Okay, I give.

No more heavy lifting. I have managed to get to a task I’ve been dreaming of for months. I’ve taken 99 percent of the dinosaur computer parts out of closets and set them out in the car port!!It looks like such a small pile but it was heavy.

The gigantic monitors will have to wait until Frank can help me schlep then out there with the other things.

The next step is into the car trunk and off to city recycle.

I started a living room redo a few days ago and I guess I just got carried away. I threw some pink covers over our not that attractive chairs. It looks a little nutty but I’ll try it for a while.

I dismantled the white bookshelf that used to bug me. I sawed it in half and put it under the stereo shelf to store the vinyl and the CDs.

Those white things are styrofoam pieces to keep kitty from sharpening his claws in the floor speakers.  It would mean the guillotine if he were ever successful.

The pix are a bit blurry but this is a dark room. Especially so with the privacy screen I’ve constructed to separates my work space from the “sitting area”. The screen is really the cardboard box from our HD TV.

Frank is off in San Francisco touring the museums on free Tuesday.

For $17 he gets a trip to the city with other Shasta College Art students.

I am not jealous. I’m really happy that he’s out having these experiences.

I loved going to school. He’s into it now. He also loves San Francisco. He lived there for years. It is the city where we met.

One of the side effects of watching Home  channel TV is the pervasive dissatisfaction it engenders with my decorative skills.

As I’ve said before, I am a cheap skate and these days for good reason. The car is at the repair shop again. My measly retirement dollars are dwindling. Rent is up. I’m not selling much in my Etsy shop. I feel great but definitely cheap.

In the living room redo I rearranged the books on the built-in bookshelf.

I put my decorated votive candles on the top shelf.

I just couldn’t look at one more shelf of books.

They look pretty good up there.

You can’t see any of the fine details.  Visitors won’t be able to enjoy the cool Elvis job or the controversial Michael Jackson design.

I may find another medium for these glitter glue, water color, Mod Podge pieces. I like them.

Maybe I’ll take the Elvis and Michael Jackson candles to the Shasta Arts Council’s holiday sale and ask an outrageous price for them. That way they probably get to take them home after the holidays and if not, well, I can use the cash.

We have too many books. When I find cheap books full of wonderful things I have to take them home. I guess at one point I thought my kids would read them but they found their own books.

I could save them for when I can do nothing but sit and read, say if I became crippled but i think I’d still prefer to do art someway, somehow.

I think I’m liking the pink chairs.It makes me feel that my living room matches my Etsy shop.

Color, color color!

Would Emily of Black Apple feel comfortable here if I invited her for a cup of tea? She is the queen of good blogging for your craft. Her aesthetic is so very cohesive. I am a little jealous.

I’d invite Heather Louise. Her dolls are superb and her portraits are dreamy.

Of course, I’d invite Amy Abshire Reyes, too.

This close up captured the Woodstock Bob photo. Bob was glowingly beautiful at this point. I imagine him happy with Sarah and their children. Why couldn’t all those crazy fools leave them alone?You can also see the cover of one of my favorite Los Lobos album La Pistola y El Corazon.

The painting is by artist George Yepes. Really, really mighty. A color master.

Okay enough reveling in my newly redesigned space. I’m off to get my car.

If I invited you to tea would you come over? Lynda Barry, would you?

11.1.09

Moon in Aries

The morning after a Halloween party excursion finds me just right back to feeling most comfortable in my own little nest. Even though CB’s home is exceedingly beautiful, small but loaded with loveliness, a real work of art like everything she does, I do not want what I do not have (Sinead O’Connor).

Daylight savings time ended early this morning. We’ll be tired, to bed and up even earlier than we had been all summer. It will actually be the same time but, to the world, we’ll be very early birds or will we be early worms?

I can be obsessed by interior design. It is one of the things I have always wanted to “do”. I have a great opportunity to do a room here at DarcyArts world.

The living room really needs help.

I was all gung ho thinking about, imagining a rich beautiful tile existing beneath the crappy rug there. On closer in spection it is really old tile dark brown with some not that attractive beige streaking. Could it be from the 40s? I think it is possible.

I am worried about taking up the carpet, crappy or not. Will it cost me in the end? It really depends on how long I live here. And there is another puzzle.

At this point in time I have no concrete vision of my future. I love that because I can get freaked out if I feel I am leading a predictable life.

The acceptable way of functioning says I should absolutely be married to a path at this point in my life. I should have all or nearly all of my ducks in a row. I should own things bigger and more valuable than a guitar amp, a couple of cobbled together workbenches and a closet full of comfortable clothes.

I think I’ve always felt more akin to the dharma bum life. I trust the light to provide sustenance. I truly believe “you can’t fall off the mountain”.

I would venture to say that all the people at last night’s party had lots of ducks and have spent their whole lives making rows and rows and rows. There were ginormous battleships of SUV lining the streets out side the glittering house.

People were costumed in many ways. 100% fake hippy was the most popular costume for prominent couples. Often Halloween costumes represent the skin we desire to slip into temporarily.

How would it feel to be all about LOVE and non-materialism? How would it feel to laze about and smoke pot and listen to music all day?

How would it feel to be a witch observing the seasons and aligning oneself with spirit?

Or Dog the Bounty Hunter, living a bleached-blonde life, high on adrenalin and testosterone accompanied by your big-tittied wife?

It was so pleasant to sit with Frank outside on CB’s well-groomed, artfully engineered patio. The stars were out. The moon was nearly full. We watched the people talk to one another.

I wondered after a while if I had been accidentally invited, just a name in a bank of contacts. The email sent out en mass.

We didn’t stay long. Long enough though for me to really feel the need to get to my living room makeover project and then that extra second more to ask myself why I shouldn’t just get rid of everything extraneous under my always temporary roof. I want to  be ready when the time comes to fly.

Morning pages 10.31.09*

John Cale’s tinkling piano was a great addition to the sound that the Velvet Underground dragged out of the factory and into the consciousness of all deep thinking musicians.

John Cale, Pisces two, somehow the weaker. Weaker? I love the cello, the violin, the drone.

Left alone, I don’t sense the depth but everybody has a part to play.

I am awake and I have done my 10 miles on the fakebike after a couple of days off. Virus made my body achy and fatigued but not too bad.

Today Frank and I will go to Colleen Barry’s Halloween party. Time has worked things around so that the artist I’ve admired most in Redding has invited me to a gathering.

Beings of light and the powers that be have sent energy through time and here I am on the receiving end.

The sun is shining, I’m in my work space by the windows, looking out on the yard, listening to Lou Reed sing Heroin cuz I am tuned in to all the Velvets songs on my iPod. It’s a good morning.

“I’ll be your mirror,” sings Nico. “Please put down your hands, cuz I see you.”

I am waiting for iTunes to load up a new version of something. I just wanted to import the Velvets third and most holy album to my nano. I wait.

Earlier, I danced down the walkway outside the house while listening to I’m Waiting for My Man, a little double stepping to come down from the fakebike high, sloowly.

There are certain things we assume these days about staying alive. We assume that money is essential. We assume that we must go to work in exchange for money. We aren’t providing for our own needs. We aren’t growing everything we eat. We have been largely driven away from the agrarian format. We accept a lot of middle men in our lives.

“I’m waiting for my middle man.”

“Dear Landlord, please don’t take away my ____.” My what? Can’t remember Bob’s line. John Wesley Harding is a good LP. It’s been a long time.

Oh, no. It’s “please don’t put a price on”  something. On what?

Google, memory’s middle man, will help me out.

Oh, yeah “Dear landlord, please don’t put a price on my soul.” How could I forget? That’s what I’m taking about.

*Please forgive my self-indulgence. I’m trying out Julia Cameron’s free write experiment. This is my first day.

I think after years of driving myself relentlessly to make, make make, I am actually succeeding in chilling out.

I am reading Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way, a book I bought after Kathy Mattea recommended it during an interview I must have done in 2006. I can’t believe it was that long ago but it was.

I wanted to start doing the morning pages but had to take Frank to school and catch up on errands. The car has been out of commission since Friday.

Morning pages is a free writing exercise that Cameron says will free the artist of the crap in the mind so that we can open up to the material flowing from the source. It’s meant to be a slow murder of our internal editor. She calls it the censor. Cool, I say.

The thing is, I already write my dreams out first thing in the morning and I blog as much as possible. That’s a lot of scribbling. Still I’d like the freedom to just write anything.

When I first read about the morning pages I was kind of attitudinal.

Julia Cameron writes:

“Living in a small adobe house that looked north to Taos Mountain, I began a practice of writing morning pages. Nobody told me to do them. I had never heard of anybody doing them. I just got the insistent, inner sense that I should do them and so I did. I sat at a wooden table looking north to Taos Mountain and I wrote.”

My response, scribbled back in the spring of 2006:

“She never heard of journals?”

I have been writing in a journal since I saw a fear Gemini friend attending to her books each day. We were in our late teen years.

The morning pages are supposed to be more of a free write with no thought to story, design or sense-making. I get it.

Back then I think I was just jealous that Cameron got to live in a small house in Taos and I was stuck in a crappy apartment on Del Sol Place in Redding.

My journals, many of which I still have, are close to being complete drivel. They are 87% boring crap. The point is to get that stuff out of the way so the faucets are opened for the good flow.

Just slowing down and letting myself get off the what-next train has allowed me to consider a few directions I’d forgotten I could go in.

My journalist’s post traumatic stress disorder had me shrinking from the idea of writing anything more challenging than blog posts. Over the last few weeks though I’ve been getting the urge to make stories. That’s a good thing.

The trick is not to dive back into the relentless mode too quickly (if ever). I need to establish a deep feeling of love and peace with my own imagination. I need to believe what bubbles up will sustain the full realization of the creation I see shimmering off in the distance.

I am going to a Halloween party tomorrow night where I expect there will be more than a few creative types. It will be good to talk to others. I’m going as a dream pirate.

Wonder what will make the best fake face tattoo?

I think I dream of this place.

My immune system has been a real champ. I haven’t had so much as a sniffle in ages, literally years.

I’m (not quite fully) down with some sort of virus that is making me achy and spacey but it’s okay. I’m on my semi-permanent maker sabbatical these days. My only boss is my own relentless drive to fill the world with crazy colorful things.

This will be my vacation within a vacation. I didn’t really get hit with the full body thing until late in the morning. After my 9 mile fake-bike ride I watched Flipping Out, made sweet potato muffins, and then read.  An afternoon nap led to increased spaciness and listlessness interrupted by little bits of additional reading.

I am reading this book:

If you have never read any of Michael Newton’s books, pick one up. It’s very interesting stuff.

You don’t have to believe.

This Life Between Life regression therapy starts with a past life recall and then allows you to get to the place where we hang out between earthly incarnations.

It sounds pretty wild but 99 percent of everything I’ve read sounds plausible, coming from a hindu-friendly pov. Nothing really rang my bullshit detector alarm.

I’d definitely like to try it an LBL session with an experienced facilitator.

All I’ve got to say to those who may be aghast at the thought of this is:

How the hell can you be so sure you possess a complete understanding of the physical and spiritual terrain that may exist. Close-minded, fearful, unimaginative Christians I’m looking at you. No disrespect, yo.

I hate science fiction. I’m too lazy to want to keep all the strange invented stand-in constructions in my head as I read the story. I don’t want to imagine a whole alien world (though some elements of Newton’s research and case studies point to some things  alien enough for any sci-fi freak. See Destiny of Souls.

I prefer the crystal, sparkly, nature-esque environments and loving beings of light that populate most people’s other worldly regression experiences.

One of the case studies shared here is from the files of regression therapist David M. Pierce of Chico, CA. I love that he used the phrase “kick-ass” when conversing with a spirit guide. Dude! That is so rad (I am not being sarcastic).

Anybody with any past life recall or LBL experience I want to hear from you.

I went for it. I pulled that big old heavy TV right out of my dining area workspace. Gone.

I had turned on MSNBC and had it nattering in the background as I tried a prototype plush snail.

I love this woman newscaster. She’s smart, and dignified but I don’t need to be in a relationship with TV peeps. Or do I.

After an hour or so I was convinced this background noise added nothing to my creative experience.

Actually that’s not true. It added a sort of irritating buzz that I realized made me feel less good than if I had been listening to music or some pleasant radio show.

Out it went. No TV in the workspace

I will sell a good part of our collection of TVs on Craig’s list, along with the two fricking gigantic bean bags my dear son left behind.

These things are ridiculously heavy and large. They must be at least five feet in diameter, maybe six. Two of them stacked on top of one another nearly reach the ceiling. Whoever takes them will need a truck and a couple of sets of muscle to get them out of here.

They are very comfortable. They would make a cozy bed for a small child.

I need to declutter my space. I’m still trying to get it together to take the e-waste to the city dump. We have our own little mountain of ancient computer screens and machines. There are two or three pieces in every closet and this house has lots of closets.

Now that i think I’ve contracted Frank’s cold virus I don’t have the energy to do anything but talk about what will be done someday. Being under the weather means I’ll have only enough energy to read and write and watch the season three reunion of Flipping Out.

I’ve become to fond of Jeff Lewis. How did it happen?

I feel for him. I am entertained by the crazy mixed up sarcasm.

I found that one can watch video of season one, two and three  on line at Amazon! Dang! What is mod technology trying to do to me?

I’m definitely hooking up our third computer to the HDTV in the bedroom.

I’m cutting against my strong work-ethic grain by allowing myself time to float and dream. After a months of nose-to-the-grind-stone effort I just spazed out. I need some time for contemplation.

I must admit I imagined going on and on, producing plush critters like a machine, right through December.

Saturn has been in in Virgo, my fourth house, for two years. In astrology Saturn is the stern task master. Virgo is service, work, duty and the Fourth house is the domain of home, self, family.

I live and work here at the DarcyArts home studio. It’s been a buzzing hive but now I feel a change coming.

It’s organic and that is a good thing.

It’s all part of the process, part of the road I’ve driven down. I am learning to push doubt over the cliff.

I am exploring my dreams day and night. In sleep, I am a dream pirate. I sail in that beloved other world and search for treasure. I pick up nuggets, shiny symbols fraught with meaning and clues of every kind. I find maps that point me in my very own direction.

Saturn goes into Libra October 30th. That means it moves into my Fifth house. The Fifth house rules creativity, children, beauty, pleasure, games.

I was born with Saturn in Libra and this means I will be experiencing a Saturn Return.

So will Dr. Cornel West, one of my favorite academicians.

The Saturn return is a life cycle. We have our first about the age of 27 and our second about the age of 57.

Saturn keeps an eye on our progress of becoming our authentic selves. Did we, in the time allotted, develop the skills we need to live our dharma (true function)?

If we have run in the other direction, away from our authentic nature we will have a rough time with our Saturn Return. If we are flowing with what we are meant to experience it will be a good passage.

I’ve been stringing this out for far too long. I really want to get off this shit but I don’t know if I can do it. I’m really sick of it but . . . “it’s like I have a gun in my mouth and I like the taste of the metal” or whatever Robert Downey Jr. told that judge. I used to be much worse. I used to love all the trappings of entertainment/media culture.

What do I get for my trouble?

I get raging egos, control freaks, really snarky “ironic”  humor, criminal-related reality shows, reality shows based on death, murder, evil ghosts, insecurity, self-loathing and a willingness to humiliate oneself and others (for what?) and way too many really irritating drug commercials about chemical concoctions nearly that, admittedly, might kill you.

I don’t need this crap in my head. I need to put down the cable TV.

I like HDTV. I didn’t want to but I do. I don’t have much time to watch it but I love film, cinema, movies.

I wish I could just get the stuff I wanted from cable — IFC, Sundance, TCM, AMC, the HD channels and, okay Bravo. Jeff Lewis put a spell on me.

I do love Castle because Nathan Fillion rocks and so does Stana Katic.

I love The Mentalist. Their entire cast is great. I think they hired a very heavy handed makeup artist for this season. The girls are looking like drag queens. I notice the makeup before anything else.

I can’t wait for Breaking Bad to return.

I want to live free. I hate paying nearly $200 a month for my cable, phone, internet package. The cable overlords really need to allow consumers to choose only the channels they want. I don’t think they’d lose money.

Aren’t they afraid of internet streaming?

Hulu? They have commercial insertions? I’ll have to check it out. I could run a computer straight into my HDTV and then . . .

I need to go read a book.

Had the chance to do a photo session with the pipe gnome. He looks pretty happy with his find.

He photographs a little flatly compared to his brother gnome. You’ll see below. Maybe it’s just that his outfit is more a red-orange. Maybe I need schoolin.

The morning dew still clings to the grass.

These would be cool printed on a very large sheet of paper.

My printer can do 13 x 19. What am I waiting for?

Maybe I’ll print some for the Shasta Arts Holiday sale.

It would be fun to try.

I wish I was a real shroom hunter and knew all about them. Could I have these for dinner? They look delicious.

Somebody is very excited about his fat spongy domes. Where are the gnome women?

Do the main “characters” at LA Ink get paid for doing the reality TV show? I am so clueless about how that whole thing works. I guess they have to get paid but just not the be fees like “stars”.

I heard that the dad of Kate and plus 8, what’s his name, Jon, is being paid less for his new status as part timer dad.

Anybody know how to find out? I’m not getting too much online.

Maybe a subscription to Hollywood Reporter? I’ve always wanted one. Or Variety? I’m going to start reading them online.

A quick peek at Hollywood Reporter revealed that Soupy Sales, funny funny, attractive, semi-inappropriate kids show host has died. RIP Soupy. Rave on Tony and Hunt.