Picture from here - via Moonstitches.

I seem to being used as a place/person to be nipped at today. And I don't much like it. Even looking at crochet isn't soothing my soul much. I'm going to take a walk now.

Been busy knitting and assembling the second baby blanket (increasing the needle size has improved productivity no end). Its off having a border put on. I also spent part of Tuesday evening painstakingly removing pieces of fabric from a quilt which I've had since I was a child to see if it could be remade into another quilt. It feels satisifying to be remaking and conserving stuff.

Eardley revisited

I wrote about visiting the exhibition with my friend R earlier in the year. I saw her last night and she said that she'd gone to a neighbours house to return a book (in Glasgow) and for some reason she asked if they had seen the exhibition. Not only had they seen the exhibtion but had lent two pictures for it. They are an elderly couple and it turns out that they had met the Sampson children now grown up at the opening and discovered that the painting they had was of one of the brothers who now lives in Australia. They have now been in correspondence with him (they sent a copy of the picture to him) and he's going to visit them when he next visits Glasgow.

What a great day yesterday. No really it was so nice catching up with two people I haven't seen for months or just briefly in the park.

After my dinner party last week I realised I was in a rut cooking wise. I bought a packet mix to make Indian Butter Chicken Makhani from the chinese supermarket. I made it last night for my friend S and it was delicious. After checking out google I realise I could easily make it from scratch if I bought a few more spices so I'll stock up on those.

A friend sent me this link in the Guardian about artists trying to balance work/money/creativity.

And my old boss is doing a poetry reading tonight in Edinburgh. If I'm not too tired from seeing the last Yiddish film at the Filmhouse today I'm going to try and make it along.

flaneur

Got excited this morning because the book I'd ordered while ill and bored came from Amazon but couldn't read it as off to chiropody and to deliver baby blanket and blue tragic teddy to Ivor-the-baby. After tea with Ivor's mum I made my way back into Edinburgh for a few errands picking up Lush shampoo, organic chicken for tonight and got waylaid into visiting card shops, stocking up on birthday cards, dead sea salts, and finding the new Plaisir du Chocolat shop in Rose St. Luckily it had a sign in the window 'closed until 3.15' so was saved from squandering money there in but I will be back once I've been paid.

cough cough

4th day off work and at home trying to get better. Its not working so far - I'm getting bored and frustrated being at home and frankly - lonely. I broke out yesterday to go to the library and the supermarket. The Michael Pollen book In Defense of Food I'd ordered had come in. Yay 60p to order and costs £16.95 new. Excellent read by the way I now want to buy a copy to press into the hands of friends. And I will start my organic box delivery again in May. I've been online far too much and every now and again phone up friends to annoy them. I thought I'd got over being alone and now realise of course thats just because normally I've very occupied and not alone ! Duh!

In the meanwhile cool links The Art of Nonconformity and Ghostschool.

A love note from Andrea Scher

off to make French toast

Master of your time?

At home today ill again hence much blogging

Practicing the art of Sustainability- Nina Wise

"How do we live on this planet in a way that is harmonious enough to sustain our species as well as the other beings that delight us, feed us, and allow us to breathe?

The answer may lie not only in the way we relate to each other, humans, animals and plants; not only in the way we relate to resources, renewable or unrenewable, but in how we relate to ourselves. What sustains our own being? What is it that enlivens us, brings us joy, enhances equanimity, wisdom, and our capacity to give and receive love?

Awareness is growing that our hunger for possessions, our lust to consume, arises in part, if not entirely, from a craving for well- being. Ironically, that craving is unsatisfied by even the most glamorous and expensive things. The hunger continues unabated. How do we satisfy this craving and find peace?

Sustainability of the species is deeply related to the soul of our being. My greatest pleasure emerges from spiritual practice, art (which involves dancing, singing, poetry and storytelling), being in wild nature, and a community of friends. It is in these experiences that I find the love that sustains me.

I suggest we practice the art of sustainability; of soul sustenance. Let's practice meditating and chanting together, and make the entire conference a work of art. We need to reclaim what we have lost in our deluded worship of the gods of fame, power, and materialism. We need to reclaim play, spontaneity, storytelling, poetry, song and dance. We need to reclaim an intimate relationship with nature as part of our daily lives. We need to reclaim the divine as an integral part of mundane existence, as the core of our being. We need to pay homage to the light of being, the radiance that animates all life."

Notes on Making Art

1. 
   Quality through quantity. Don't get hung up on making this one piece good -- make ten and one will certainly be pretty good.


2. 
   Do NOT mix generating and editing. When you're making a piece, don't stop and get judgmental half-way through. If it's a piece of crap, get that piece of crap out of your system -- don't try to fix it mid-flow. Finish it, move on.


3. 
   When to judge: After you've completed a piece, look at it and decide what direction you want to go in next. Or if you're selecting pieces for submission to a show, apply your critiquing mind then. Make a piece of art; look at it; make another.


4. 
   Don't be afraid to re-use elements. If each piece has to be unique, then you're going to get hung-up when you create some bit that you like. But if you can re-use bits, then you can keep moving.


5. 
   How to have "lots of ideas": permute. Start anywhere. Once a piece is done, try varying some aspect. Think of all the variables that could have permutations.


6. 
   "Get through your first 50 failures as fast as you can." I don't think that we should be shooting for a place where we no longer make crappy art. A good artist is one who's in motion making lots of art -- you only think they're so much better because they produce so much quantity that their pile of "good art" has also been able to accumulate. For every piece of crap you create, you're one step closer to getting something you really like.


7. 
   Don't even bother "fixing" pieces. Making art shouldn't be a struggle. You're simply "thinking out loud" onto the page, photo-paper, or canvas. If a product seems confused, leave it confused. Make another piece where you contemplate whatever issues you were wrestling with. Try something different. When clarity arrives, it will come in one living piece -- not be Frankensteined together out of a single infinitely re-worked, mangled corpse.


8. 
   Work fast. Creativity is exciting. If you're not judging while you're making, then you can just throw things together as fast as your mind can move. You're smart; if you don't like what you've made, you'll know immediately. You might not know what to do about the problem you perceive... Don't "think", standing there cogitating -- try things. If your hands are in motion, you can be generating new permutations. The one that you want to pick will come out on its own time.


9. 
   Let your level show. Let the world know that despite having years of investment in your art form, you're still a beginner who doesn't know it all. Rather than hide your thought process, let your questions be present in your work. You are a fundamentally more interesting artist if people get to see what it is that you're struggling with, rather than just your final answers. Show your work. Talk about what you still can't understand (unapologetically).


10. 
    Don't hide your failures. If you are only willing to show those perfect pieces that you are aspiring towards, you're never going to display / publish your work. Show everything, the worst of the crap included, and let your ego be humbled -- and goaded to create more.

From The Scarlet Letters

Ndeble wall paintings in South Africa. They use a lot of strong colour and bordered by black. Yesterday I picked up my baby blanket which was being finished off at my mothers and as I looked at it I thought it reminded me of something. Then I realised Ndebele wall decoration. The teddy is a 'tragic teddy' knitted by my mother which she as donated for the baby in question.

"Don't ask yourself what the world needs; ask yourself what makes you come alive and then go do that. Because the world needs people who come alive." -Harold Whitman (and also often attributed to Henry Miller).

from SelfTaughtGirl

Love that quote and it reminds me of what I need to prioritze in my life. A busy period is coming up in the next few months but important not to neglect my photography and ability to noodle across the city.

Last night I had 11 people over to dinner - I am the most unMartha like hostess. About half an hour before the first guests were to arrive I phoned up one and asked if she could come with chairs. But still I'd over filled my small flat and 3 people had to perch on the sofa in a small kind sub party in the corner. As I was dishing up I realised I was running out of plates - dashed to my understair cupboard and retrieved some more and washed them quickly.

Rather than being perfectly organised I pray that people arrive late as I hurridly sweap floors shove wool into bags attempt to banish signs of life. Mean while the orange double tulips I bought from the supermarket open extravagantly. Then I give up light candles turn off the lights and hope that the slight disarray will engender a cameraderie that a more polished do with chase away.

There is always a point when I wish I'd never got myself into this situation. Why oh why did it seem such a good idea when I clicked on the email addresses and sent out invitations so gaily two weeks ago. And why didn't I start preparing right then and there? STOP ! This is the worst worst repose to life the 'I should have done it right done it better been more organised more x'. The more I relax into what I am rather than what I feel others think I ought to be the easier it is. AND I have more energy - the leakage towards the other way of living is just too much.

Imperfection
I am falling in love
with my imperfections
The way I never get the sink really clean,
forget to check my oil,
lose my car in parking lots,
miss appointments I have written down,
am just a little late.
I am learning to love
the small bumps on my face
the big bump of my nose,
my hairless scalp,
chipped nail polish,
toes that overlap.
Learning to love
the open-ended mysteryof not knowing why
I am learning to fail
to make lists,
use my time wisely,
read the books I should.
Instead I practice inconsistency,
irrationality, forgetfulness.
Probably I should
hang my clothes neatly in the closet
all the shirts together, then the pants,s
end Christmas cards, or better yet
a letter telling ofmy perfect family
But I’d rather waste time
listening to the rain,
or lying underneath my cat
learning to purr.
-by Elizabeth Carlson

There is this fantastic poem over at 37 days which I'm nicking in its entirety

Polaroid Alert!

TopMan in Edinburgh's Princes St is using them as part of a window display. I noticed it today while on the bus coming home.

postcard polaroids

here

great interview with Ianthe Brautigan

on writing memoir.

Tom McGuane had this great thing he told me. We were talking on the phone, and we don't talk often but I was in the middle of the process, and he said, "What are you doing?" And I said, "Well I'm writing a memoir" -- I knew he would disapprove because those guys, they have their own code of things.

CV: He was a friend of your father's?

IB: Yes, he was a friend, along with Jim Harrison. And I knew he'd -- not disapprove of me writing a memoir in particular, but you know, they're fiction guys, they write fiction.

And he said, "Well, whatever you're writing has you by the back of the neck. And you just kinda have to go with it." It is what it is. You have to accept what it is. And that's the roughest part about memoir writing -- or any kind of writing, I think. I love Toni Morrison; I think she's incredible. I will never write like her in a million years. It's just not going to happen. I have a very distinct style. And it's not that. [laughter] So it's accepting your writing. If you're writing a memoir, accepting that this is what it is.
And then you have to find a structure for it.... I read a million memoirs. And I would find somebody and go, "Oh, OK, you can do this; this is a structure that will work."

Eucalypt Sydney

Not well today so in bed listening to radio. Its a lovely day so a shame to miss. Tea and then venture out to supermarket I think.

Oh lovely things on the internet. Plant Amnesty who are campaigning against the torture of trees and shrubs - Seattle based but desperately needed in the UK. Kaffe Fassett who is doing a knitting workshop in Libertys ! And finally but most funnily Photoshop Disasters

Creative people should have hobbies

My Yiddish class convened in Glasgow last night to put on an entertainment in song, dramatic playlet and instrument for a group of elderly Glaswegian Jews. Luckily the class I'm in is full of talented singers, bagpipe players etc so we were able to put on a passable entertainment. I am officially the worst speaker in the class so I was in charge of surtitles on cards for the dramatic bit.

We got the 10.30 train back to Edinburgh. After all the excitement last night I'm exhausted but gathering my strength to go to work.

Anyway my rambling point is many things in my life I have to do well, photography, teaching, filmmaking. Its nice to have something in ones life that is just fun. It adds to life a rounded dimension which is not all about being good it, achieving and excelling.

Pic from here

After my moan last night to L I've got on the phone this morning to find out who is responsible for ordering the digging up of all the cherry blossom trees from Nicholson Square. It sounds silly but the cherry blossom there is one of the things that makes me feel we'll make it though the winter and out the otherside. I'm not going to take things lying down anymore.

the real toy story

from Treehugger

After many months I managed to meet my friend L at Sophies bar for the pub knitting. The endless toil of baby blanket for me and a hat for her and plunged into the ills of the world. (Edinburgh is being destroyed by a crazed council hell bent on removing all the trees, foisting a 7 year plan for trams, selling off prime real estate for a pittance - ME. HER equalities down the pan in Scotland and getting worse as fast as the statistics can be compiled). However we were the only knitters .... quelle pub knitters?

Small spark of hope on the horizon - one baby blanket down 2 to go. The first one is at the outsourced finishing collective ie mother for a crochet border. The original blanket which was made for The Cutest Neice Ever (TM) was being used this weekend to turn her into a Blanket Monster. Blanket covering small child instantly turns said child into a Blanket Monster...

Tomorrow I go to Glasgow. I think I'll splash out on more film.

Picture from Carol Hummer