new job?

I will hear more about the new job when I return from NYC there was a possibility of a 60 hour per week job, but fortunately the management was shifted to cover that position as even though the money would have been better I am not sure that I would have wanted to be on call as much as the job required and I do have other more interesting options afoot still. I tried to take some pictures of the mid coast on Sunday but it was too bright and they didn't come out well. I am making progress on the Cinco de Mayo pinata and it might even be ready by Cinco de Mayo! I noted that an exchange student in Germany used a photo of one of my pinatas for his virtual birthday party! what fun.
Currently I am working on a large green recycled bag with some hand knitted and felted pieces. It should be done in a couple of days. I also re-felted a small vibrant pouch bag and it came out fantastically! I formed it around a sturdy rectangular box and it is holding that shape well. I worked some in the garden digging up siberian iris, hosta and primroses. The magnolia is in bloom and the yard is filled with its sweet perfume.

Indic?

My last name is apparently a very common name in India. I get a lot of calls for discounted telephone service to India and on blogger I often get the message that I can "write in my native Indic" . The name was Austrian and started with a Ts my ex husband changed his name and the spelling to one that never made a lot of sense to me, it always seemed French. We certainly are finding out otherwise lately.

Feliz Cinco de Mayo steampunk style

The propeller to my steam punk air ship remains illusive, but I plan to write "hot seat or bust" and "Feliz cinco de Mayo" on the streamers. For some reason this particular pinata has been a tricky one, for months taunting from its perch on a plant stand but I worked on it a lot today even shunning my garden which needs some springtime work. My application is looking pretty up beat and since Henry said I need to be over the top and I think he is right, I'm going full force with this pinata schtick. There are 7 questions. Heres a bit from the first draft if you have any thoughts please share them.

1. Quirks, rituals, superstitions…What makes you unique?

Often seen cheerfully bopping down Maine St. with brightly colored pinatas, I am known locally as "the pinata lady". I suppose this started in the seventies when I was studying in France on a scholarship. I has made a pinata for a little girl's birthday party and was invited to join the local crafters group. I have been known for my pinatas ever since. My basic philosophy is that I'm here for fun and I like to share that fun.
I don't have any superstitions, but I am generally a hopeful person I very much believe in magic and the power of positive thinking. One day many years ago, I was walking in Harvard Square thinking I need a watch and there it was laying in a puddle at my feet it served me well for a couple of years until I traded it for a bunch of oranges in Jamaica. Aside from this hopeful belief in providence, I'd say one of my more annoying quirks is my need to think out loud as I work on my projects. I am the original external processor.
Oh and I live in a tree house in a meadow in a meadow in Maine which is probably one of my more unique dreams come true.

New adventures!

The schedule for the northeast corridor Amtrack is next to me. I have an interview for Who Wants to be a Millionaire on May 5th and I am hitting the streets of New York City just me and a giant gold and silver steampunk pinata for ballast. Pretty weird huh, I should be the ballast for the air ship, but I think it will be the other way around. I managed to glean enough money for train fare round trip. I can get a ride from Maine to Boston and back. I just have to make some money for meals. A massage and a facial would be nice but hey that would just be over the top.

Introductions: Poet/Pinata Lady in a Tree house

Ephemeral Permeance

Hot ginseng tea from
the rebel siege next door
and leftover chinese luncheon special
stacked on our stacked
newspaper mattress.

From the Hilltop Queen Anne victorian
We peer northwest
through
leaded glass
rain streaks, mist
chinatown, gastown, downtown
bay and lion peaks.

This window,this view.
Our photo gray
closing snap.

Tomorrow the
demolition squad alarm clock
on the first floor will jar
us from our down and into
separate yukons
north and south.





The poem was published some time ago in The Cafe Review a lit mag out of Portland, Maine. It is based on a trip with a group of travelers I met in a hostel in Montreal in the long days of June many years ago.

I am retro-cycling into that more agreeable hippy like sphere once again after a responsible 22 year stint in the real world of social service agencies, as I raised my three children. I am making pinatas and other items that strike my fancy, reading cards at the best tattoo shop in town and working in my perennial gardens, right now. My youngest son is still in high school. My middlest one is struggling after a brief stint at college- writing music and sci-fi and drawing anime figures here in the tree house. My daughter the activist, is off in Philly stirring up the masses in her quietly charged way.

I did not merely quit my day job. The company I was working for spiraled and crashed after an ugly year. Allegedly, taking people's IRAs, definitely taking their mileage and vacation pay. I know for a fact they weren't even paying into unemployment insurance, because I ran into that stumbling block when I tried to collect some. It was a blend of poor management and another unseen casualty of war as have been so many social service agencies. Don't even get me started on no child left behind..... A system for creating cannon fodder.

Losing the job and the attached politics of the downward spiral was horrific, but ultimately good timing. My better half had just undergone a series of surgeries for a methosilioma like cancer just before it happened, I spent three weeks in the ICU with my love and I was needed at home for the long recovery process. The chemo is over and there is a tentative remission, but with this sort of cancer they can only do rudimentary scans as it is considered terminal and insurance won't cover PET scans.

I am still maintaining the vestiges of that more traditional life more specifically a mortgage to pay. So I am my tossing hat into the ring for at least a part time position. In the mean time, check out my wares at my little Etsy shop of the same name and while you are there, visit the other etsy shops : etsy Maine team, freethinkers shops and the pagans of etsy. They are a fun and talented bunch of artists and crafts people. Maybe to spice things up I'll introduce you to some of them along the way.

This blog will feature some of my works and I hope will be a positive reflection of my creativity as I try to stay on my quest for fun and color and keep the treehouse near Merrymeeting Bay in the family.