Procrastination

Just for a minute or two. I have so, so many things to do that I just can't get started. They're demanding things today: a new logo design for the OCF, more or less visualized but not on paper, and several pieces of art for several customers who all ordered on Thursday and Friday. I put way too many items on my credit card for post-Fair payment. So much riding on three days in mid-July.

I committed to buy a huge pile of locally-made tote bags of an untested design that I have a lot of faith in, and that I need a couple of weeks ago to be efficient about their decoration. I hope they sew like crazy next week down at T&J. I'm really over-excited about having locally made goods. Most of the bags I sell are made in China out of relatively cheap fabrics, and you know what their labor picture looks like. Probably the largest portion of the cost is the freight. Of course the local ones will most likely have to use imported canvas since textile production has not come back to the southeast just yet, but it is definitely a great improvement to get the bags made here. The quality is terrific.

Between T&J Designs in Springfield and Silver Linings Productions down on 4th and Lincoln, we now have two textile production factories in our area, so the next thing we need is to have a big organization to commission a hefty order of t-shirts for the 2015 event. It seems so close, just within our reach to walk our talk down to the tags. How cool would it feel to have your staff shirt say Made in Eugene/Springfield for the Oregon Country Fair?

I would love it. We could get organic fabric and make it any colors we want, now that we have run out of the good useable colors in the Royal line. Using local printers has been a huge success and has saved the Fair some money, so the next step is sourcing the garments here. An excellent goal.

I also bought 48 purple hats. Eugene is probably the only place where you can sell that many purple hats and mine continue to sell out. *Queen Bee* on purple is apparently irresistible. I drew some little bees and have been adding them to the bee series: I now have Worker Bee, Queen Bee and Beekeeper. Getting on the bandwagon, because who doesn't love bees?

The duplex next to me went this week from a jungle of about ten years of neglect to a sterile wasteland of dirt and "beauty bark." The previous renters had lost control of it though I still tried to corral the blackberries and maintain a bit of garden on that side of my house, expanding my raspberries and blackcaps to fill space. I'm way over my property line into an easement that lies between us, and when the renters left I dug up a few things left by previous renters. I knew Stacy and Rita would have wanted me to save the hydrangea and the grape vine and I wish I had gotten over my moral qualms and stolen more of the plants, as the workers were apparently instructed to cut every living thing to the ground. They killed a lilac but left weeds, took some artichokes I could have eaten and wiped out lilies and other bulbs I could have dug if I knew where they were. They'll be covered with fabric and bark and are probably already dead. I'd been watering, and probably still will water what is left. I relocated many of the rocks which were going to be taken to the dump. It's hard to watch this type of management in a neighborhood of gardeners, but perhaps they will be able to make the yard cute enough to attract some new gardening tenants or owners.

The loss of habitat is frightening. There had to be birds nesting in those thickets, and I hope they had all fledged. I won't really miss the blackberries, as I've been trying to get rid of them for more than 25 years now. They had a fine crop of bindweed too. We lost privacy, and the neighborhood lost the little children who added so much life to our street. I keep finding their little cars and toy fragments in the dirt.

All we can do is look forward. Of course we all are talking about buying the property, but though they will make it look cute, it has some problems still to fix. Some, like the siding which will not hold paint, are only temporarily fixable. It won't be a good deal. I can't recommend it to anyone I know, though I would love to be in touch with the owners for a change. But it will be fine.

And I don't have time to think much about it. The workers were all good people and they gave me countless things they didn't want to take to the dump and they didn't eat my berries the way those cute kids did. I'm sitting in a really nice chair saved from the basement. I got new stepping stones in all of my messy-looking gardens, and maybe I won't be living next to the worst house on the block now. All will be well, as I constantly have to remind myself this month. It will all get done.

I'm not going to go find any photos for you though. I have to get with my day-off program and get to work. I'll get a day off in August. It will be epic. I'll be rich. I'll probably be fully stocked for Holiday Market at the rate I'm going this month; over-production is my tendency and it kind of makes sense, and allows me to take it easier in the post-Fair season, when I need to paint the south side and put a roof on the shop. I'll get to do that kind of thing then.

Besides it's cold and cloudy. I had to wear a jacket all day yesterday. Summer doesn't really start to be full-on until the fifth of July, after it rains on the 4th. Even though we know that, we still complain. Ahh, Eugene.

By the way, no one is buying Curmudgeonland City Council, a hat I thought was brilliantly funny. I think that may be because people are thinking I am talking about our City Council, which I assuredly am not. Our City Council has a curmudgeon or two, but usually I am pretty pleased with the level of dedication and caring in our city leaders. It's supposed to be a comment on the level of self-importance in some difficult people I guess, the way they feel they should be in charge of something, or everything. Some random man suggested the idea, and if he shows up I will give him his free hat, but it wasn't meant to be a political statement. So you can buy one. Maybe someone will.

I think Eugene might just be too full of nice people. Guess I can live with that. In our discussions by the fountain yesterday we reflected on how OCF was all about people taking care of each other, as opposed to Burningman, for instance, which is about radical self-sufficiency. Slightly different tribes who can learn from each other. I'll reflect more on that as I draw my peach today. One of my biggest concerns is whether or not I will be able to finish Donna Tartt's The Goldfinch before it is due back at the library. You see how I am. Today's big reward will be reading until I fall asleep, which will probably involve one page. Maybe two. Read a novel for me this week.

Working it Through

OK, I give up. Feeling so much irrationality I've been trying to stay quiet, but the writing helps with grounding me, so here I am. Way too many things to write about, and the idea is not to increase the anxiety but to lay it to rest.

I was in the running for Mayor of Curmudgeonland yesterday. Had a low sales day, right when everything in my life seems to be about money and how to make it work for me so I can get my goals aligned. It was humbling to remember how it feels; one of my friends even had a zero day going until I gave him a pity sale. I was thinking about buying one of his wonderful items but was trying not to spend anything...but no one deserves a zero day. I love what I chose and am so glad I bought it.

Went to the farmers to get some cherries to make me feel better: sold out. No fruit to be had over there after two yesterday. Drat my holding-onto-my-money impulses. Went to Dana's for my fave, German Chocolate: sold out. Got plain pound cake but had a plan.

Probably over 500 pounds on my bike cart

Hauled my excessive tonnage of handmade glory home, them forced my poor aching foot into the evening garden for my first crop of black raspberries for the season, managed to rummage up an entire pint of strawberries that the jays had missed, cut open the mango I feared rotten, which was still good, and still had a bit of goat ice cream in the freezer, which is not as hard on my dairy allergy as the cow version.
Had to sit down with an icepack on my foot to hull the strawberries, but put in a movie and had the most sublime dessert. Cried at the movie, enjoyed the fading of the stressful, windy day, and now it is a new one with all new potential.

I do love how balanced my load is

It was quite a week. Went to the historic meeting of the City Council and County Commission to support the farmers' plan for downtown expansion. It's the best idea they've had and I'm definitely in favor of the concept of leveling the butterfly and spreading out the farmers. I wanted to see the politicians in action and put names to faces and there was a lot of lettuce to think about afterwards. The development community was there to keep control, the bogus "Market district" trying to keep a finger on whatever the plan might be. I'm no longer optimistic, but fortunately that big meal isn't really on my plate. My farm job is just to bring the tote bags downtown and be supportive to the farmers that feed me. I'm quite happy to be out of the loop on the bigger issues.

I'm sure I'll have more to say about how a for-profit business run by millionaires gets so much city support when a non-profit incubator that keeps hundreds of poor artists alive has to struggle to keep our boat afloat, but that would certainly fill the page and up the anxiety level. Another day. I could also talk a lot about the big Mall of the Woods in which I hope to make my fortune next month and all the ins and outs of that, but those issues are also set aside while I work my skinny arms to the bone for awhile. This is supposed to be my day off, such as I have this time of year.

I did get all into my "nobody loves me" deprivation issues yesterday as I watched everybody else's shirts walk by and all those people with too much to carry who didn't want to spend even $5 on my offerings of affordable, durable and beautiful bags. It's always surprising how close to the surface those childhood issues are for me. It's mostly the overwork that brings up so many fears. I can't make my body do what I need it to do, increasingly. My foot hurt almost all day long. My back and left side are really a mess. I still have weeks of too much to lift and do and not enough time to recover. I remember how this goes when I stay in the patterns that don't work. The end result is surgical and I'm determined to change that.

How do I balance it all? Had a good exchange about people-pleasing with a customer who couldn't find a satisfactory hat, even though I brought the fourth tub with the smaller and larger hats. My neighbors Raven and Tim are always helpful with the universal messages and advice on how to counteract the errant thoughts. Focus on what is good, stay in the moment, be happy for others the way you would like them to be happy for you. Every day cannot be my day. I do so well most weeks, I think of myself as *above average,* which can be a trap. Selling is most certainly much more fun than not selling. I got into control issues, calling the crew to clean up some unfortunate vomit (lots of people on crutches from too much summer, one who couldn't manage her medications, and then there was the drunk with the shopping cart...) I had too many awkward conversations and was too focused on what everyone else was up to. It's better if you just keep handing me money, folks, keeps me out of trouble. Also alive.

Yet the day before, I scored a maple table and set of chairs from my neighbor's basement, a better set of furniture than I have ever owned. I can actually send some of the things I have to the dump and upgrade, getting furniture way more valuable than anything I would have bought. Isn't that abundance? Don't I have a wonderful garden and a fantastic place to live, and a lifestyle I can support rather easily for an oldish lady?
In a few hours I went from happy as can be to feeling like a failure. Am I really that fragile?

No, of course I am not. This is the anxious time of year, when I have to take risks that do have a high probability of paying off. I get irrational but have the self-awareness now to recognize the emotional states and know how to ease them. I rarely can be pushed all the way off my center, and I'm not there yet at all. Just feeling the potential.

Table and chairs

Turn around. Feel the other things, the softness of the summer, see the glorious colors, watch the blue jays as they carefully bite tiny pieces off the cherries, right through the nets, until they can pull the rest out and gobble them up. (Note to self: it is not worth it to net the cherry tree for seven cherries, no matter how delicious they were.)




I have to get my solitude today before I immerse in another week. I have to rest my body and not try to move that tabletop and do a profit and loss and balance sheet and assure myself that the plan is a good one. I have to get my wonderful peach design finished and print my exceptional bags and be ready to succeed. I can do all these things and more. I can stop trying to put obstacles in my own way and just keep my nose to the grindstone, smelling the wonderful aroma of good meal as it comes from between those millstones. Don't scorch it by trying to grind too fast! My blueberry design seems to be a dud, because I went too fast to get it done to have the bags ready for no one to notice. That's the stuff I want to prevent.

Everything is going to be all right. As I biked home on Broadway I started singing the Pharrel Williams song, echoing the flash mob I saw on Facebook, which took place Friday in front of the Red Wagon Creamery. I AM happy like there is no roof. I live in a wonderful town. I love and am loved. I am a good hard worker who can roll with whatever happens. I can take calculated risks and succeed or roll with whatever happens after that. It will all work out, and I'll keep learning, keep trying, and keep having my good days. Next week will always be amazing.


So there we are, I'm now ready for my "day off" such as it is in June. I already have another crop of black raspberries and Tuesday there will be more cherries. I saved a piece of pound cake for today. Kim made *Curmudgeon City Council* the Find of the Day, so the potential is definitely there. I'm ready for Tuesday because when you don't sell much you don't have to make more. There are actually some good amounts in the Accounts Receivable column.

Back view

Best part is how well it turns around in the space for easy unload.

Hope you are all having a fabulous weekend. I think it's time to move the stationary bike out to the deck so I can finish my novel (Sarah Canary by Karen Joy Fowler) while I ride. I'll dust off my new chairs and put a free sign on something else. I'll talk to my mom when we have our usual Sunday call. Be well!