Original Needlepoint pillow designed and worked by Tammy Vitale.  Basis for design is the rug to the left.

I’m being lazy this morning and using what I have at hand – the pillow behind my back in my chair, and the rug that is on my floor.  This needlepoint, which still looks brand new, is 31 years old this year.  I made it for my Mom for Christmas the year before she died.  The needlepoint was out being block when she died, and the place where she was having it done moved in the time it took me to track down that she had it out.  I was happy to find it as it took me months to work.  I grew up with these rugs in the living room and dining room of my childhood home.  I now, as I have mentioned, have the dining room rug in my room – the living room was given to a local kitchen pantry/thrift store for someone else to discover and love.  Husband doesn’t like them so we have worked out the perfect answer by my having it in my room, making me feel snug and warm.

Yesterday, thanks to Leah’s careful explanations – and the fact she uses typepad so it was a direct plug-in – I learned how to add those lovely little connect buttons to my side bar.  I have added Finding Water where I am part of a community working through Julia Cameron’s latest book by that name,  and Create a Connection where I am guest hosting Sunday Creative Challenge during February (and, after this month’s book swap, plan to join in the monthly Monday swap – how fun!).  And then I figured out how to get the moon stages on here – that’s been sitting incomplete in my wish box forever. 

Husband and I spent a good deal of time at IKEA measuring furniture after measuring the new room at the cottage.  We will use tax refund (finished and electronically submitted last week by ME!) to furnish and then see if we can rent it.  Then we’ll see what we want to do with houses.  That is put off until April – I guess whether or not we rent the cottage will play into that decision.  IKEA is fun but not on a Sunday – it was, literally, wall to wall people and hard to move.  Afterwards we felt like we’d had a workout since it is a HUGE store and we saw every last inch – sometimes twice.

This mornings morning pages for Finding Water worked as morning pages always do:  start generally and then something magic happens by page 3, when I am despairing that nothing but random stuff will happen, a breakthrough comes, from a twist of a word, and I’m off in a different direction.  While the actual process says don’t share the morning pages, I think I will anyways over at myspace, because that’s what works for me – I need a way to remember what I’m learning here and typing it will make it stick better. 

Here are some of the things which have jumped out at me from this first chapter.  First, as I was reading through the blog roll of folks who are participating, I kept seeing something along the line that this chapter is about optimism.  I missed that completely – perhaps I just don’t read chapter headings.  But I did note "grounding" and "possibilities" inside the chapter – as those always speak to me, she who is cusp of fire and water (which makes steam/air).  Grounding is something that I have to work on.  Husband says I walk heavy; I say it’s the only way I can keep myself attached to the earth.  It’s been known to be hard on the knees.  And I have a homemade chapbook called "Possibilities" – which is playful and helps me remember that I have choices.  One of the pages says:  "What is the story you tell yourself about your life?  What might happen if you chose to change the chapters?      Who might you be?"

Here are first chapter underlines:  We are never too old to be young at heart.  …the joy had to lie in the process and not in the product.  Doing the work was the best cure for the difficulty of doing the work.  "you keep the faith," he answered.  "You keep the faith." [my note says:  trust the process, a Goddard saying that rules my life]; and:

"As an artist, I must take the time to see.  My artist’s eye must be schooled in the particular.  It is not healthy for me as an artist to be tuned to the inner movie, always watching the ‘what if, if only I had’s" as they unspool on the inner screen…"What if" and "if only" are poison for any artist.  They throw us into the past.  They dull our lens on the passing world… and:

"I must cling to the small and positive…I must not entertain the large and overwhelming.  For me that is romancing trouble….I must see my fifty-eight years [my own 58] as years of valuable experience, not merely "age."  This perspective can be tricky to maintain. [Amen, Sister]. and:

"I had to do something with my creative energy or it was going to turn in on me…"

All excellent reminders along the path.  I’m grateful to be on this journey at this point in my life.

thought for the day:  An artist is someone who turns his coat inside out and falls in love with the color of the lining.  Jeanne Tardiveau quoted in Finding Water