Firefly1234’s Neighborhood

Normally about right now I'd be stressing out in a major way.  I love the holiday season, but just cannot deal with the stress and chaos of it all.  December traditionaly makes me want to hide; it wears on me until I'm prone to tears and tantrums at every little thing.  This year though?  Don't care.

A week in Ireland alone with my BFF and soulmate over Thanksgiving has completely reset my perspective on things this year.  I wouldn't say I don't care about anything, but so very much of it all really isn't important.  My yard looks like a muddy war zone.  Don't care.  I've only barely put up any of my holiday decorations.  Don't care.  The outdoor lights we did put up before we left, were a mess up front and not working at all out back when we came home.  Don't care.  Almost all of our many strands of indoor lights are completely non-functional in a werid coincidence.  Don't care.  I've only just started shopping for gifts, and though I know what I want to give people, I haven't actually got anything yet, nor have I started making the gifts I want to make.  Not worried.  We may or may not get cards in the mail this year -though I don't even have any picked out (or made) yet.  Don't care.  Our schedule for the month is cram-packed and already there are double-bookings.  Whatever.

It's just not bothering me.  Vacation is always good.  Vacation in Ireland with my sweetie seems to have been the perfect medicine for my holiday nerves.  Bloody brilliant.  I expect these holidays will be so very far from fancy, organized or even pretty, but given the difference from my unusual December state of mind, I'm also figuring they'll be the most pleasant I've had since I was a kid and had nothing more to worry about than being good for Santa.

I think maybe I'll hang another garland and a wreath or two today.  Maybe do some online shopping.  ...Then again, *shrug* maybe not.  Definitely need to make a latte to sip while I get some work done though.  It is the holiday season after all!  :)

I haven't been getting solid, regular sleep for weeks now and I get kind of pinched and cranky, which makes me prone to bouts of madness, ...more so than usual.  I have imaginary arguments with voices in my head, and the imaginary snowballs and spills out into the real world.

I'm not going to delete the post in question because there is some genuine frustration and honesty in it, but at the same time, I've chilled out a bit and realized how stupid and self-centered it is to bitch about people wanting to make me happy.

I'd prefer my holidays to be easy and meaningful, but it's occurred to me that plenty of people must love the chaos and consumerism too. So, if anyone is wondering what they can do to make my holidays happy, I'd ask for simplicity and some quality time.  For those of you that love the holidays large and loud, I hope you get just that, and if I can find a way to contribute to the chaos, I would make the effort just to bring you a little holiday joy.  ;)

Every year a few people ask me that question, and every year it catches me completely off guard.

I'm almost 40. I left home and started supporting myself about 20 years ago, half my life now.  When there's something I want, I budget for it and buy it for myself.  Why would I ask other people to buy me stuff at this point in life?

Still, I'm always asked.  You'd think I'd know to have an answer prepared by now.  It just seems so damn weird to me.  I'm flummoxed.

So, I'm thinking now.  What do I want?

I want:

• A lovely little home on the west coast of Ireland with a view of the Atlantic
• Enough money that I not only never have to work or want for anything ever again, but also enough to insure the same for my loved ones, with plenty left over for my favorite causes
  

I guess I could stretch my mind a little and delve into the highly unlikely:

• World peace
• A rocket ship with warp drive so I can tour the universe
• A safe, functional teleporter for more mundane travel needs
  
• A polar bear I can ride around town to do my errands.

Besides, shouldn't gifting be a from-the-heart thing???  I don't want people to do my shopping for me.  If they come across something they want to gift to me, then that's really thoughtful and appreciated.  If they don't, I'm absolutely fine with that and certainly not keeping score.  Uhg.  I really hate how complicated people make holiday gifting.  Talk about taking the fun and meaning out of it!

How about a realistic answer, just for the people who really want to give me something they know I'll like?

• Consumables - wine, cheese, chocolates, candles, stationery, soap, ... LOVE these things!  Doesn't even have to be difficult or expensive.  Buy me a loaf of delicious bread from your favorite bakery, or some jam you've had that's so good it makes your eyes roll back.  Those things would be excellent gifts!
• Make me something.  I LOVE homemade gifts!  Bake me cookies, make an ornament for my tree, draw me a picture, have your kids draw me a picture  -or hell, print out a nice photo you've taken!  String some beads.  Hey, just jot down your favorite recipe for me!  All absolutely lovely gifts!
• If you don't want to make me something, buy me something lovely that someone else has made.  Support independent artists and entreprenuers.  I love that!
• Make a donation to a good wild-life/conservation organization in my name.  How about a local soup kitchen?  An art scholarship fund?
  
• Seen something pretty that made you think, "Jen would love that!"?  I very likely would.  Shiny things, pretty fabric/scarves, gorgeous yarn, pretty paper, ...

A lovely little home on the west coast of Ireland with a view of the Atlantic, please.

Vacation pictures need to be sorted and memories still need to be jotted down, so instead of the beautiful landscape of Ireland, I present you this morning with my yard:

Some good stuff went down this week.  I took my mom out shopping for her 60th BDay.  I wanted to treat her to some pretty clothes and a decadent lunch.  She seemed to have a really good time.  I know I did.  :) 

I cheated though and bought something for myself.  I grabbed a few things that caught my eye so I could try them on and get Mom trying stuff on too, which she seemed hesitant to do.  One of the things I picked up was a gorgeous, grey-blue, long velvet jacket.  I put it on for shits and giggles, looked in the mirror and thought, "WOW!  WANT!!!"  I tried to be rational and thrifty and talk myself out of it, but it had to come home with me.  It fit like a glove, even over my curves, and the color looks great with my red hair!  It was obviously made for me.

I also picked up the glass bowl we saw made at the hot shop demonstration on Monday, and it's even prettier than I'd imagined!  I have it on the diningroom table now, and I have to stop and fondle it every time I walk through the room.  I'll get pictures of it eventually, if not today then when we get back.

I also got my hair cut this week, and I'm loving it!  It's still below shoulder length, but quite a bit shorter than it was.  I have a little bit of bangs now though, which means I haven't had to clip my hair back to keep it out of my eyes at all since getting it cut!  Fabulous!  It has more layers in it too, so I get a nice bit of volume and texture from my natural waves just letting it air dry, which I love!  I'd get pictures, but I hate primping for the camera.  There will be vacation pictures galore this week, and I'm sure I'll be in some of them.  :)

So it's been a very good week.  I expect next week will be even better, by far!  :)  No complaints here!

This is the calmest I've ever been before even a day of fun, let alone a week's vacation and travel.  I don't know why I'm not having any stress or anxiety, it's not at all like me, but I'm not about to stress over the lack of stress either!

I am feeling some guilt over leaving Mia.  I wish she'd focus during her english lessons and learn human language already so I could clearly explain to her that we're not giving her away to strangers and abandoning her, that we want her to have fun exploring a new place for a week, but we can't wait to bring her back home.  I miss her when I'm away for a few hours, a week is going to be tough!

I looked out the window this morning and the side yard is filled with little green flags marking the current sewer and water main lines, so that's progress on the plumbing front already.  I just need to drop off a house key for them before we leave.

I have a good idea what I need to pack, and it's going to be very light.  Clothes will be casual and allowing for layers.  I'm going to wear my hiking boots, and that's all the shoe I'll be taking.  I wasn't going to take any electronics other than the camera, but now I'm thinking I'll take my mp3 player and my Kindle (for the plane).  Aside from that, I'm just going to pack a sketchbook, a pen and some drawing pencils.  I'm not even planning on packing much in the way of toiletries, since I'll just hit up a store in Dublin when we get there to get some shampoo and soap and such.  Packing will be so easy.

I have a few phone calls to make today, a couple errands to run, a little laundry, some light chores...  then it's just time to pack.  Now worries at all.  ...Which is weird, but also lovely.

What a fabulous afternoon!

We went to the museum and I headed straight for the Chihuly exhibit.  It was a decent size exhibit, all stuff from the museum's own collection, but most of which I hadn't seen on display before.  He really is great with color and form.  There were some gorgeous pieces, many of which had me wondering how they were made.

As we were leaving the exhibit, we walked past the hot shop and saw there'd be a demo in fifteen minutes.  I've seen a couple demos there before but I still really wanted to see another.  :)  We went into the cafe to have a quick bit of refreshment, and just before the demo was supposed to start, I noticed the studio was near full.  Glass walls, you see.  (Pun intended.)  We chugged what was left of our orange juice and snuck into a couple of seats in the back row of the studio.

It was a great demo, a one woman show, which is kind of unusual.  She did a great job though, managing all of the pipes and punties all by herself while explaining a ton about glass and the blowing process.  It ran almost an hour, and in that time she demonstrated some basic techniques as well as optic molds and thermal shocking for that crackled effect.  By the end of the demo, she'd made a gorgeous 10" diameter amber, footed glass bowl with a scalloped edge.  She'd used a special glass that gets an irredescant finish when it's flame-treated at the end of the process.  I have some of that glass, but I haven't yet figured out how to work it in my torch flame to bring the metals to the surface.  Craig very patiently waited while I hung around after the demo to ask a few questions, and I got dibs on the bowl she made!  Assuming it survives the annealing kiln, it's reserved for me, and they only charge $50-60 for the bowls made during demos!  (Procedes to benefit the museum, of course.)  That's 1/3 to 1/6 what you'd pay for a similar piece sold by the artist!  I can't wait to go pick it up!  It'll be ready Tuesday.

After the glass pavillion, we went back to the main building.  We took a quick look through the gift shop, which is a fabulous gallery filled with beautiful, original art pieces, lots of which is glass work!  Then we attempted to check out the LitGraphic exhibit, but I was too wound up with too much glass on the brain.  I couldn't focus on the graphic art at all, so I asked Craig if we could bail and come back to this exhibit another day when I could give it my full attention.

So we were only at the museum for a couple of hours, but it was an absolutely fabulous couple of hours, and it left me totally recharged, wound up, and filled with inspiration.

We did a little shopping while we were out, getting some rain pants to pack for Ireland so we won't get soaked if it starts to rain while we're out tromping through bogs and looking at ruins.  :)  We each got a few lightweight shirts to pack for the trip too, so we're pretty much ready to go now!  ...This is going to be a long week.  :D

*And* on top of the awesome time at the museum and the great shopping-fu, we also had a late lunch at Panera.  They've brought back their mac&cheese!!!  I had a small cup of that sinful yum with one of their fuji apple salads, which are so delicious.

It was a great day out, but it wore me out completely.  I'm going to spend the rest of the day just chilling and waiting for bedtime, I think.

*L*  I just noticed that the "Chihuly Toledo!" exhibit has been extended through February 3rd since the last time I'd checked the dates.  We're still going today though.  I have my heart set on a trip to the museum now.  :)

The challenges of the past few weeks are now history.  Mia has a reservation for boarding, we're ready for our trip to Ireland, work is caught up for the first time since I took that job years ago, our sewer and water main will be replaced while we're away, and my sister and I managed to actually surprise my mom with a 60th birthday party at my house last night.  Challenges are behind me, vacation is just ahead, and my house is squeaky clean.  Today I finally feel like myself for the first time in many months.  I can breathe ...and just sit, without guilt or anxiety or anything hanging over my head.

We're going to go to my house of worship today, the museum!  There are four totally awesome exhibits there right now that I've been really wanting to see, but something has always seemed more pressing.  By the time we get back from Ireland, the "Chihuly Toledo!" exhibit will have ended.  As a glass artist, I -will not- miss this exhibit, so that's really the only thing on my plan for the day so far.  We may or may not check out the other exhibits too.  They're all free (love our museum!!!), but the other three will also be running for a bit longer, so we'll have time to catch them on future visits.

The party last night was a smashing success.  My mom was genuinely surprised.  :)  My sister made a gorgeous and -delicious- cake.  It had Baileys in it, lots of chocolate flowers and tons of buttercream frosting....unf.  Everyone had a good time.  Craig talked radio with the uncles.  The kids were totally enchanted with the bunny, who, surprisingly, didn't seem to mind them too much.  Uncle Mats thought our potrack was brilliant (thanks, Deb & Brian!) and since we still had the other one from the set in the garage, we we able to send them home with one.  Everyone talked and talked and laughed and laughed.  Good times.

I don't believe in regrets.  I'm so very happy with my life as it is now, with all the experiences I've had and all the fabulous people I'm privileged to have known.  Every once in a while I do let a "what if" wander through my brain though.  There's only really one I'm at all interested in, and sometimes I just wonder how things might be different if I'd made a different choice.

The biggest "what if" in my life to date is, "What if I'd studied art instead of engineering?"  I honestly don't remember why I made the choice I did.  I remember my elders and mentors praising me for even considering engineering, telling me it would provide a secure future.  I know science has always excited me, and I remember being eager to learn the answers to a whole bunch of why/how questions in my studies.  But I don't remember what that extra bit of motivation was that made me choose the difficult and exciting road of science over my passion, the one thing I was always thoroughly content doing, art. 

I don't regret my choice, even though I hated most of my classes, quickly realized I did NOT want to work as an engineer EVER, and quit just shy of qualifying for graduation when the money and my stamina ran out.  That path lead me to some of the happiest memories and opportunities of my life, and even some extremely difficult moments that are still precious to me for their lessons.  It was a most excellent adventure.

But, ...what if?  What if I had chosen what I knew, what I felt was me to my core?  It seemed like the easy path then because I knew I loved art with every fiber of my being.  Did I pass it over because it seemed too easy?  Would it have been fulfilling and natural to me?  Surely there would've been just as many challenges down this road.  That's just how life works, right?  I just couldn't see them around the corners.  I didn't get that cliff-diving adrenaline rush thinking about doing what I know and love.  I was probably craving the excitement of the unknown over comfortable familiarity.  But what would life have been like down that path?  I honestly wonder.

Yesterday, while cleaning out an old box of memories I haven't touched in ten years or more, I found a letter from an art professor at the university I attended.  I would've been a junior in high school when I got this.  The important part reads:

Congratulations on the acceptance of your art work in the 31st Downtown Art Exhibition.

I would be happy to meet with you and show you around the studios of the University Art Department at the Museum.  [contact info]

Once again, congratulations on your success.

I don't remember this letter at all.  It was already haunting my dreams last night though, just hours after finding it.  I can't imagine that it wouldn't have made my heart skip a beat with excitement, that it didn't make me second guess the whole engineering thing.  It chokes me up a little now.  It's always been a dream of mine to make my living by making art, even when I was being romanced by science and engineering.  Why didn't I at least go take a look?  ...I probably didn't have any faith in my own work.  I can kind of remember thinking there was no way I was talented enough to follow that path.  Engineering must've seemed so much more promising.  Heh.  I've never worked as an engineer though, and I'm still pining for an artist's life.  Live and learn.

Well, the beautiful thing about life is that it's never too late to chase your dreams.  University was a grand adventure, and engineering really was a delightful bitch of a challenge.  I learned so much, and made such good friends and priceless memories.  Maybe everyone has to spend some time in life doing something you don't want to do, and I was lucky to get that out of the way early and move on.  Now I just need to keep doing my best to forge a new path between the road I took and the one I could have taken.  I will get there somehow, dragging everything I found on that first road with me.