interpretation pretty open as to what that meant. I’ve felt like other people have been coming after my uterus and everything within and around for quite a while, despite some nice-guy misogynists telling me I was imagining it. I mean, what the fuck do you know as a privileged rich white man? Best thing you can do as a man? Admit that you mostly don’t have a fucking clue what it’s like to be a woman. You might have an inkling, but otherwise: Not inside, biologically, with periods and pregnancy and mood swings and menopause; not outside, trying to walk somewhere in public, dating, safety, being perceived as an object, wearing the wrong thing, whether you’re showing stuff off or not, it’s always wrong. Not breastfeeding, not being the mom, not with society’s expectations. I’m not saying being a man doesn’t have similar issues; I just think there are more “acceptable” options for men (in terms of what society believes). And I full-on admit I don’t understand what it’s like to be a man. Some men have some of a clue, but mostly it seems not. The better men are understanding even when they don’t understand.
So the drawing was full of all these stereotypes and yet she stands tall on a pile of men. Because every man came from a woman, y’all.
Anyway, my rampant feminism aside, I need to get the quilt done in the next…um…5 weeks. Yup. So speedy mode. Midnight? Not helping…
Licking my elbow does not help me. This might even have been the night before. It looks awfully dark. It is! It’s Tuesday night. I sit on the couch and watch all the stuff I have saved on Tivo…
If girlchild is still awake, I have to watch her stuff. Some of her stuff is also my stuff…top box is pieces, bottom box is trash…in case I drop pieces in it (which I often do).
In the late afternoon (because I had to run a thousand errands), I managed to finish cutting and sort them all into bins by 100s. This is a smaller quilt, so there’s only 8 bins! A miracle.
Of course, I also did the two birds that need to be done in December, so that was two more bins.
And then because this time of year isn’t crazy enough, girlchild and I hiked Iron Mountain in the dark with the group I often hike with.
She wanted to show she had conquered the mountain.
That night, I realized I would need to clean the office up a bit to be able to cut fabrics out. I hadn’t put everything away from last time (and honestly, it’s a disaster area in here anyway, because all my school stuff lives in here too). So I had drawers open that cats had slept in and fabric piled everywhere…
I like a fresh start. Plus I need that table cleared off because that’s where I put the Wonder Under pieces.
And one section of the floor, I think the cats had knocked a bunch of stuff down (they get a bit rambunctious sometimes), so I needed to clean that up. Finding floor space in here has been a priority this last month. Two feet at a time, people. Two square feet is all I ask.
I had a ton of fabric to put away, both from the last quilt and from Houston, so I started by stacking by color, because everything in here is stored by color, except for the ones where I can’t figure out what color it is.
That was about halfway through. There were some issues with storage. It doesn’t seem to matter how much I use…it is not enough.
And I found this from a million years ago, from an Ellen Anne Eddy class.
Hand-dyed silk velvet plus thread-painted fetus. You know, like you do. That may still be in here when I die.
So at that point, it was Thursday, and although girlchild does most of the cooking, that means I get stuck with the cleaning (and then she complains that she can’t find anything because I moved it…from the couch to her bedroom), and I also cook a few things and I constantly try to clean up in the kitchen, which drives her nuts, but I can’t stand having to do it all at once.
So this picture is about 10 minutes before dinner is served. She’s making gravy. The fire extinguisher is out because she spilled turkey juices on the stovetop and it got in the box where the controller things are (technical term) and short-circuited something, and for a few minutes, we had loud popping noises and big sparks and electrical fire smoke. So yeah. A typical Thanksgiving…
The wine? Well. Obvious. See fire extinguisher. Especially after loud pops and sparks. And no, it’s not fixed yet. It’s actually not top on my list at the moment. The rest of it works, I got everything cleared off of there because of the fire danger, and I have other things that are more pressing. No really, the sink is completely clogged and getting fixed this afternoon, so I can finally do all the dishes. THEN I will deal with the stove.
Thanksgiving was small this year…just my parents, me, the girlchild, and the ex…
Guess he has decided Brits can celebrate that holiday…food was good, of course…
She makes a mess in the kitchen, tries to set the house on fire, but it always tastes good.
And yes, we’re still eating it. Ex came over last night and took away two platefuls of food. Sent a bunch home with my parents as well. And then we realized girlchild wouldn’t be around next year to cook.
Shit. I think we’re going out. I do cook. I just don’t want to spend that much time cooking for so few people.
Or dogs. I don’t feed dogs people food. Dogs LIKE people food.
Oh yeah. Pie and pi. All good.
Once the food was all eaten and I had cleaned up as much as I could with a nonworking sink, I finished cleaning up the studio (ah, much better)…
Hung the new drawing where I could see it, assumed the background fabric I had would work, and started the next fabric-picking adventure…
I don’t know what YOU do when chock full of tryptophan. I told you I was a bit crazy.
I picked all the stuff on the bottom…
And then started thinking about the fleshy issues…a pile of 7 or 8 bodies that I need to be able to distinguish from each other? Need at least two sets of flesh runs…
Luckily, they’re pretty simple bodies, so I don’t need the usual run of 7 fabrics or so. Although on the right, that’s the run for the main female figure, I think. The stuff on the left was the first of the male bodies.
Friday morning dawned nice and clear, and soccer was first on the agenda…of course.
Girlchild decided to play for another team, because hers didn’t get into the tournament they wanted. Luckily, it’s local, because we have a game a day.
I graded papers (ah, back to reality) and watched her run around and score one goal…
They beat an Alaskan team 5-1. I’m sure that team was a little hampered by the over-80-degree weather. Then I came home and helped dad do some yard things and went and bought two trees with him to block off that big open space that has been there since April? March? Don’t even remember how long. I need to go out there today and dig holes and trim off dead stuff and be a responsible homeowner (my neighbors will be thrilled). And I went to the gym. See, this is where time goes. But at the gym, I wrote…yes, I’m still writing. The story’s still not done. And I finished my book (the one I was reading). And these were good things. And then I traced some more Wonder Under for another piece, a small one that’s been lying around for a good long while…
Of course, technically it has nudity in it, so it can’t go into any of the shows coming up that need smaller pieces. I’m tired of making things FOR something, though, even though I don’t mind the themes that I’ve been in…sometimes you just have to make the stuff you WANT to make. I’m getting a wave of that feeling coming on…strong. I traced this also because I was watching something on Netflix that I couldn’t watch in my studio and I wanted to finish the episode.
Anyway, then back to the studio…where I kept going on the pile of flesh…
Which is taking significantly more time than I usually take, mostly because it’s complicated to figure out what is overlapping where, and to make sure I have all the pieces for that body, and that the fabrics don’t overlap in the wrong way.
After 4 hours of ironing, I am barely in the 200s. The plus is I should finish the pile of bodies today, so it will go faster after that. I think. I hope. Because remember how I said I wanted to be done with the ironing by the time school starts again? And there are two more soccer games? Plus I have to plan for school, because hey, we do have to go back there, despite the scary adrenaline rush I get when I think about it? I calculated grades yesterday from the stuff I had graded so far after break. It’s possible I should just quit teaching right now. I’m an absolute failure.
Sigh. So. And on top of all this, I slammed my finger in the door and I keep reopening the wound (bandaids forever!), a Golden Retriever is currently trying to play ball with me, my kitchen looks like a hurricane hit it, and the fish at school has probably died because I keep forgetting to go over there and feed it. Girlchild has applied to her first college, boychild got food poisoning on Thanksgiving from something (he did not have turkey dinner), and I’ve been living on deviled eggs for three days (I’m not sure that’s a bad thing).
This time of year just kicks my ass. So I’m going to kick it back by making lots of art. Yup. You can’t stop me.
Here’s Aug(de)mented Reality 2…for some post-turkey amusement…
I hear the wind blowing. It’s blowing quite heavily at the moment. I considered sweeping leaves up in the driveway this afternoon, because trash pickup is tomorrow and I never finished from last time (weeks ago). Ran out of room in the green recycling bin. But then I thought, what’s the point? I had seen the wind advisory. I knew I’d have a million more leaves by the morning. Better to wait and do it later this week. I don’t like to waste energy on things that need to be done more than once in a short period of time. I don’t have much time.
I don’t know how to feel about today. I don’t know how to feel about most days. Those questions “How are you?” or “How’s [insert name of current project] coming along?” or “How was the hike?”…I don’t know how to answer those. The hike was good, because I was outside and the rocks were really cool, but the last two miles kicked my mental butt, and yet I kept moving, but I’m debating that 14-miler I signed up for, because I’m not sure I can hike that far. Is that what you wanted to hear? Or did you just want to hear “Fine. It was fine.” I can’t answer the “How are you?” at all. I don’t have the words. I could draw it, but we’d be here for a while and you’d be frustrated by my answer. The projects? They’re moving along. There’s nothing I really want to talk about in depth about any of them at the moment. I’m just progressing, moving forward, continuing the process. I don’t know.
NaNoWriMo, for example: I totally forgot to write yesterday. I wrote for a short period while waiting for something, I don’t even remember when, but I only did like 400 words. I’ve haven’t done that few words a day all month. But I was busy yesterday and I got into art-brain mode and I just plain forgot. So this morning, I wrote 2500+ to make up for it. I have a little over 4000 words to go to hit 50,000. And I figured out how to kill off one of the characters. While I was watching David Attenborough’s show Life in the Undergrowth (fascinating, by the way, and kinda creepy), he talked about how ants use formic acid to attack plants and predators, and I had a lightning bolt hit my brain. It’s gonna be SO COOL. OK. I know. This book, it’s just plain weird how it’s inhabited this part of my brain. It’s writing itself. It really is. By Thursday, I will have hit 50,000 words this month, which I think means the book will be at 75,000 words. And I’m in the rising climax part of the book or whatever it is when all the good stuff happens that makes your heart race. I know the book itself won’t be done on Thursday. My goal is the end of the year. Then edit its ass. Then start the next one by next November.
Meanwhile, a car had a brake issue, so it went to the mechanic, my body went to the doctor and we tried to diagnose all my frailties (elbow brace, toenail collection, weird exercises with soup cans and hammers, more blood, changing meds. Holy moly.). I picked up my quilt and the photos. Warned him there was another one coming in December. Heard the story of his dog and cats.
The hardest part…parts…it’s been parts…about this vacation have been my mood swings (down, down, down) and the girlchild’s moods. So moods. The theme for Thanksgiving this year is MOODS. And none of them particularly good. I say everything wrong. I do everything wrong. I get irritated by having to stand in line at the post office to sign for a shirt she ordered (my name on the package, so I have to sign for it, plus she’s not 18), and then she’s out to lunch and at a friend’s for hours, so she doesn’t clean, and because we’re down to one car, she’s texting me to hurry up while I’m in Target trying to do all my errands in one place (I failed at that, by the way). Big Fucking Sigh. This is not fun. I have been on the verge of tears (or just outright crying, let’s be honest) more times in the last few days than in the last month. OK. That might be a lie. It’s been an emotional month. Blame hormones. Blame my thyroid. Blame the fucking moon. I mean, how could they ever have looked at the moon and NOT seen that it was a sphere? I just don’t understand. It so obviously has the sun reflecting off of it in crescent stage. It’s such a beautifully awesome thing. And yet it’s obviously fucking with me.
See. This is how my mind works. It’s on a crazy train.
I guess the good thing is that I worked. I finished tracing all the Wonder Under, despite almost needing to walk out of the living room twice due to girlchild’s intolerance for ANYTHING or ANYONE. (I do live here. I do. I have rights. Inalienable rights.)
It took almost 10 hours to trace this beast. Only 768 pieces, so you know the pile of men really did slow me down. It should have been 8 hours. Julie says I should copy the pile and color code the bodies. She may be right, but I feel like it’s time I don’t have. On the other hand, then I’ll waste the time trying to figure out what piece goes with what body. GAARHHH. Cannot Decide.
I also traced two more birds that were on order…
I’m hoping to finish them by the end of the year as well. By the way, there are three birds that have not sold. I should put them in their own post. I’ll try to do that tomorrow.
And then I sat down and started cutting Wonder Under out.
I only did it for an hour, because it was getting late. And some of it is releasing from the paper, which is always annoying. And I need to buy background fabric or decide if what I have in house will work, because inevitably, I will be ready to iron on Thursday and nothing will be open. Must Plan Ahead. And I have to clean house and straighten up my studio so I can tear it apart again, and now I have a window screen AND a screen door with issues, and for every one thing I solve or resolve, two more pop up in its place.
And dammit. I’m still depressed. That’s the only thing to call this blob in my head that keeps raining on my parade. That keeps dragging me into the mud. That keeps eating at my peace of mind. That won’t shut the fuck up and leave me alone.
Knowing that this is not how you want to be? It doesn’t really help make it stop. This war quilt I’m doing, women at war: it’s women at war with their own bodies, with failing uteri and thyroid glands, with fluctuating hormones and clogged ducts and irritated tendons and pus-filled pores; at war with their children and their parents, with people trying to push them into holes, into slots, into places they think you should fit, telling you what to do, how you’re doing it wrong, constantly getting at you; at war with men, the misguided, the nice-guy misogynists (so many of those), the crazies, the assholes, the arrogant, the self-centered, the clueless; at war with society, which is trying to control my parts, my mind, my place in the world. Nature vs nurture. There’s outliers and I guess I’m way the fuck out there. Like in outer space outlier. I’ve never wanted to be easily categorized or explained, but that makes it harder…to just be, honestly. Sometimes it just makes it harder to exist. I’m here because I want to be. I’m here because that’s where I belong. I never meant to be here by myself though. And it’s hard. It’s hard to deal with the girlchild’s drama without any support. I often just want to crawl into bed and never ever come out. Just put the pillow over my head and ignore all of it. Never fucking come out.
I don’t know how many times I have to scream “This is not where I want to be!” before someone hears me.
That’s why I keep these guys around, the furry ones, even though all they did today was sleep, bat at me with claws out, and vomit. I swear I cleaned up more vomit today than I did anything else. It’s just not right.
So this looks like a picture of the girlchild messing with her hair, but look closely.
What is that in the back, in the corner of the couch?
I do not know how to explain the dog.
Then this evening, the scary bitchy cat ventured out again, and this is the closest I’ve ever seen her to any living thing that was not human without her trying to kill it.
It’s not even that cold tonight.
But I had both of them for a while…
It’s hard to cut out Wonder Under with her on your lap, but again…she’s old and I feel sorry for her, so I tolerate a lot. Besides, she didn’t vomit today, so she’s on my good side.
Tomorrow I finish cutting out Wonder Under and hopefully start ironing to fabric. Dammit. That means I need a background. Aargh.
And the song the post title comes from…one of my favorite bands…
So. I’m officially on vacation. I traced Wonder Under Friday night for a little while, but I was exhausted and went to bed early, because I had a long hike early Saturday morning. I get up earlier for hikes than I do for school. It’s a little crazy. But it was a good hike (post later) and we went out to eat afterwards, which I almost never do, because you lose the whole day. But I could afford to lose the whole day because I have a whole week of them off. Anyway. It was good. And I came home and tried to function, but the body and brain were old and tired. Eventually, after the second or third cup of tea and some reading of the book club selection that I had to be done with by today (there’s nothing like leaving it until the last minute), I got up and started tracing Wonder Under again…
The fun part (wait, put “fun” in quotes) about tracing this section is that it’s a pile of bodies that are all overlapping, and although I might have tried to be logical about numbering them in the first place, that logic has now left the building, and I am often staring at the pile, trying to find the next piece in number order. Piece 225 took like 10 minutes to find. I don’t know what I was thinking. So the almost-200 pieces in the pile took forever to trace. But I wasn’t going to give up. I wanted it done, so that when I came back to tracing today, it would be straightforward and relatively easy.
The thing is, that pile is gonna kick my ass when I have to pick fabrics out, because overlapping and random behind spaces and I don’t even know what parts go with what body in half of it. Yeah. Way to fuck with yourself, Kathryn. I guess I like a good challenge.
So I’m 4 hours into the tracing and only at piece 287 or so. Like I said, it was a bitch. I have about 5 hours left, I’m guessing, and I’d like to be done today. No really. I would. That might not be realistic though because I still have to go grocery shopping and to book club and to dinner at my parents’ house. Hmn. Are there 5 hours LEFT after all that? So much for vacations, right? That’s why you’re supposed to GO somewhere, so you can relax and stop doing all that other stuff. Then again, I don’t really do anything else right…why start with doing vacations right? It’s a stay-at-home vacation because I can’t afford anything else. I would have loved to have taken the girlchild to NYC, met the boychild there, hung out, got an AirBnB apartment, checked out the city. It would have been cool. It would have been $1500 I don’t have right now. Especially with college apps coming up again.
So we’re here in lovely San Diego, soccer tournament, practices, a couple of hikes, dinner with the close family on Tday. And lots of artmaking. So my plan is to have all the Wonder Under ironed to fabric in a week. Because then school starts back up again and that 3-week stretch notoriously kicks my butt. And then I have vacation again, but only about a week and a half before this next quilt has to be done. So yeah. I need to work hard. Like usual. Like what the fuck is new about that? This is my life. It’s a continuous hard-work endeavor. I’m not always entirely sure what I get out of that. People tell me the art is cool, amazing, etc., but then I just make more of it. I don’t know if there’s a reason for it, except that I’m incredibly unhappy when I don’t make it. And there’s enough of that feeling in my life…I don’t need to make more of it. There must be a better balance though.
I did take time out to finish the book for book club. It must have been cold last night because (1) I was wearing polar fleece in the house (lots of windows behind the light table) and (2) the bitchy old-lady cat was in the living room, curled up tight next to me.
Which was fine. Notice the pile of dirty clothes on the floor? Girlchild has some cleaning to do. I’m tired of the slob factor. That’s one goal for this vacation…get the mess under control, at least enough to get me through December.
I wanted to show you where I normally write…
Yup. The computer. The computer desk is a mess. The chair has been scratched all to hell by bitchy cat, who often is sitting on the chair (you can see the top of her head in the picture). Right now, she’s not, but that’s because morning winter sun is over THERE on the table, so she’s curled up over there. Thank god. I can actually sit properly. I’m over 42,000 words on the novel, and I will easily hit 50,000 by Thanksgiving. I’m hoping to keep the momentum going and get to the end, whatever that is, by the end of the year or earlier. I’ve already decided no sequel. So I’m writing it that way. I guess I always knew I would. I do have another book started in my head though. Different story, different characters, different location. Still sci-fi though. Not sure what’s up with that.
Here’s Luana Rubin’s review of the two SAQA exhibits at Houston this year…she mentions my piece.
Someday I’ll meet her in person and tell her how to pronounce my name. Or maybe you could do that for me.
On September 23, 2013, I started drawing a quilt that I meant to have drawn in July, early August at the latest…but then my life sort of exploded and I couldn’t focus. I had gotten into the 25th anniversary SAQA exhibit called Celebrating Silver, curated by Yvonne Porcella, on the strength of my description of silver as the color of age and experience, the crone versus the mother and the maiden…so I started by drawing the crone…
This is two days of drawing, about a month after school started, when I am mostly exhausted when I get home from school…
I made a copy of the page and then taped the copy to the next page to continue the drawing…
And then I decided it sucked. I actually liked the start for the mother, but decided it just wasn’t working out…so I cut it off and started again.
Better. Much better. So down to two pages…and I keep drawing. Then I start drawing up the sides…
And I decide it needs to be longer and I add to the bottom…
There is a size limit on this thing, but I cut really close to that limit. Go BIG! or don’t go at all, right?
Then I started numbering. Oh my.
This thing has enough detail to kill me. And it almost did. One thousand two hundred and thirty-seven pieces. None of them very big.
I started tracing it on Wonder Under in October…
I finished right before I left for Houston last year…
Lots of little tiny pieces…
Which then had to be cut up…I didn’t even start until mid-November.
This is the background fabric I originally chose for this quilt…
Stay tuned to see what happened to that decision…right before I sorted all 1200+ of those tiny pieces, at the end of November.
I started ironing them to fabric in late November…
And trimming them as well. There are some things that are portable and some that aren’t…
I can’t drag my whole stash around to iron stuff, but I can drag this shoebox around with a pair of scissors…
The fabrics started piling up in December…I took a few days off ironing. Not sure why? School. Tired. Whatever.
But eventually I got my focus on (realizing that time was getting TIGHT)…
And finished ironing everything down to fabric on December 6.
More tomorrow…hopefully…if I have internet. I will be at the SAQA Meet and Greet Thursday at 5 at Houston, as long as flights fly and nothing bad happens. I will be tired! Yay! But I will be there. Like I told my dad, sometimes you just have to run away from all the crap…I totally grabbed all the stuff I needed to grade and ran away from school. I need to go back out and get meds and food and money for tomorrow, but I’m not going back there until Monday. You can’t make me.
A typical afternoon after school during the Fall soccer season: Our heroine lounges on the couch, freshly made hot cup of tea at hand, grading in a pile next to her, studiously at work. The phone rings and hysterical screeching emanates, so loud that the nearby windows vibrate with the sound. Girlchild is at her soccer practice after coaching little girls at the wonders of the game, and her father has brought her the bag with all her equipment, but the giant hole in the side means one of her shoes has fallen out…somewhere between the couch and the driveway…of her father’s house. Sigh. Our heroine stands up, considers whether to re-engage the bra-strapping structure that she was quite relieved to have removed, and gets into the car, figuring no one is looking at her boobs anyway. What the fuck. Whoops. Lost character there. She drives to her ex’s house, raids it for the shoe (it took a while; it was wedged between two cushions) and drives to the soccer field, where she slowly drives past the field, waving the shoe in the air until one of the parents runs over and fetches it, delivering it to the girlchild.
You think I jest. This is unfortunately how it goes sometimes. That was after my second cup of tea and 3 Motrin, trying to banish the giant headache brought on by minimum day schedule, blood sugar affected by minimum day schedule, and a hellish back-and-forth with adults that should not be allowed in a work environment. As teachers, we seem to have fewer protections against stupid adults (including the ones we work with) than in other businesses. I am now department chair, not by choice, but because it was the best thing to do for the survival of the department (and my sanity). Next year, there will be more options and I should not have to be in charge. For now…it sucks, but it is. I also finally went off on the tech lady who keeps telling me No Duh stuff, like “did you check their email and password?’ Um. No. I assumed that if a 12-year-old can’t log in, that they did it right and I don’t need to test it myself. And I wasn’t smart enough to check my OWN password list, instead of relying on them to provide that information. Because I’m not smart or anything. Granted, many teachers aren’t tech savvy, but some of us are, and it’s not in your best interest to piss off those who have a clue what they’re doing. Don’t assume we’re all idiots and talk to us like that. Fucking condescending tech people.
So yeah. It was a meditation day. In class. My kids were really the least of my troubles. Today they were the easiest part of my job, which is saying something.
I just took on another art entry too…due by January 1. I think I took it on. I might be clinically insane on that one. Because there’s one I want to do for February as well. There is no rest for the crazed.
I really need to go to bed, instead of trying to write this tonight. Suffice it to say that I will continue tomorrow morning, after more caffeine has crossed my non-ruby lips, and hopefully I will have something pithy to say about the million fleshy pieces I ironed tonight (and the million I did NOT).
It’s morning. I wish I felt rested, but it is not my way. I did finally start ironing last night around 10…because I graded papers and cooked dinner and dealt with girlchild’s breakdown over a variety of crazy things, not the least of which was that the ACT test that she took a little over a week ago? They lost the test booklets somewhere, so they all have to retake the test. She’s livid (her word). I’m kind of amazed. How does one lose such a thing? And what is their home address? Because I know a few hundred high-school kids who want that.
Anyway, part of the issue was solved last night, but we still have to deal with the ACT…in her crazy schedule, she doesn’t have a spare 5 hours lying around to retake a test. So we’ll have to jiggle some things.
Anyway, I finished sorting all the fleshy bits and ironing them down…
It’s kind of like a crazy jigsaw puzzle. That will never fit together right. That’s one of 7 in the run…plus fingernails and toenails. I haven’t dealt with all the other stuff yet…it’s piled up at the back of the table…
It includes eyeballs, hair, hearts, arteries, lungs, nipples, lips…anything that’s not the standard flesh colors. I’ll start those tonight…so although I’m in the 800 box, I haven’t finished stuff from the 300s yet…so I have no idea how much I have left. I did iron for almost 2 hours last night (I was in the zone), which is why I’m so tired this morning. Because I can’t just stop ironing and go straight to bed. My brain’s moving a bit too fast. I have to let it ramp down, read for a bit, space out a little. It takes almost an hour…sigh.
Katie and Babygirl are not currently friends…this standoff was while I was trying to iron, with Katie standing right where I need to be. She won’t move when you tell her, or at least, she won’t if there’s a cat involved…so I have to physically pull her out of there.
Babygirl likes the iron because it’s warm.
I would think she would back off a bit when I’m actually ironing, but she doesn’t. She looking pissed off…well, she always looks pissed off…but we did comb her fur, because boychild said we had to, and she quite happily whacked away at the both of us with her claws while we were doing it. Amazingly, we are both scratch free, so she didn’t really mean it.
So 7 1/2 hours into the ironing. Still progressing. Yesterday was very successful. Grading a whole assignment got done, ironing got done. I wish I could guarantee the same each day this week, but…yeah.
This is the best part of Wonder Under…
(That’s sarcasm) Yup. The fusible sometimes releases from the paper. I am really obsessive apparently and lay out the pieces of WU and try to match them up to paper pieces that are the same shape. If I can’t figure it out, I just retrace them. I have not been good about keeping my WU in plastic bags this time around, and I can tell…it’s releasing easier. But it’s still the easiest method for me to do what I do. The two pieces on the right? I didn’t number them. I will figure out what they are eventually. Something in the tree.
OK. Today I teach zombies. Or I teach ABOUT zombies. Can’t remember. Might not matter.
Kathy Nida 