You Say Goodbye and I Say Hello

This post has been a while in the making.

I was afraid to write it....

My last rattie, Max, passed away from old age the summer of 2017. I held him gently under my hoodie, next to my heart, as he took his last breath. The hurt never scabbed over....

I'd planned to wait a bit before adopting another, and that wasn't hard to do since none of the area pet 'warehouses' seemed to carry them any longer.

But then I ran across a single 'blue' rat pup in a mall store crowded with kittens and puppies for the holidays and my heart stopped. James tried to talk me into him but I was just too afraid to give my heart away again. And by the time I thought I was ready, he was already gone....

I was crushed! And I've regretted not adopting him ever since....

So imagine my delight when I visited that same store this past winter just days before Christmas (and exactly one year later!) and discovered this sweet little one. Just 8 weeks old, silvery blue!, a carbon copy of the one I let get away. The salesgirl there opened the cage and put him on my palm and my heart broke wide open.

And thanks to my James, he went home with me for Christmas....

I'm not a noob. I've had ratties almost all my adult life. I made sure to continue with the food he'd started at the pet store. I made sure to use aspen bedding. I let the new baby settle in.

I wanted to give him an 'M' name, like all my other ratties. And I thought it should be Christmas-related. I began making a list:

• Marley
• Myrrh
• Menorah
• Merry
• Mistletoe....

But that night I dreamed that I walked up to his cage, expecting to find him but finding my old Max instead -- alive and well again! -- and I said, "Max, what are YOU doing here??" And Max said to me, "I'm not Max. I am so much more." So when I woke, I named this little one 'Much.'

The next day was Christmas proper. My local grandbugs visited and longed to hold the new baby, but I kept them apart just to give Much more time to acclimate.

By that weekend -- just a couple days later -- he began showing vague symptoms: repeatedly digging in his ear, tilting his head....

I've fostered a rat that had gone untreated for an inner ear infection and it wasn't pretty. I like to think that I made the remainder of his life a happy one. Seeing signs that Much could be in the early stages of something similar made me panic. He'd have to see someone immediately.

It was the holidays. What vet could possibly see him?? James phoned the pet store; it was no help. The person there had no suggestions nor any recommendations of a vet in the area that could see such a small animal. I called the Animal ER and was told we could bring him in, but when we got there I was turned away at the desk. Only cats and dogs, said the person there, and I assured her that whomever I spoke to on the phone said they'd see him. After some behind-the-scenes questioning of the staff, Much was taken backstage and given a once-over....

The doctor who examined him said she could find nothing wrong, but that didn't mean there wasn't an infection in the inner ear. So she started him on antibiotics and we brought him home again.

And he was fine.

He was fine.

Until he wasn't.

We watched television together, curled up warm on the couch, and Much was on my shoulder, tucked under my neck, cuddled in my hoodie. I loved on him a bit, then returned him to his terrarium. And when I checked on him that night before bed, he was gone.

It was the last straw for me.

The whole day had already been sad and tearful and full of big disappointments, and this just put me into a tailspin.... just as I was preparing to say goodbye to the old year and welcome the new.

I believed then that Much was already ill when I adopted him, and I still believe it. But that does nothing to assuage my grief and disappointment. The only thing that even makes me feel marginally better is knowing that for the short time that he was with me he was loved COMPLETELY and will be incredibly missed....

Not long after his death Much appeared to me in a dream. He looked just like his little self, only 'different,' and I used his appearance as the basis for a story. And here it is:

A STORY

As usual, the old key budged stubbornly in the lock, and it was all she could do to get it to turn. Forcing it gave her some quick and heated attitude.

“No, no no…. Don’t let my New Year start on a crabby note,” she grumbled to herself just as the mechanism succumbed and clunked, and the heavy glass door opened with a gentle swoosh. She swiped the light switch with a mittened hand, illuminating the darkened North Studio with its long empty tables and upturned chairs. Immediately a wave of comfort washed over her and she silently thanked the Universe that – at least for the moment – she had the place all to herself.

Her moist boots squeaked across the cement floor. One more key, one more turn, one more light switch and her own little studio brightened to life. She inhaled deeply the smell of dry paper and dried leaves, her eyes taking in the chaos of creativity, recalling happily the recent time she proudly shared the little studio with her dad. After what seemed like a stunned pause he’d said, “Well…. You sure have a lot of stuff,” and her heart swelled pleasantly now just thinking about it. She did have a lot of stuff! And reacquainting herself with it all again after the bustle of the Holidays made her socks go up and down.

Immediately: backpack on the chair, jacket on the display rack. A quick glance then into each of the empty cups on her drawing table told her which was for beverages and which was for ink water, and she dropped a tea bag into the proper one before walking back out into the North room, filling the cup at the water cooler, loading it into the old microwave, and then setting the carousel atwirl with the press of a button. As the timer counted down, she leisurely absorbed her surroundings: the color and chaos of the big room’s furnishings, the smell of paints and brush cleaner, the echoes of laughter and creativity. What a pleasure to be there again after all the stress of the Holidays!

The microwave pinged. She carefully removed the steaming cup and gave it a sip before returning to the little room again and closing the door. Instead of clearing off the drawing table she simply pushed everything forward to make space before adding a sheet of cardstock and grabbing a pencil. It was a pencil she’d found on her walk there that morning, stabbed point first in the snow on the ground near the School of the Arts. A yellow #2 Ticonderoga that had been nibbled to death in the middle. It made her smile to see this and recall her own elementary school days a million years ago spent nibbling her own yellow pencils….

“Alexa, play some ambient music.”

A pause. A little pirouette of light from a device on her windowsill.

“Playing ‘ambient music’ on Pandora,” came a disembodied female voice behind her, and a selection from a fantasy movie soundtrack began. She picked up the pencil and drew.

The music made her think of mountains. And snow…. Friends on a quest, meeting adventure head on….

By the end of the lengthy selection she was surprised to discover that her hand had drawn a tiny creature with perky ears, a long tail and long whiskers, black button eyes goggling with curiosity… and little feathered wings.

And over the figure was a word balloon.

And the word balloon said,

“I am so much more.”

The End

...

Preparing to be Captured -- Part Two

I owe you an update on my last post of the Old Year, don't I? And I also owe you an apology for not writing hard and heavy about my Fest Season and the months that followed. So much Magick happened, of course, and I think I get overwhelmed then and just don't know where to start....

In any event, in that last post of 2018: two weekends of Fest remaineth, I was nervously preparing to be photographed at some point, I'd just Amazon Prime'd myself a costume dress so I could look like a girl in the pic if I wished, and I was learning that the weekend of the shoot would be the first iffy-weather one of the season.

So I packed layers and costume pieces and choices. I practiced my smile....

Then Saturday dawned COLD. I'd slept in a sleeping bag on my shop floor the night before and I swear when I woke that my bones were ice. I needed layers, so I opted for shapeless 'boy clothes' -- long-sleeved shirt, jerkin, leather vest, wool coat, leggings, boots, the works. I loved the look and I felt confident! But I'll admit: although black is my favorite color, it probably doesn't allow for a great picture.... (Except for that one above: a selfie put through the Prisma app. I love it.)

The day got busy and time passed and I forgot about the possibility of being photographed. And when I did remember, I rather hoped that Mr. Edwards had secretly taken his pic from afar so that I was totally unaware....

Although he insisted that he could make our shoot 'painless', when he did arrive I fell apart inside -- instantly filled with anxiety -- and the brief little session was everything I'd feared.

Stand here.
Turn this way.
Look at me.
Chin down.
Slight smile.
Give me 'coy.'

Ugh; I was my own worst enemy! I brought the anxiety, I brought the awkwardness....

Maybe it's the posing that breaks me? Maybe it's having to look right at the lens? Once finished, he turned the digital camera window to me and said, "See how nice this is?" as he zoomed in on my face. I already had my hands over my eyes. I couldn't look....

What was I so afraid I'd see, anyway? A panicked person trying to hide from the lens? The little girl who always looked so freaky in school pics?

I don't like this about myself. I've been this way FOREVER. Photo Day at school was almost as anxiety-inducing as Vaccination Day, and the resulting snaggle-toothed pics that the teacher would show off (with glee, I swear) in front of the class was proof positive that the camera and I were NOT friends....

Photo taken by and courtesy of Sarah D. Butcher

Not long ago, my Eldest (who takes amazing pics) took some candid shots of my parents together and made one into a large canvas print for them as a Christmas gift. Because she lives so far away she couldn't be there when they unwrapped it. But I was. Mom took one look at that photo and laughed her lungs out. Laughed so hard she cried! And then when she caught her breath again there were comments along the lines of, "Good gawd, what a sight!" and "Imagine having to look at THAT in the mirror every day, haha!"

I was CRUSHED.... Because when I saw that photo it brought tears to my eyes. Suddenly I  wanted to grab it from Mom, rescue the woman in that pic, shelter her from the laughter, and bring her home where I could look at her with love. Like she deserved.

Mom couldn't look at her own face in that photo without cringing and laughing with embarrassment. What was so funny, so cringeworthy about that face? Did mom look at herself and see her mother? And was that so bad?....

These are ALL my face. And that's OK.

I swear to God at the time I did not see myself in that moment. But I do now.... Just recalling it as I type brings to the forefront all the feels and confusion and tangles and knots about my relationship with my face and how I imagine others see it.

And what I'm learning could fill another blog post.

And maybe it will someday....

Mr. Edwards visited my shop on the final Fest weekend. "Well, you're off the hook," he said. "I didn't like any of the pics." Part of me wanted to say, "I told you so," but I didn't. I was secretly relieved, though.

He promised to return that final Sunday for another try but didn't make it out to Fest again before the season ended, and that's OK. Because between now and next season, my face and I have some inner work to do.
...

Odd Narwhal is my Spirit Animal

Someone had just one job. And unless this is a special licensed cartoon character that I'm unfamiliar with, they failed.

But Odd Narwhal doesn't care!

This toy and I ran across each other recently while I was looking for deals in a calendar store at the mall that is busy selling off its stock before pulling up stakes and moving on.

Is this a character from a cartoon? Was it simply assembled haphazardly in the factory? Is it unaware of its freakydeaky-ness? Is it cheery BECAUSE of it? I wonder....

And I love that there are little heart sparkles in its eyes, as if it couldn't be more pleased with itself, and its oddness, and Life, and its discounted price tag, and the fact that it's still on the shelf after the Holidays....

I've decided it will be the metaphor for my New Year. And I've decided that I may just have to return to the calendar store and rescue it (should it still need rescuing).

Smile on, Odd Narwhal! I applaud you! And I dub thee my spirit animal for 2019.

And in the New Year may we all proudly display and celebrate our individuality, our unique qualities, our put-together-wrong-ness with big smiles and heart sparkles.
...

Yesterday's Commute

 My walk to 'work' yesterday was filled with magick....

I witnessed a little mob of starlings in a treetop and enjoyed their crazy, freeform mutterings.

I did not slip on any ice! (Hooray!)

Everyone I passed ignored me completely, even after I said 'hello' (what's up with that??), except for a wizened man (who looked like he was a hundred years old) who stopped me with his toothless smile, pointed at ducks on the river, said, "Aren't they BEAUTIFUL?", grinned and wished me a happy new year, and then shuffled on. (He was a gnome, I'm sure of it.)

There was a man and his dog in the snow, playing with a frisbee, and the dog was having the time of its life.

Leaves, leaves, leaves.

And clouds!

And the sounds of dripping, melting icicles.

And shadows....

And a studio that hasn't seen me for a bit.

And some FaceTime with this faraway grandbug. 

Due to a sudden poor connection partway through our computer visit, my face was frozen on her screen, and it remained so until the end of our conversation. 

As we said our goodbyes I was hesitant to throw her a kiss (as is our custom) because I wasn't sure she'd know when to catch it. And when I told her this, she just laughed and said,

"Oh, Yaya! I will catch anything you throw at me!" 

See? MAGICK.

...

First Weekend Eve of the New Year

Coral-hued clouds. Blue
shadows on snow. Weeping icicles...
Feels like spring.
...

Happy New Year!

The new year already!? Wasn't I just wishing you a happy 2018?

WHERE DOES THE TIME GO? Wow....

And that picture? Where I'm smiling and celebrating my laughlines? That is misleading, because it was taken way before I crashed and burned during the holiday.

Because I know how much I hate to read downer posts, I won't subject you to one. But I will say that I'm resembling that photo more and more as the moments pass, and by tomorrow I hope to be making that face again. (...wings crossed!...)

So I'll just wind this up by saying that I hope the new year is great for us all. May it be everything we need it to be.

May those brutal goodbyes be few. And may there be many amazing new hellos!

And may we all get to be as creative as we desire without having to worry about money or healthcare or how clean our house is.

CHEERS.

I love you.
...

Preparing to be Captured

A long LONG time ago I was brave, apparently

I follow him on social media and I read his posts, but last weekend was the first time I've spoken at length to Larry Edwards, one of our photographer regulars at Fest.

He visited primarily to offer his concern for something negative that happened in my shop the previous weekend (I suffered the downside of my Pay What You Wish idea.... it happens....) and had planned to purchase some art, and I suggested we trade: my work for his work.

And this weekend that might happen....

Rarely do I ever take a good photo. I think I'm allergic to camera lenses! I'll admit that it's not so bad now when all folks are pointing at me is a cellphone, but when someone who knows what they're doing points a badass lens at me, I immediately turn into Awkward Woman.

One of my Eldest's photos

My Eldest once took pics of me at Fest at the end of a cloudy day, while crowds were sparse and both of us were bored. Maybe I was tired. Maybe my sales were under par. In any event, I couldn't seem to smile much. I didn't care that the lens was staring me down. I didn't even care what I looked like....

But those PHOTOS! When I saw them afterward they took my breath away! Maybe it was because I trusted her and was comfortable with her? (Could it possibly be because she's female? Hmm....) Anyway, I swear I'd use them now for everything if I wasn't 20 years older than I was then....

Not so long ago, I participated in a photoshoot with a dear Fest friend who was having pics taken for a future book. I'd never done anything like that before, and the experience was surreal. Someone actually 'styled' me! But it was all fun and games (just acting natural with others in a group setting) until I was singled out and asked to pose.

I'll admit I have zero interest in The Spotlight. Even coached gently by my friend (who has TONS of experience with this!) I felt awkward and uncomfortable. Maybe vulnerable is a better word? All I know is that I'd rather have been enduring a root canal at that moment, and all I could think of was how I was disappointing my friend....

Twig the Fairy -- THIS is that friend!

I never once asked that photographer to show me what he'd taken. And when the book was published, I anxiously looked for myself in it. There I was, in a group photo, hiding behind my hand. No one would ever know it was me! (*whew!*)

This week, Mr. Edwards sent me a message: "Wear makeup this weekend if need be; let's shoot."

And I panicked.

The first thing I did was order a frippin' overdress in my post-menopausal granny-body size. Then I practiced making myself up to look 'glamorous.' Then I haunted the mailbox until the dress arrived, tried it on, saw that it FIT, breathed a sigh of relief!

But now today I'm taking a step back....

The hell am I doing!?

Mr. Edwards is a professional; his photos are incredible! And I'm a human bean; I look the way I look. And sometimes I even like the way I look.

James took this; it's not about my face maybe...

What would that future photo look like if I was just me? No makeup? (except eyebrows; I refuse to look like a sugar cookie in photos of myself....) Would I like it? Would it sadden me? Would I have to accept that THAT is the Real Me? Could I learn to be friends with that person? Come to terms with her? Embrace her?

Who knows if this will even happen. Fest is in its next-to-last weekend, things are brutal and busy now, and I'm the only one in my shop for most of the show day. I'd feel foolish if I glammed myself up and we weren't able to make the shoot happen. So how would it be if I just threw on my boy clothes and didn't care?

Hmmmm.

...to be continued...