Happy Winter Solstice!

Get out your candles and holly boughs, it's the winter solstice! Instead of knocking back eggnogs and celebrating the death/rebirth of the year, I'm going to be at work, scurrying through stockroom mazes and barely tolerating the body aches that accompany a 10 hour shift. 


In three days though, I'll be back in NB. Three days.

Library

A list of some of the movies I've seen in the past month and change:


Capote
Milk
La Vie En Rose
the Darjeeling Limited
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Bright Star
Run Silent, Run Deep
The Russian Ark (fell asleep halfway through. Must re-watch)
The Life of Birds, narrated by the fabulous David Attenborough
The Wire, season 2 
and Golden Girls, season 1.


I really like movies. I don't much like sitting still for an hour or two at a time, but the movies (and TV shows) I've seen captivated and inspired me in a variety of ways. Five of the movies on the list brought me to tears, and I'm not a sob-in-the-theatre kind of woman. 




To balance that screen-staring, I read a great deal. Everything from Egyptian mythology to surveys of modern Pagan witchcraft to stories about Newfoundland, and yoga manuals. I need a good dose of fiction next, and thankfully the Central library here has a fantastic selection of everything. Browsing through those tidy shelves, finding gems, and chatting with the librarians is well worth the risk of being harassed by one of the free-internet using creeps that hangs out near the CD racks... 

What Have I Been Doing?

My nail is ugly but healed, and I should have been writing by now. A lot has changed and a lot hasn't changed around here. Moods fluctuate, the temperature has been mild, and the holidays are right around the corner. Let's make a nice tidy list to make sure nothing gets left out:


1. It's been difficult to get to the studio, what with my precarious financial situation requiring more hours at the shoe shop than at the workbench. I'm okay with how that's worked. It's not ideal (really, winning the lotto or marrying rich would be ideal), but it's temporary and I can handle temporary. 


2. What have I been making? Not a whole lot, to be honest. I've prepared the loom for weaving after Christmas, dyed a few skeins of yarn, and began working on a present for my grandparents. I've started drawing again. I've made mind maps. Overall, December has not been a productive month for me. 


Which leads me to a redefinition of the word "productive". I feel guilty when I don't put in enough studio hours, when I spend more evenings watching movies or reading than making tangible things, when I work on little things instead of the Big Important Objects. People like to see Big Important Objects, and I do too. The problem with being obsessed with making Large Things, or expending large amounts of energy on one thing, is that when I shift gears and spend more time and energy on the smaller projects and inspiration-gathering, it becomes more difficult to measure what it is you're doing. 


I've got a week in Burlington before heading home for the holidays. A 34 hour work week, a visit-friends-in-the-city week, a pack/clean/write/mail/eat week. I'm going to spend time this week making goals for the next year. Here's how they're shaping up:


1. Love more: Accept the natural creative highs and lows of artlife, worry less about being in a town that doesn't suit me, learn about heritage, cultivate a strong voice. 


2. Wear silk undergarments, or pretend all my undergarments are silk.


3. My life, at times, is a lot like a Wes Anderson movie. Run with it. 


4. Land at least 3 exhibitions this year. 






These Resolutions are still in progress, but I like them. I like heading home for the holidays even more though. SEVEN DAYS! SEVEN!