Rowan's Journal

Stress stress stress stress

November often sucks; this one is no different although last year was. Last year I had the wonderful job of the Ecclesiastical robes that Central Pres hired me to make for Heidi Peterson. That *totally* made my November and December last year.

This year, not so much. Everyone is thinking about the holidays, and not about getting stuff sewn. I'd hoped to avoid this stress this year, but no. Everybody's "after Thanksgiving, is that ok?" And what am I supposed to say, "NO, interrupt your comfy Thanksgiving and holiday and vacation plans, please." That'd go over like a ton of bricks.

But other than this one cloak I'll deliver on Monday, I have NO other jobs paying off during November. I have $200 or so in the bank toward rent and it's after the 15th. I'm trying unsuccessfully not to freak the fuck out. I have no money to get holiday groceries nor the mood to make them to eat by myself.

I hate November. I hate being single and having no family, no safety-net and scared about my financial security all the time. I fucking hate it. And now Thanksgiving plans have fallen through so I either stay at home alone or I finagle my way into someone else's celebration which I also fucking hate. Being a 5th wheel for a holiday dinner is a major depression trigger for me but staying home alone is worse.

EDIT: I bit the bullet and accepted an invitation. We'll see. It's at a Chorus friends home but I swear if the dining table conversation goes to conservative politics, I will leave.

I have no idea what Chip's holiday plans are but I hope to see him on Saturday so we'll see.

I need to keep at this to keep accountable. I don't know if this is seasonal, depression and mourning, new normal for me...or what.

But a dear friend asked me how I was this morning and this is what I said.
It's accurate and smack on, so I'll just post it here as my update.

"Lots of work to do, not enough time. Must do the work to get the money, not really feeling like it. Good things happening, but I feel numb-ish.

Wanna just take a day off and drink tea and read but I can't, not and get done.

Just REALLY really tired of pushing and pushing and not really getting any break. If I take a break, then I'm behind in my work. But if I don't take breaks, work doesn't go well."

The singing/music rehearsals and lessons are great and makes me feel alive and then I come home and go back into a haze. I really want to stop this merry-go-round and find another ride to get on; one that is fun and happy and where I interact on a personal level with a loved one and build a happy home and take care of someone and be taken care of.

Dating Chip is fun and I enjoy it but it's sure going nowhere fast. I can't push and I suspect that he's holding stuff back as I am; one simply can't be 100% transparent, simply not possible nor desirable. I'm just taking the time we have and enjoying it; about all I can do.

I had to turn some work back to a woman who has been bugging me about it. I should have been honest and said, "Look, I just don't want to do this project; it's not my type of thing." Actually, I DID say that but she pressured me and said she couldn't find anyone else to do it. It's a dumb jacket that she designed that she thinks she's going to get rich on but it's ugly and will have a very limited appeal plus she doesn't want to pay me much to make it up.

So I procrastinated, as I often do when there isn't a hard deadline. Yesterday she called me and got all whiny and demanding and dithered between still wanting me to make it and wanting me to send her back the fabric. I finally snapped and said, "Make up your mind!" Then she dithered as to whether I should mail it or meet her somewhere. So I'm mailing her stuff back and she'll supposedly reimburse me for the shipping but I doubt that'll ever happen. It's a fairly big box; about 15" x 15" from all the materials she kept mailing me. She honestly has forgotten how much she sent me and kept saying, "do you have enough stuff to make this" and sending me more. I think she'll be honestly astonished as to how much material is actually there.

I took this job reluctantly and now that I'm hammered with work, this is what happens. I accept my responsibility in this situation totally. I don't need this sort of crap but the exchange triggered my insecurities and my feelings of lack of worth. And now I have to spend money to ship her fabric back.

Bah.

After the client was here all day Friday working on her dress, I ended up working a 10 hour day but she ran me to my chiro appt and then took us out to lunch so it was great; she's a pretty nifty gal if a bit emo and well, actually a bit crazy but who am I to judge, right? She had a rough time and was hospitalized for awhile after a nervous breakdown. But I believe that being excommunicated from the Mormon Church, I can certainly understand. I'm very fond of her and feel very comfortable with her. Thing is, she and I have gotten pretty close and we have the agreement that we'll be totally candid and so I tell her when I think she's screwing up and why, from the benefit of my screwing up but I do so lovingly. And she takes it well; she may not listen to me but that's part of the deal. I advise her and she gets to take it...or not. But then we discuss it and we're cool. See, that's the deal with a close and loving friendship; you get the chance to tell someone that you think they're full of shit but that you still love them. And then they get the chance to either take that advice or not. She's been there for me lately when I was down, as well. She's the gal who fell through on taking me to Oklahoma for that sewing machine run but it worked out alright. Friends like that, no matter of how long a duration are not friends to toss away lightly.

So I was pretty whopped Friday night but had to get up on Saturday morning anyway. I had to get up to go to some fucking thing but damned if I can remember what it was I had to get up and go to at 10am. Literally wracking my brains and damned if I can remember. Huh, oh well; certainly made an impression on me, whatever it was.

Saturday afternoon I worked on Edina's costume and didn't get enough done. I almost decided not to go but decided at the last minute to make up a quick "what do I have on hand" recipe as I won't go to a pot luck party empty-handed. So I grabbed a jar of yoghurt dressing and a head of broccoli at the store. Then at home, I cut up the dozen or so cherry tomatoes I had, finely chopped about 5 of the broccoli florets, combined with an equal amount of the ricotta cheese and stirred in a cup or so of the dressing. Tasted it and then added a shake of poppy seeds, a dash of vinegar and a shake of Penzey's creamy peppercorn dressing mix.

Then I made sure I was feeling good enough to the birthday party decided to go, and glad I did. Quite a large crowd of choir gals and other friends of the birthday gals. And AMAZING food! I didn't allow myself to get bogged down by pondering who was glad to see me and who wasn't. I did notice that Judy's partner, Judy, wouldn't even look at me much less greet me but since I had pre-determined that I wasn't going to let one person or my insecurities weigh me down, . I didn't let that confirmation of her being upset with me slow me down. I flitted from group to group, conversation to conversation, ate my plate, assumed that I was welcome in every circle of discussion and shared a wonderful, laugh-filled conversation with Tara's partner who is not only a professor but also an expert sewer and museum-rated historical garment curator. We traded sewing disaster stories and horrid client stories, to the amusement of several standing around. Soon as I started feeling a tiny bit anxious about my work pile-up or like I wasn't really fitting it, I said general good-byes to friendly gals and took myself away. I came home and worked on the costume some more and made blueberry/lemon/almond bread for church the next day.

Yesterday, I got up and made the bundt cake but realized I'd screwed up and opened a white cake mix. Crap. So I used three whole eggs rather than just the whites, dumped in the rest of the box of Hershey's chocolate, added a couple teaspoons of mint extract, mixed it all together and then folded in mint chips and the remaining special dark chips and put it into the bundt pan. I thought, "well, if it totally sucks, my entire reputation doesn't rest on this." So I packed it all up and drove to the church which is sort of a mess since they're starting remodeling on the 2nd floor. But it's still lovely there and they so appreciate everything we do. The rehearsal went well and then the service and Heidi's sermon containing stories about Billy Mills, Olympic gold-medalist runner, was really thought provoking.

We went down to prepare the Coffee hour goodies before the last hymn and as usual, Gabi annoyed me by her preoccupation with food and her general cluelessness. I TOTALLY get that this is MY problem and that I'm letting her get to me and that she doesn't intend it; she is just the sort of shallow, self-obsessed, insecure, un-empowered woman that I generally want to slap but I can't because it's truly not her fault at this point. She'll either get it and become a real and vital woman or she'll remain a scared little virginal spinster and turn into her mother plus cats. It makes me nuts. But for her to say, "Oh, there's probably not enough cheese" as she's slicing it and arranging in on a plate, all the while she's eating slice after slice of it, just made me nuts. I finally said, "well, if there's not enough, don't you think you should stop eating it?" and she just said, "but it's so GOOD!" So I sighed and kept slicing the cakes.

It turned out that, rather than being a disaster, both cakes were a hit. I described the not-quite-chocolate cake as "blonde chocolate" and told the process, but not that it was caused by a mistake on my part. Everyone thought it was clever and they really loved it. I did share that the blueberry/lemon/almond bread was my own recipe but didn't have the recipe with me. I do feel some pressure there since the owners of Function Junction go to church there and somehow, impressing them with my cooking and baking seems important to me. And yes, we ran out of cheese quickly. I am trying to suspend judgment and appreciate Gabi for her truly sterling qualities but it's hard. I may have to talk some more to Tony about this because he totally gets it and will help me to find good ways for me to deal with it. That's such a nice friendship 'cause we can each call each other on our shit, ask each other for advice and be silly and enjoy each other's company. I loves me a Tony, who is my gay boyfriend. That makes him chuckle.

Then in the evening I went to KWC rehearsal CD practice. I'm really enjoying working with Lamar; this is a side of him we hadn't yet seen; the light-hearted, talented musician who is empowered to make arrangement decisions and direct us, without any fear of stepping on the toes. Ida made a comment something like, "See how relaxed and easy-going this is?" for which I wanted to slug her. I'm still a bit touchy over Michael's quitting and having her suck up by making a comment like that was insensitive at the very least. Nobody has been comfortable about the obvious elephant in the room but Lamar has taken the high road and shown his professionalism by picking things up and moving on without a beat or a single comment. That was really a tacky thing of Ida to day and to everyone else's credit, we all let it just drop. She really think the world does revolve around her opinions and she really didn't like it that Michael didn't treat her specially as Joe did. She's intimidated by Lamar so she respects him. I'm so glad.

Gabi wasn't at the rehearsal; no clue why. She did say while we were working on clean-up at the church that morning that she was worried about and afraid of Lamar; I kept my mouth shut. The time Lamar jumped down her throat last Fall in rehearsal CD time was when she, and only she, kept dragging and Michael kept reprimanding the whole Soprano section when we ALL knew it was HER. So next time when it was Lamar running rehearsal, he simply said, "Gabi, you're the one dragging; you must keep the proper rhythm and not drag. You're pulling down the entire song" and she found that abusive. I think the rest of us about cheered because it had been making us ALL NUTS. So no wonder she's afraid of Lamar; he won't let her get away lingering on each note because she's enjoying the sound of her own voice. I know she's sensitive enough to realize that she annoys other people but not conscious enough to want to figure out why and to change it. I guess that's part of what drives me so nuts about her.

I must rehearse music today before Elijah rehearsal tonight. I'm in the double quartet and since the other Alto doesn't seem to get the right notes, I MUST be secure on mine so I can hold my own.

One last frustration: I have been wondering why my rent check hasn't cleared my account. I have known that my landlady was selling her house and had bought a condo or something but didn't know the status of her move. I have already established that I don't like calling her because she is so nosy and intrusive and controlling so I hoped that a note would suffice. So last month I included a note with my check asking for her forwarding address when it was appropriate and heard nothing back. This month, I included another note asking for a forwarding address. SO. This morning I get a phone call. From my Landlady. Asking where my check is. So I said, "Well Linda, I mailed it out the 4th. You haven't received it yet?" She said, "no, I haven't" and then said, "Ooooohhh, I haven't given you an updated address?" No, she hasn't. And apparently she has already sold her other house and the new people are living in it in the last month. And apparently she didn't put in a change of address at the post office 'cause she said that the gal living there had called her and told her she had some mail AND HAD DONE A CHANGE OF ADDRESS FOR HER and *I* am the one who is irresponsible and out of touch with reality? Huh. And no, I still do not have her updated address.

And still have not heard from Chip to know if we're going out for my birthday tomorrow. I'm going to send him a chatty, "hey, it's my birthday tomorrow and I feel like steak, wanna help me celebrate?"

Anyway...this is me using my journal as just that; writing stuff out blowing off steam, using this as a place to get stuff out of my head.

I don't know this guy but I feel for his situation; a friend posted this and I'm just boosting the signal since that's all I can do. I live in daily fear that this long-term-loaner laptop I've been using for a couple years may die any day and I'd be up that creek with no steering implement, for sure.

"So, a friend of mine is in a really bad spot. robertsloan2 is living in San Francisco in a residence hotel on $750 a month disability. His rent is $600. (Or something like this. My details may be off but it is ridiculous.) While he gets food stamps, this puts him in a place where he cannot afford anything beyond bare necessities, and sometimes not even that.

Robert's computer died this morning. We are looking at donating our working laptop, but it is six years old, and I'm not sure how much time it has left. The Internet is Robert's support network and more than that, his livelihood, as he is a writer and looking to self-publish. Without a working computer, he can't do any of this.

Because of complications with Social Security counting any money that Robert receives through his paypal as income (and will thus take it out of his disability checks), I will be acting as guardian for the collected funds and will arrange to have the laptop purchased and sent to him, and will make sure that he receives any funds leftover. My paypal is mistressnonny@gmail.com."

Every little bit helps. Please pass this around! Thank you guys! :)

Somebody recently asked me about the Navy Faille Walking suit that I had up awhile back to sell, to see if it was still available.

It is; I was having a brain fart. If you're still interested, please ping me.



(And the white spot in the above image is on the lens, not the costume.)



Sizing:
Jacket is meant to be worn with a corset
13" back shoulder
24" sleeve length
36" bust
34" waist
Skirt length in front is 39", hem goes to a sweep train in back.
Waistband ties at back. Horsehair braid stiffens the hem, should be worn with a small crinoline under the skirt.

Price: $150, negotiable

One of my biggest frustrations in life as an entrepreneur is people not replying to emails or phone calls.


I have two clients now, bless their hearts, whose projects are completely on hold BECAUSE THEY WON'T CALL OR EMAIL ME BACK.

For crying out loud, people, this is how I make my living. I can't work if you don't contact me.

One thing that really, truly sucks about being self-employed.

Some better this morning; I just checked the bank accounts and the one PayPal amount made it into my business account this morning. PLUS the two over-drafts that were in "pending" did NOT go through as overdrafts because I covered them both times by shifting around what little I had in the two accounts to cover them. SO relieved!

I got paid for the Trebs blouse at yesterday's rehearsal so that'll go into the bank tomorrow first thing. Then a dear friend hired me long distance to make a veil for her and got the payment sent by PayPal which transfer will show up in the account in another day or two.

With a whole lot of hard work this week, I should be able to pay rent. That will still leave an overage in both water and gas that I have to come up with right away but at least I can now put a bit of gas in the car and buy tuna for the cats. I've been feeding them chicken because that's what I have in the freezer.

It amazes me how shameful it is, in this country, and at this time of year, to be poor. It's really depressing too, seeing people spend SO much money on trivial stuff when others are struggling just to keep fed and housed and have heat and water and electricity. There's such a huge imbalance in this country and while I don't have any answers, I certainly see the inequity. I also see how easy it would be to get angry and to be jealous and for that to turn into a canker and get really poisonous. Fortunately, that's not my nature. On my better days, it's my nature to count my blessings. This is turning out to be one of those days, because due to wonderful friends and a lot of hard work, my recent desperation is looking to be done for now.

Here's a blessing: http://www.craftsy.com/classes?ext=thanksgiving2012
A very nifty site of teaching crafts so that the teachers get paid and people get to learn stuff. This is a form of education I really like. It's something I'd love to take part in, if I can figure out how. It's another one of those things that takes money and time that I just don't have right now because of scrambling so hard just to survive.

One last thing; this damned respiratory stuff is still hanging on. This has now been since before HALLOWEEN! The time I took off to try to get over it is now biting me in the arse 'cause I still feel ill but now HAVE to work and no time to go to a free clinic to get examined. I'm doing the cider and I think that's helping it not get worse but it's not kicking it. Some how mid-last week, the gunk re-attached itself to my nasal passages and throat. I'm SO ready to be done with this. I may try Elderberry since someone at TM rehearsal recommended it. And I need to get some Echinacea and Golden Seal but until this PayPal cleared, I couldn't even afford that.

Still, lots to feel thankful for. I have a wonderful relationship, if a bit strained right now to our mutual stress. I have two sweet kitties, both of whom slept with me last night; a small thing but something that adds lots of bliss to my nights. I had enough food for breakfast this morning and now, enough cash to get a few more groceries. Really, if I start with breakfast, I'm good for just one other meal in the day which is how things usually work for me. I have LOTS of work and now will just pray for lots of energy to get stuff completed QUICKLY.

And as always, I'm immensely grateful for my friends.

Yep, signed. And gonna spread (if you'll pardon the pun) as far as I can.

Originally posted by myrrhmade at Reproductive Rights

EDIT: I have removed the items that have sold to make it easier to view what remains. Thanks and please pass along the word that the sale is going on! AND THERE IS MORE COMING. I still have more jewelry to photograph and haven't even started on the costumes yet.

This is gonna be huge: my apologies up front here for the length of this post. I just couldn't think of a better way to do this or to keep track of it (with the accompanying spreadsheet so I can track sales, receipts and shipping. If someone has a better idea, please speak up. I also apologize for the quality of some of the images; they were the best I could do in a hurry yesterday. If someone wants to see the stuff in person, please PM me and we can make arrangements for local friends. (Edit: I've decided to do this in two posts as this is so huge, perhaps that will be more manageable. This is the first 18 of some 40 items. The two crowns are at the end. No real order to this but what I grabbed to photograph.)

Business details: Items listed here are by the photograph numbers. Payment can be cash, checks (if I know you well) or PayPal to this email: rowangolightly@gmail.com.
I must charge shipping for out of town sales and *will* insure them; the buyer's preference on shipping method but my default will be USPS. There will not be any added "handling charge" as padded envelopes are free from the Post Office. If I deliver the items to folk in town, I might need to add a fuel charge since gas is that expensive right now. And of course, I'll be happy to answer any questions about any item.

NOTE: Please (oh please!) put the item number and item in the body of the comment so I know which item you're looking at. Thanks.

Oh, and the pricing is negotiable; if you really love something, ask me and we'll discuss it. Best way I can think to do it is to comment with the number and title of the piece you wish to buy. I'll hold it for 24 hours awaiting payment. However, if multiple people want to purchase an item, I'll open bidding on that item within the comment line.

Pretty much everybody knows that I've performed at renfaires for 30+ years and have acquired lots of stuff during that time, too much jewelry, too many costumes and props, collected over the years. Not everybody knows that I have as great an addiction to jewelry as I do to fabric. This is really top-notch quality, tasteful stuff at really great prices; I've collected some gorgeous things and remember, it's not too early to do holiday shopping!

This is time-consuming stuff; I spent all of Friday afternoon and evening taking pics and editing them, then writing the descriptions and now most of Saturday evening adding the pics to this post. I really would like for this to pay off, trim my overage of stuff and for my friends to get lovely things in return.

( Read more... )

The amazing haikujaguar is doing a kickstarter campaign for her fabulous story "Rosary of Stones and Thornes" which I know I blogged about; simply an incredible story. For any of my thoughtful friends who enjoy non-traditional spiritual tales, this would be right up your alley. I highly recommend the story; I was waiting for each new crowd-sourced chapter with baited breath. It is both heart-breaking and gorgeous. She has such a gift for drawing characters.

And I'd love to see her able to produce the book and the art work for it. She's such an engaging and thought provoking writer, is M.C.A. Hogarth, but she's also an incredibly gifted artist as well.

So since I can't help out with the kickstarter campaign, I can help spread the news, which is exactly what I'm doing.

Here:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mcahogarth/a-rosary-of-stones-and-thorns-a-novel-of-love-and