play time

As I have said, I am eager to start playing with this new technique. As usual the best laid plans and all. I am still anticipating....

For my first trick, I will etch some rather large metal tags that I got 1st because I thought they were cool. And 2nd because they were an incredible deal. If all goes well and indeed all that has to be done is stamp directly on the metal and then let the solution worm its way through then on to my next trick.

My next experiment will be to see if I can etch a frame for a tag holder. Obviously anything with a rounded edge is going to give apoplectic fits. But if it works how cool would that be? An etched frame... ah the possibilities.

And then should that give me the oohs and aahs of my peers that I so cravenly seek... onto metal washers and gaskets. Perhaps even... dare I say it and give away a very cool idea to someone who won't credit me? I DARE!!! An etched paint can to give with a gift of stationery.

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY COOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!!!!!

do you believe in magic?

I have to say I do. And I know that there are good psychics out there. You certainly can't trust all of them. It's like anything else, you have to get a feel for them. I won't go to any old doctor just because he/she says he/she's one. I don't recommend going to any psychic just because he/she says he/she's one. Use your head and your heart.

I have a couple I see on a regular basis because they have proven themselves honorable and reliable. One is willing to teach me how to tap into my own gifts which I keep doubting. And the other is willing to pop off with a comment that leads into a discussion that by all rights I should pay for but don't. Joan and Verta are the best I've met on a regular basis.

Like I said, Joan did a reading for my birthday and said that I would be writing by the end of Spring. That that path would take me away on travels and would bring me some economic freedom. It would open doors. I also said I misinterpreted her reading and immediately thought novel. I lacked the imagination to see something else. Why didn't Joan tell me it was copy writing? Here's why Joan is a good psychic... she knew that my lack of imagination would prevent me from believing the reading and taking it seriously. I would have gotten in my own way. Worse I would have slammed the door in Destiny's face.

So how do I cope with this sticky door?

For starters, I looked into the agency that sent me a direct mail flier yesterday. It is for a writing course. Why? I love to write. Just look at the blog. Second I love to write, I'd love to be a paper back writer but will take some baby steps to learn sustainability. Thirdly, they promise me that diligence will bring in loads of cash because while many people will take the course not many will follow through and pursue clients. In short order I can make all the cash I need to finance my business equipment; learn valuable direct marketing skills to increase my chances of landing major accounts for my own business; and best of all be completely independent of that annuity. It really is only a carrot and not a very big one at that.

Why would I even look at a direct marketing brochure? Normally I don't. But the company name says it all... Artists and Writers. That's what I am. That's what I do and that is what I want to be. It was also not that flimsy little tri-fold or #10 envelope stuffed with postcards that I normally get. It looked like something I may have ordered and forgotten about.

So how do I know that this is the right course?(Pun intended) Tracey made me promise that the housekeeping gig would be temporary because of the health effects. And Joan's reading back in January said I would be taking the writer's route to success. I thought she meant my paperback aspirations. So I've been plugging away at MI Works trying to make anything happen. In so doing I triggered some kind of direct mail deluge and there among the flotsam and jetsam I found my life preserver.

I am going for it. I'll still blog and I'll be doing art with a vengeance. But I won't be relying on the vague promise of possibility but on the tenacity and temerity that angered and made my mother so envious. I refuse to give up on hope and this program has it in abundance.

Some doors open more easily than others

I have been having difficulty with money for the last few months,as I have already explained. And it would seem that my problems are not yet over. To resolve my cash flow issues, I joined a temp agency. Just as I was ready to chuck everything again, a conversation with a good friend reminded me that a door would have to open because it had to. Reasonable when one is trusting Providence. So I said, I guess my best bet is the temp agency and I just won't sweat it. The very next job they put me on asked me to apply within an hour of getting there. Within a week I was asked to be the head housekeeper's assistant. Now as we are all excited to work together I find the temp agency has a few things to learn about disclosure.

First I was told it was 90 days from working with them. Then I was told 90 days working with the client. Then the client was told 90 days with the agency and 90 days with them. So either way I look at it I can't be full time on the schedule for most of the Summer. That really translates into a significant blow... economic rebound will not happen at the predicted desirable rate. How like the rest of the country.

etchant, perchance to dream....

Apparently there is this great little bottle of creative goo at Radio Shack hiding under everyone's noses. It's called etchant. I did not discover it. The credit for that goes to a writer at one of my art magazines. And it produces a piece of etched metal that is absolutely incredible for embellishments. I may even have to consider it for some pendants in my chokers.

I've mentioned this whimsy with a dash of tradition philosophy I have. The whole aesthetic in my company goes right back to the 50's when my grampa was with an outfit that sent memos via manila envelope with a stringer seal. I have a few magnesium printer's blocks that he found along the way. Grampa was always tinkering in the garage, making repairs and creating his own tools. I have been looking for embellishments to work within that aesthetic and now I have found out how to do it.

First big paycheck is this week. I need to see Indy, buy etchant and start putting my fiscal house in order after being out of work for so long. But I promise that there will be samples as soon as I get to the Library.

hazah!

I think I have solved my technical difficulty in downloading photos/scans... the public library. They have a guru there that can help me figure out how to post photos. yea!!!! Now I only need a money guru to unlock my annuity. Another tech guru who can help me buy a digi cam and something called a macros lens so that I don't get soaked in the tech store. And a really really really super cool never before seen on tv or anywhere else studio organization system.

Currently I am working out of my bedroom. All I can say about it is at least I am able to work. If others had their way it would all still be packed away. I am sure that it the goal. Pack everything away so that she will forget her foolishness.

I say to them and anyone else tempted to "forget their foolishness" if Edison had given up when his family told him to we would still be sitting in the dark. If Whitney had given up we'd all be picking cotton by hand. If Bill Gates had given up then who knows what Al Gore could claim inventorship to. No, I am not any of the aforementioned fellas. I doubt that I will change the world so significantly that I make the Time 100 of this century. But what I do will make a difference on a personal level that I hope has a lasting impact beyond the pages of Time.

how small the world?

Small.When you grow up in the Great Lakes region, way up in the 45th parallel, you think the world so vast, your life so isolated that nothing matters and nothing touches you. Of course reality and economics finds you no matter what lonely road you live on. And there is technology to shorten the distances.

As I open to what is in the world, I am feeling a competitiveness bordering on mania. I also feel left out and waaaaaay behind in my knowledge of how it all works. But I am encouraged that the competitiveness will let me tap into something deeper that will inform my art. As I expand into the world and the world expands into me, there must therefore be a well which can be tapped to continue to feed the artistic flame of creation.

And so... the world opens wide.

it's a great big universe...

and we're all really puny. Just tiny little specks about the size of Mickey Rooney.

Thank you Yakko, Wakko, and Dot. Any way, my point, if I truly had one, is to say for as large as the world seems and for as disconnected as people in general tend to believe we are, I have found that there are more people like me than I could ever have imagined. Today Wil spoke of the Death Star playset and the long lasting sorrow of having traded it for a landspeeder. We are very close to the same age and had I the good fortune to have had the set i too could have been talked into a trade. I ended up on another site that was full of the stuff that I thought I was the only one who remembered or cared about. (Lit. police prep end alert! I know, my bad)

We, on a human level are not so disconnected as we tend to think. The lines in the sand are completely arbitrary. We chose to cross some one's line to join their side; we chose which some one's lines are worth being angry over being drawn in the first place. Do I want to be a Rockefeller? Not really. Do I want to be Hollywood? Not all of it. What I want in my life I draw the lines.

No other lines matter. It's a great big Universe. If it's not big enough for all of us there is a problem.

The best part of contact with your guides...

is knowing that you're never alone.
I think I whined about that once before. The feeling that nothing is right when there aren't people around to share you interests. Well, I never really have felt heart-deep aloneness. I always felt as though I had all my friends around me. They are guides. Nieve in particular is my sci-fi/puzzle/games/research buddy.
When ever she has show up of her own volition, I have found new sci-fi to love. Star Trek OS, the Martian Chronicles, Assimov, Dr. Who. And she stays around for a long time when she gets here. I guess. Now that I know what to look for in the memory banks, I know that she was always around for a very long time.
I must always have know about these guys. Because I never seemed to worry much about being left alone. And this not-alone quality to my life has always annoyed the people around me. My brother for one.
I guess that is my contribution to our squabbles... I give the very distinct impression that his choice to be or not to be in my life makes no matter to me. It doesn't. People are who they are and will be when and where they will be. That I don't desperately need him offends him. When I was insecure it offended me when people didn't want me. I understand. I am sorry he's afraid of the UF but ... I am never alone or forsaken and I can't live like I am just to soothe ruffled egos.

new technique with metal

I can't wait to try this one out. It is just the thing to really make some of the pieces I'm stuck on come to fruition. It involves dyes and metal spoons and keys. I can't wait for the time to get to this.

What's it all about?

As far as my artistic career goes... this foray into the Universe to meet formally with my guides and masters means that there will be a speed of fruition that I had not expected. Nieve, the Dr., will help me. She promises it will be swift. Note she hasn't said painless. But what else does it mean?

Well, I left Verta's Friday in absolutely no pain. I felt like I had 15 year old legs again. I felt limber, vital and I felt my blood flow despite what the rigors of commercial housekeeping does to a body. I did not feel pain again until I went to lunch today. And when I engage Nieve later this afternoon there will be no more pain.

It also means that I will gain greater accuracy, pinpoint to be precise, in diagnosis and prescription. For my art that means it will be much easier to access the heart than ever before and a greater confidence in executing a painting will make me far more prolific than I have been before. But it also means that there is the potential for unrestrained rubber stamp design. I am getting back in tune with that creative genius that feeds energy to itself by remaining within the Unified Field.

Universal Guides

I am so excited by Friday's events that I can hardly keep myself from screaming. The guide that came to me has been with me before and I have been aware of her. But I had blocked all but one memory conscious thought. The last time I saw her, I was working at a sub shop and baking for the wholesale end. It was after 3am and I was wide awake but angry that it was taking so long to get through the shift goals. For fun, I listened to coast to coast am. Suddenly i thought there were people in the store. I rushed to the front and they first 6 of what would be 12 began to fade from seemingly solid form. Most of the first 6 were ancient warrior types. The next six came first in a group of three, all armoured. Then came two, one was a Mage. And the last was a woman I did not see clearly but impressed me with Dr. Crusher's character type. This was who appeared Friday. She was the most modern looking of them all. Most of the 11 so closely resembled the Heroes of the Lance that I thought I was nuts.
I had planned on calling coast to advance another theory from one Greg Kimball espoused. They insisted that I did not and then they were gone. That was at the height of my Tarot reading. I think that is when I quit reading for myself. I can not forget them. And I cannot deny them. But now I know how to communicate at will.
If only the Mage did not scare me. He makes Raist look like a Kender.

Accessing the unified field

Whatever the unified field is called it's function is to hold everything together and energize whatever is in it. For most of the vast cosmos there is no conscious interaction with the field. A star forms; a star exists. People are part of the cosmic creation process and we can choose how we function within that field once we have come to exist. It is a humbling and at the same time exciting concept to understand.

For several years now I have been studying the spiritual concepts across the earth. And last night, during one of my class' exercises, I got as close as I have been to the cosmic center... what some call the Source and others call Christ-consciousness, than I have since returning from Marquette. I have been able to access the field on purpose and communicate with one of my guides in a way that I have not done for fear or disbelief. Of course to some this may sound like hogwash or witchery, but it is simply the Creator sharing with its creation that which was meant to be shared from the beginning until Avarice showed up and spoiled the fun. What is the point to this exercise?

To heal myself, others and to participate according to the invitation of birth that we were all given before getting lost in a world belief that pursues nothing but perishable goods. The spirit never dies but I have a horrible feeling that it can be lost, diverted or worse languish on the edge of vast No-thing-ness.
That is a fate worse than death.