Handmade Matters

I bought a new fork yesterday, with a groovy 20% off coupon, and having lived without one for an entire season, I am thrilled to have it. It was made in India, "to S&J's exacting standards" and I felt bad about that, but you just can't find handmade tools every day. The hay fork on the left in this photo cost almost the same when I got it a couple of years ago. It is so handmade it thrills me and I keep it in my kitchen so I can look at it often.

It was made by Virgil Courtright, esteemed local craftsman, and is a marvel of the traditional. It has a number (I got #4) and was made from the white oak that used to be in Daniel's booth, the Daniel who was rumored to have a pit in his booth where he hid his un-wristbanded friends. So legends go at the Fair. It is, if you didn't notice, made from one piece of wood, one branch. You won't find this type of tool just anywhere. Not even at Down to Earth. I got it at the Tuesday Market, where Virgil sold for a short time before he retired from selling. I did not take a lot of time to deliberate that purchase. It was one of those things that I knew I would not see again. It is, along with my handmade CAT trailer, one of my most treasured possessions.

Handmade traditional crafts with the person's fingerprints on them, with a story, with a history, those are the things I want. I like the specific use of the hay fork. You don't stick it in the ground. I use it mostly to move leaf piles around. I'd love to have more tools like it, but traditional handmade crafts like this are increasingly rare. That is why we are called right now to fight so hard for the places we can sell these painstakingly made and finished items: Saturday Market and the Oregon Country Fair. Things are changing, and it isn't just about 3-D printers and that new pen that draws in three dimensions...it's a big issue of economics and labor.

Lots of craftspeople find themselves unable to keep up with the demand for their amazing products, and they have to make a choice: sell what they can make, but still keep making it all, or hire out some of the work. As soon as they hire out, they quickly arrive at the tempting point when they become a manager and no longer make their work. It beckons, "the next level," and all the good business advice would tell them to take that step. One thing people rarely do is just quit retailing at the hand-crafted marketplace when they are making this transition.

They have a lot of rationalizations they use as they move further and further from the guidelines. I've been there. They need the money, they find a loophole in the terminology, they keep secrets, and eventually they have to lie. It's a rough road, and it isn't simple. One of the hardest things is to have the integrity to step aside from the easy opportunity, the community they love, and to admit that they no longer are hand-crafting the items they bring to sell.

This is in the air right now, and it will take commitment to change the erosion that this transition has brought, particularly to the OCF. Another of the Fair legends is that everyone has a scam. It's cynical, but I've had mine, and you probably have had yours. It's easy to take advantage of the yes, yes, yes culture.

I have a few typing chores to do today but this is the typing that has been calling me. I want to discuss things that are flying around in my atmosphere but are hard to discuss, and a blog really isn't a discussion, is it? I don't want to write a rant.

I've ranted before about the difference between pointing out what is wrong (in your opinion) and not engaging in finding a solution. I still do that, of course, but less often than I did in my younger years. That is because the complaint often makes no change, and the situation grates more, and the next complaint is "Why don't they do something about that?" Operating word: they.

There is no they in most of the things I've complained about. There might be a person involved, but there is a huge distance between their actions and my complaint. Mostly if you want things to get better in this world, you yourself have to engage in a productive process to find a solution. If you can fully engage, with others of the same and different opinions, often you can find an elegant solution. That almost never happens with a complaint, even a written one, even a heartfelt one, a necessary one. The complaint has to be followed up with some productive action by someone, and why not by people who really care about it? Why not you?

If you are shy or busy or not a people person or not really sure how to go about the process to the solution, well, so will be most of the people who end up in the fix-it room. Everyone is going to bring their flawed self to the process. We will all have to work around whatever obstructions come up, and if they are you, still just complaining, we will have to work around you. Maybe you could bring some tools with you. I figured I was pretty good at taking minutes, so I got myself on the newly created Scribe Tribe. I was still in complaint mode, and got insulted and quit one group, (sorry) but then decided it was also part of the solution to refuse to get insulted or offended. Just set that aside, as it most likely was not intended. That has served me very well. Now I'm also on the Craft Committee, and thus unfortunately a target. Nobody really hates the Scribes, but lots of people don't like the committees and the crews, and some are viewed as particularly evil. Can thinking people really be that thoughtless about volunteers?

Volunteering with my various organizations completely changed my complaining process. I found that there were some fantastic people involved already, people I really enjoy and want to work with. Gradually I understood how things were done, who did them, and why they took so long sometimes. As I found out more details about the problems, I almost never thought of them as simple things that could be easily fixed. I like to be efficient and to get things done just as much as any busy person, but sometimes changing things too rapidly just makes them worse in some other unforeseen way. It's good to try to foresee these things, and that usually takes a group, a group of people who think in different ways and bring their different perspectives and ideas to the table, and take the needed time.

Having been attacked and criticized a time or two, I found out just how much harder it is to engage in the solution afterwards. I won't want to help you just because your distress is great...if you get it all over me. I will first want to get away from you. If you come kindly and allow me space to respond kindly, we will get somewhere so much quicker. This is true everywhere from the DVM to the corner store to the fenceline where the neighbor has let the blackberries go. Anger is not a good social lubricant.

And sarcasm rarely helps either. It creates defensiveness and confusion. Any kind of negative start creates a longer road to the solution. Think about that next time you just need to bitch about something. Do you really want to make things better? There are usually lots of options if that is the case.

So, this new fork I just bought needs a bit of finishing still. Part of the handle needs some rasping and sanding. I'm not taking it back though. I got that 20% discount, so DTE already took their loss. I will take the rasp I got from my Dad and some sandpaper and fix it myself. That will be satisfying, and now I'm kind of glad I didn't look them all over and get the best one. I picked the one with the prettiest wood. Somebody somewhere chose that wood and if they were getting paid to be a craftsperson and finish that tool the way it deserved to be, it would have cost twice as much. Because that is the complicated economic reality we live in.

I wish I could buy all my tools and all my things from craftspeople. Most I can. It makes my life feel rich, and I recommend it. Less plastic, more real. Fully finished.

Oops, my friendly UPS delivery person just did me a favor and brought my stuff early enough to work on it today. Guess my typing is done for now and I will engage in some craftsmanship. Hope this weather holds for one more day! See you Saturday.

Satisfaction with Minutiae

This week seemed really satisfying, at the end at least, if not so much at the beginning. I got a lot of work done, wrapped up the week with Market, and today only have a few tasks on my list. And the sun is out (however temporarily.)

I had big printing job, printed 300 shirts on Thursday and over 300 on Friday. I was pleased to find out I could still do that, without pain and suffering, too. I'm turning 64 next week. It really is hard to imagine doing that kind of screenprinting much longer, but it looks like I will do it for the next few months, anyway. Build-up to OCF is a big effort, bigger still this year with the logo tote bags I am planning to sell.

In a long print run like that, (each pile stood about 30 inches high, pretty much a cubic yard of cotton) I get into the minutiae of it all. These shirts were organic, lightweight, and the ink was waterbase, which is way less toxic than the PVC-based plastisol I have grown to hate. It was a pleasure not to have to wear a respirator and worry the whole time about the high cure temp and subsequent shirt scorch possibilities. It went fast and I could keep working without a break to breathe and rationalize why I'm still doing things I hate. I made more than minimum wage for those two days at least, making up for all the days of prep work and making things that don't sell.

I was proud of my skills. I got down to the exact number of squeegee pulls and the pressure for each (one batch took one firm and two softer strokes, plus a flood stroke to fill the mesh with ink for the next, and the other batch took one less stroke per shirt, but two firm strokes, which is a bit harder on the body) and I could work on my foot position and squeegee angle and efficient movements between the two ends of the conveyor dryer. I wrote blog posts and letters in my head while I worked, sang along with KRVM and grew increasingly fond of the station, for being so Real. I made lists of things I would do when I was finished printing.

I felt that joy of accomplishment and it wasn't about the money. I like surrendering to hard work like I do to nasty weather: the task is clear, finite, and I just try to find some moments of peace in there. Things are out of my hands in a way, while my hands stay busy doing the task. I look outside and want to be out there, so I promise myself I'll do that as soon as I can. I am amused at the news or a song lyric and want to tell someone, but mostly I just want to keep working until the last shirt is folded away in the right box.

I like the work at Market too. Packing up in that tired state is lovely sometimes, watching friends say goodbye or catch up on the conversations they had to drop to engage with customers, observing the parking protocols (I get to stay uninvolved with those, but they can be amusing) and the regular satisfaction I get from building my load on the trailer and working in the orderly sequence I've devised. It all feels good.

My sales weren't that great yesterday, kind of like the weather. I definitely don't have the most fashionable styles anymore, and it's getting obvious that I'm not very interested in the clothing part of my business. I'll be happy to let it go to focus on the hats and bags, or maybe something new. It will still take a year or two (maybe more) to get it all gone.Printing did remind me not to feel guilty about my decorated commercial products...screenprinting is most definitely a craft technique, and one in which my 35 years of practice have made me take it for granted. When I think about the variety of different skills I use and all of the choices involved to get to a decent result, I am reminded that not everyone could produce the goods I can produce. No wonder it is hard to let it go.

And during the Market day, there is a mind-boggling array of skills necessary for success. Some is just knowing how to work your particular spot. I have hot spots in my display, and places no one looks. The right signs in the right places make it easier for customers to engage comfortably. They hate to ask the prices and they each want a particular kind of attention, some more distant and some wanting to be close. I overheard one man complaining that he wanted to buy from one of my neighbors but he couldn't get her attention. I know how hard it is to give the right response...I had the same experience in the opposite way in a farmer's booth. They were distracted by visitors with a new baby...and I was in a hurry. No one was wrong, it just didn't add up to a money exchange.

And then there was my actual purchasing...I like to be recognized, but not pressured. My neighbor Tim Fox brings his wife Gila's lovely, precisely crafted jewelry and I regularly buy earrings, the one jewelry item I wear. My birthday is coming up so I looked over their stones, and liked a pair with marble beads in black and white. I wanted to spend more than $17, so Tim thought to pull out his drawer of extra stock. Tucked in the back was a pair that I loved immediately. The price was way out of my usual comfort zone, so I got the marble ones, and had a few conversations with my fellows about the others. Did I have the money? Yes. Did I think it was a sensible purchase for me? No, money is a little tight right now. I could actually think of about a dozen reasons why I shouldn't get them. I also had a few thoughts about why I should. I told my sensible self to think about it for a week and see if I still wanted them closer to my actual birthday. There are other things I need more, I have a lot of earrings already, and so on...then about fifteen minutes into my wait I went and bought them.

It made Tim's day, of course, and I immediately put them on and my drab rainy-day outfit was transformed. I felt happier, more fulfilled. I didn't care about my low sales. I was more generous with my attention and let Tim give me a long explanation about one of his scientific/philosophical theories of civilization, and I was able to engage with a young person who liked my "Unreliable Narrator" hat, and point him to Tim's little books he sells, so he got another little sale and made a new friend too. It almost made me cry how well that all worked out. When Rich came with his guitar I tried and had some success with singing in Raven's booth. (I'm still not quite comfortable with these impromptu sessions, but we're working on it.)

Every day at Market the emotional quotient is so much greater for me that the huge, clear physical one. I have, every week, some highly significant and profoundly affecting personal interactions. It isn't easy, but I love having a place to have these conversations, a place not as intimate as my kitchen, a place where we know we have to wrap things up and get to the point, which is often the same point: "Ah well, life is rich if somewhat bewildering." Lots of laughing and promises and putting doubts to rest. Those visits mean so much, and I know why people avoid them, and I know why they come back for another one.

I don't feel like a socially skilled person, really. I spend almost all my time alone at home, addicted to work and solitude despite the imbalance that brings. I say many awkward things in the course of a public day, and I feel vulnerable and sometimes even frightened when encounters get confusing. I've driven off many a potential customer with my stupid jokes or assumptions.

Seeing things from the inside of a booth is a perspective we probably shouldn't be so comfortable within. We tend to think of the neighborhood as our territory. We've named the place Raven's Crack for the big crack in the sidewalk that runs between the shaker booth and Willy's White Raven Artworks. We feel like people ought to know our obscure rules...don't bring your petitions in there. We sometimes feel trapped. Three different groups asked me for donations. It's a bit hard to continually be asked to give the things away that I have made to pay my bills with. We feel a bit like sitting ducks sometimes. I know that doesn't occur to those asking for donated crafts: they feel that they are giving us the opportunity to support their group in a way that will multiply, and that is correct of course. We are not in the privileged class, though. People might be surprised how poor some of us are. Yet we are usually generous.

I make it a point to drop dollars into the musician's cases as often as I can, particularly those who bring something wonderful to my neighborhood I would otherwise miss. Most musicians are pretty sensitive to the crowd reaction and I hope they include us as more than background. We don't really enjoy the ones who bring the same songs or come to practice in public and use our attractive setting, though we tolerate them. We really want the ones who see us, and get to know us, and become a part of us. That goes for the visitors too. We don't really like the ones who jam through, smoking and vaping, on their way to the wild scene at the FSP. We don't like so much the ones who hurry through making remarks that reveal their distaste for us or their dismissal of our offerings. We act more like we are on our front porches than in a public place.

Some of us have such a great level of ownership of our dear marketplace that we forget to be generous and grateful. We make snarky remarks or laugh at someone's outfit, or show our annoyance when our display gets messed up one more time. We forget to do those kind things that people remember, like giving someone a bag who doesn't want to spend $5 or $10 just because they left their bags in the car. One of my favorite feelings is surprising someone with thoughtfulness. It doesn't get any better than that little Brownie action I learned at age six, doing nice things for others without the thought of getting anything in return.

By the way, no one stepped in the fountain for the last two weeks. I put a strip of easily-removed masking tape along the edge, and it works like a charm. I did also rearrange my display, but pointing out the edge was really the key I think. I will still give a free hat or tote bag to anyone who comes and tells me they stepped in while looking at my stuff. I have to do some penance for that somehow.

Yes, it's Sunday and I am still so Catholic despite decades of counter-thoughts. I want to feel good and peaceful and like I did the right thing. Virtuous. Compassionate. Generous and giving. I always round up for the Kareng Fund. I always point out where to find my fellow clothing artists when I am asked for their goods. I don't take vendor discounts, unless they are a quarter off a piece of pizza, and I am learning to tip because I realized I am bad at it. Next week I will drop $5 on the workers at Dave's because they never grumble when I come for my free coffee with my own cup. I never think to tip them, because Dave and I trade and money isn't involved. Yet I get special service and expect it, and that is separate from my relationship with Dave. I want to do this life right. Making up is better than avoidance. I want to evolve and save the world in the ways Tim and I discussed.

I love the relief when something is finally addressed and hammered out and things are right in the neighborhood again. Last night the traffic patterns during loadout were working pretty well, and most of the people got the spots they wanted when they wanted them. Tim Giraudier said that all was harmonious in the neighborhood, and that was what stuck with me the whole way home as the rain fell delicately on my head. I loved listening to the real person, a third Tim, on KRVM as I brought in my dampish stuff and stowed it away for another week. And today and last night when the real rain beat on the windows, I am warm and dry. I do love the Market. I do love my life. Hope you all have moments of feeling the same.

Rain, then wind, then sun

We are having our normal April weather but of course all those who sell outdoors are hoping for abnormal April weather, sunny every Saturday. I will want warm and dry Tuesdays in May as well. Outlook is unlikely.

I don't know if I will commit to rainy Tuesdays, but I do find that rainy Saturdays work okay for me. My wares are not generally ruined by the damp if I open the tubs to air them out during the week, and carefully remove any items that really do get wet. Last week the actual rain was minimal and nothing got very wet. It's a different day though.

I have to bring the pop-up instead of the slightly easier umbrellas and stand. I use two umbrellas but one fastens to my display. Each system is heavy and hard to manage but I need shade too, so I have to take something. I prefer the umbrellas because I dislike the look of all of those white pop-ups in a row: too uniform for me.

But if there is any chance of rain at all, I take the booth and at least two sides. It's handy to stretch one out the back over my trailer and tubs, just to keep it all dry. I use another on the south side for showers, and take it on and off during the day as the clouds pass by. Raven and I have a few strategies we use at the seam of our two booths to minimize the drips, though we always get some water in the back corner. It has to go somewhere. I did like the old style booth when it drained off the back, but not the part where it pooled up and you had to poke it with a stick to dump the water off, sometimes on someone. The pop-ups drain okay, although drips come down from every side.

On the second week, the sunny one, I took an extra hat stick to display more hats, and as a result four people stepped in the lower part of the fountain while looking at my stuff. This has happened periodically but never so many in a day. I haven't known quite what to do about it but this time it was so obviously my fault that I determined it wouldn't happen again.

I stopped bringing my old bamboo folding fence which has outlived its usefulness anyway and brought an extra stick to fill out that back corner so that no one's foot will approach the fountain. I also put some tape on the edge of it so it would be more visible. It's really simple to put the tape on and take it off each week, so I'll probably continue that, and the stick worked really well even though it makes my load look even sillier with all the tree branches on top. So I think I fixed it, even though this week there wasn't actually any water in that part of the fountain, so no wet hazard. Still a bit of a hazard, but at least if someone steps over the edge it won't be my fault.

I went through my usual Catholic process of guilt and confession (I had to tell Beth...) but came out with a workable solution, so all is well. I imagine there will again be water in the fountain, especially with this week's forecast.

I like to sell on the rainy days for a couple of reasons. On the sunny ones, everyone comes, so there are maybe twice as many booths, and probably not quite twice as many customers for them. I do pretty well in the rain. Of course, my particular craft (the hats) is one that people sometimes need in the rain. They need them in the sun too, so I'm happy to have a product that works that way. The bags and the clothing don't work that way, but still, the rainy days are not too bad for my sales. I feel lucky about that.

I am also a really staunch Market supporter. The bills have to be paid no matter the weather. Our "Rainy Day Fund" would not last long if we really used it for the rainy days. With fewer booths, we still have to have full staff along with all the customer and member amenities, and even more of those sometimes, like the heaters. Being a fair-weather marketer does not make me feel right. Plus, when I used to stay home for questionable weather, it almost always improved and I had to deal with that guilt. Now I just get up and go. It's much simpler.

So despite the gloomy forecast for the week, I'll still go on Saturday. I'm prepared for it. I'll take it easy on Friday afternoon to rest up for it. This will be the fourth Market though, and I have really hit my stride. The first week was super exhausting, the second not so much, and last week felt normal. I was tired, and my foot hurt, but it wasn't overwhelming. May might be overwhelming. I'm planning to do Tuesday Market, and that is a surprisingly hard turnaround, selling two days with only two in between. I can do it though.

This is a good year for bags, so far. People are discovering mine, and appreciating the choice of beauty with utility. Most people have what they describe as far too many bags, but they make convenient gifts, and I have a lot of choice in style and size, so they are selling fairly well. I have no idea if this will continue. The future is always a mystery to me.

The present is more concrete. Writing this reminded me that although I did dry out the booth and the sides, I forgot to open the tubs to let out the dampness. Guess I'll go out to the shop and fiddle with my stuff some more. This is the second-to-last Tuesday I'll have to work out there. Maybe UPS will arrive and I can actually get some things done. Hope you are having an efficient and productive day!

Fine Points

Update: I got the approval! My sincere thanks to the OCF Board and the Craft Inventory crew for maintaining this opportunity.

 I'm waiting to hear if my OCF logo items were approved. I keep telling myself to be patient and have trust, and have faith in my clear self-expression, but darn if I am not anxious about it. I had a "grandfathered" logo item, which is what you get if you are approved for at least five years. You still have to apply each year, but you are not judged, unless I suppose the quality of your work shows significant decline. I decided to stop making the silk scarves and flags I had been making.

They never did sell very well, and I had to make the price artificially low to get any interest in them. They were gorgeous, no doubt about that, but the many processes to get them to be that way were fraught with ways to ruin them, and they didn't like being taken to the dusty woods and hung in the sun. I never mastered the display or the packaging, and when I broke my foot the same year as I secured a big printing contract in April, I didn't make any new ones. I didn't make any new ones last year either, and I felt that was really a breach of my contract. A logo item is supposed to be something precious. Since mine were dated, it was right there that none said 2013. When I finally admitted that none were going to say 2014, I knew it was over.

I'm generally bad at letting go, but I think I will be able to handle this. I can always bring them back and re-jury them. My major plan of shifting from clothing to silk seems impractical. Sure, silkscreened silk is fairly unusual and luscious and wearable, but silk is expensive, has to be imported from China, and is quite difficult to work with. Pricing them to reflect the work is a huge challenge.

But I still want to get out of the fashion clothing business. It's going to take awhile. Instead of trying to make it with silk, I turned to the items I already make, that do sell. My hats are solid as a product, and I think I will be able to continue with them indefinitely, within my physical limitations. I enjoy them, my customers enjoy them, and although they are a commercial hat that I decorate, I buy great quality hats, use plenty of artistry in the decoration, and am working on some ideas that will involve more handwork.

My tote bags are the same. I search out and buy really good quality bags. I keep the price down a bit too low to make the kind of profit a businessperson is supposed to, but working for two cents an hour has never bothered me. I am the boss, and I take lots of breaks and take bike rides when I want. I put a lot into the decorating, making the art and screens, doing all the printing myself, and trying to make beautiful complex designs that people will love. In the craft of screenprinting, the t-shirt or tote bag is considered a blank canvas, and the item significantly transformed by the work. My bags definitely meet this standard.

I also, just to be clear, pack them up and haul them to the blocks every Saturday, and dry them out when they get wet, give them away when they get ruined, and figure out ways to keep them in top quality until they sell. A person gets a lot for their $10 when they buy one of my bags, and people love the more expensive versions too. (I charge more for the ones I dye, and for the more expensive styles.)

So in preparation for my latest shift, I went to my extensive collection of OCF logos and made one the right size, with the right areas for ink and no ink, essentially re-drawing the logo to suit my purposes. I kept it as accurate as possible. I made two screens, different sizes (I would charge a customer $50 for that.) I ordered a lot of different bag samples, to see what was really out there for me to use. I printed up five, chose four for the jurying, labeled them, filled out the form, paid my $10 fee. So just for the chance to put them before the decision-makers, I invested at least $100 worth of work. Not a problem.

I would imagine all the people who make logo items go through this process. You can't jury an idea, and thank goodness, it isn't about name recognition or how much you pay the Fair or help the Fair. It is a simple voting evaluation process, done by the Board and organized by the Craft Inventory crew.

It has taken a lot of years to get the process right, and it seems pretty fair the way it is currently being done. However, unless the Board member has a working knowledge of a lot of crafts, they might not know just what they are evaluating.

I'm scared because what I submitted looks like a simple, commercial tote bag with a simple print of a very familiar icon. Nothing about it says years of dedication or dollars of investment. I thought a lot about making a multicolor, splashy logo print, but I didn't do it for two reasons. One, that would really be a lot of effort for a speculative end, and it would still likely look like a simple product, because in the age of computers, we have seen that logo in every kind of multicolored glory. The Elders wanted a t-shirt made, but they wanted a multicolor peach with a green leaf, etc., and I just can't print something like what you see on a computer or on a letterhead. People's expectations have passed beyond what can be screenprinted by hand.

I have to print each color of ink with a squeegee that I hold in both hands, and to use the kind of waterbase ink I use, I have to do it rather quickly, and if I am doing more than one color I have to do it even more quickly, and tote bags are hard to print on because they are so textured, and I have found that I really can't be all that ambitious within the craft. At least not on a $10 tote. So to think of doing many dozens of multicolored fancy logos between mid-April and July, not to mention making the investment in the bags, dyeing them, sewing the ones that rip during the dyeing, printing them with my old arms and back, I have limits. I knew if I wowed the Board with a fancy print, I would not be able to deliver the quantity of them needed, at least this year. Not handmade ones anyway.

And the thing that bothers me the most about it all is not whether or not I get approved and get to make the bags, simple or complex, or who is evaluating me and what they know or see, or whether what I make will sell or whether I will make enough of them, or whether or not the bag market will be over-saturated or still be a good one. What really bothers me is that it is indeed possible to make and sell a complex, multicolored bag of great beauty, through the processes of direct print or heat transfers. These, to avoid a lengthy explanation, are not really hand-done processes. Direct print is done by a computer right onto the bag. Looks beautiful. Transfers are printed by machines on paper and then glued to the bag with heat. Plastic ink, plastic print, low durability, not significant handwork. Not handmade products. But customers think they are.

And those products are being sold at OCF and elsewhere, and being passed off as handmade products. Technology came and offered a way, and people took it. Several very popular artists I could name, but won't, use the transfers and the direct prints to make garments, and yes, to make tote bags. This might shock you, but you have bought these things at Saturday Market and at the OCF, and they were wonderful, and you loved them. I loved them. The totes with the birds and the beautiful peaches on them were lovely. They sold like hotcakes. The hoodies with the patches on the back, the commemorative shirts, the many many dozens and hundreds of event items that were in such high demand, were not handmade.

Yes, they were designed by wonderful and talented artists whom we like or even love, and they made a lot of people feel good on both sides of the transaction. The designs started out as art. They still appear to be art. They just aren't really craft, and the people who order them and take them out of the boxes aren't really craftspeople.

So there is one part of this dilemma. All of the Board members judging my crafts have seen these commercially made and decorated products offered by the Fair and they proudly use them and display them, and their expectation of what a tote bag can look like and the price it can demand are adjusted to fit that reality. My offering pales in comparison. I can't compete. And I shouldn't have to.

I get that the Fair, like any event, would not be sensible if it did not offer event merchandise to the willing public. Having this be in the Fair's budgetary control through the commemorative products is sensible and practical. Craftspeople have a hard time making enough things to satisfy that kind of demand, and we might just fail to do so, not bring enough shirts or bags or water bottles or whatever the public needed and was willing to buy. When the volume of official OCF items started to become apparent, I, as someone trying to sell t-shirts, felt pretty defensive. I didn't want to be petty, but my immediate thought was that I was paying a lot to be competed with in this way. I grew to believe that there was room for it, that there were enough people willing to buy things that it was kind of a fine detail that some of them weren't hand-crafted.

I've grown less willing to excuse it. If my logo bags are approved, I will at least feel that I have a fighting chance of survival selling them, since people really do enjoy buying from a real craftsperson. They enjoy feeling the connection, and being a part of that vital relationship, so I have that edge the official stuff will never have. It becomes murky when the commemoratives are the designs of a really popular artist, but I think that ship has sailed far and wide in the last few years. Those things sell. The Fair makes money. Everyone thinks they are buying a handmade item with that popular artist's work on it. Everyone is happy about it but curmudgeons like me, and of course we are partly just jealous. Because we can't compete. And we don't want to.

One thing I love about Saturday Market is that we do not compete. We all get the same 8x8, and we all pay the same $10 plus 10%. We make or break it through the ways we are individuals, and it is very direct. It is what is called a *level playing field.*

Saturday Market does sell tote bags, at cost, as a courtesy to customers, but they are printed by a member. (Yes, it is me.) OCF has made the effort in the last two years to have the staff shirts printed by members, and I applaud them loudly for that. It is a huge change and probably a lot more trouble and expense, but it makes me feel so much more valued and trusting. I don't know where the commemoratives are produced and there may indeed be some hand-crafted items among them, but having them be handcrafted is one shift I would like to see. Offering commercially made items to the public with one hand and trying to promote and restrict selling everything else to craftspeople is a tricky balancing act and it doesn't feel good. It's even hard to see things like the wonderful printed rayon peaches strung out from Odyssey. Those look handmade, but I don't think any Fair artist who works in printed and handpainted rayon made them. I love them, but I hate them too.

This offering of commercial goods has contributed to the erosion we've all noticed in what is being sold. It has made the atmosphere more welcoming of commercially made items, has made some craftspeople resentful and defiant, and I think we can do better. It might mean the Fair makes less money. It's not a small question to consider. It's in line with the small factory issue currently being addressed by Craft Inventory and Craft Committee. They seem okay, until you think about how they change the marketplace for the real hand-crafting artisan.

I'm certainly not going to be impolite if my items are not approved. Jurying is hard and I hate it and am so very grateful to have the grandmothered status that I do. I'm well aware that my goods wouldn't get into any of the high-end craft Fairs I used to do. The Fair keeps me alive and I do love it and I recognize how difficult it is to have coherent and consistent policies and practices. I don't expect perfection. I do want to keep going in the right direction.

I've said before that being this age (I'm about to turn 64 and the Fair and Market are both 45) brings a refinement stage. Those things that bother us become intolerable, or we learn to get more coherent excuses, or we change our behaviors to line up with our convictions. I want to keep making and selling at OCF, and keep myself alive and committed. I want to be honored and valued for what I do, and kept alive.

I want the same for my organizations. I'm willing to work for it. If I don't succeed in getting what I want (the logo approval) I'll be gracious. If I do, I'll do my best to walk the line of practical, sustainable, and beautiful effort. I'll probably make that multicolored peach in some do-able fashion. I'm very grateful to be here right now, a part of so many amazing efforts by so many exceptional people. I don't want to have any ugly confrontations or even any ugly thoughts.

I just want us all to keep going in what I see as the right direction. It sounds simpler than it is. It's a long walk, and this is a long post. I have to go. It's time for Jeopardy. Thank you for all you do. Thank you for listening.

That was Too Much!

Opening Day of our beloved Saturday Market was yesterday, not too wet, not too cold, and my sales were great! Right on my last year's average, which is an excellent start, and gets me going. I haven't really made any money this winter...lived off savings, felt the luxury of not working for money. Got to focus on my Jell-O Art adventures, my writing, my other needed areas of improvement. It was time to refocus, and I am glad to be back doing retail, despite the difficulties.

I felt especially vulnerable yesterday, and especially tired last night. The emotional openness I bring downtown can be exhausting, and it's pretty hard to protect myself from it. People really need to tell their stories. One word of empathy leads to the next, more horrifying story, as we all figure out how to re-establish our intimacy as well as our boundaries.

I am really so grateful for every sale, every dollar, every word of appreciation, that it gets in the way of business. I am surprised someone wants to really buy, impressed with their decisiveness, and that they would choose me, and my goods, to spend their dollars upon. People actually make a point of coming to support me, and not just me, and it brings tears to my eyes, often. If I don't cry a little on a Market Day, it is an uneventful one.

I got big hugs, ones that conveyed deep heart stuff. I got compassionate listeners. I got frozen out by people who used to like me, drawn in by people I have nearly ignored. I was chosen and passed over. One woman found one thing in the booth she liked, a mirror made by a fellow vendor. Nothing of mine. I got three custom jobs, two of which I had tried to say no to, and am glad I didn't succeed in driving them away. Some of my acquaintances were friendlier, some I missed even saying hi to. I'm sure I breezed past quite a few people who thought I was a snob, or maybe they could tell I was hurrying to get back to my booth. I couldn't shop until after three, and by then the farmers were leaving and I was too tired to want anything.

Whatever is going on with my body, food allergies or hayfever, or something, was a problem but not an insoluble one. I love supporting the food vendors and I dearly wanted to, but most everything included cheese or milk, and I knew it would be a mistake to test that one. Dave kindly fed me spinach, avocado, ham and strawberries, and that got me home, where I had squirrelled away sorbet and things I could eat. A great number of my fellow vendors share these food issues, as it turns out, and they bring their own food, something I have to get more in the habit of. My habit has been to run over and get my faves from the various food booths, or the farmers, and I love so much bringing home cake or fried fish to heat up, a treat and reward for my hard work. I have to change habits, at least until I get a handle on this. It will be okay.

The biking and lifting were harder than they used to be, but I can still do them. I felt weak. I got worried about next month, when Tuesday Market starts, and the obvious future in the long term, but that is just the ongoing challenge of age, of trying not to focus on fears but preparations and adaptation. Lighter loads have to happen, and they will as the weather improves. Everything will work, as it always has, and my job is to relax and take it all in stride.

Sad, distressing, and unexpected things happen, here, there, and every single day. They will be manageable if my attitude is manageable. My expectations have to be in line with what is presenting itself. I can do these things. I'll put a few more things about self-preservation on my list for next week. Like a scarf. I forgot to take a scarf. It would actually have made a big difference.

Time to have my weekly chat with Mom so I'll close. Maybe I'll come back and post photos, if I don't take a nap. I need a nap.

Observing Changes

This is a heady time for me, with a lot of things in the air, a lot of personal risk, but a calm center somehow. Of course Spring, the hopeful season, is here, and the Saturday Market will open very soon in response. Many of us are really ready for that. I have made almost no money all winter (Jell-O Art is a full-time job), so am really ready for some retail. It's not that I haven't been working, just not so much in my shirt shop. Though I made Jell-O shirts! (And Babes with Axes, thank you, thank you.)

A few years ago I noticed that the maple tree I can see from my kitchen goes through a pink flush when the buds appear with the leaves inside. It's subtle, and the first year I noticed it I was astonished, as I have been looking out that window for many years. This year it lasted for over a week, here and there on the tree at first, and then quite evident, but not so much when the sky was cloudy, gloriously against the intense blue we had for several days last week. Every time I go outside I notice things that I have not remarked upon to myself, even though I must have seen them in passing for years, even decades. I think this close observation developed from my house research, as I have learned to look at the physical presentation of something, a house or a person, or a news article or an object, and try to see the story behind it. It's a deep observation that is gratifying, and I'm happy to be developing it, even though it makes me sad for all the things I have missed before. When it comes to people, I've been extremely saddened by the deaths of people I really should have paid more attention to, in a more focused and personal way, and that is a particularly important lesson in being here, now, and alert. I hope I learn it well.What was I so afraid of? It seems so trivial.

I've been doing a lot of business writing in my roles with OCF and the Market, which I enjoy but also makes me nervous sometimes. I've observed that close scrutiny has worked for me here, too. The minutes-taking is so very detail-oriented, even when I am supported by the voice recorder, and it can be crucial that the intent of words be transmitted as well as the words. It's really a skill-set that goes way beyond spelling and grammar, and it also is satisfying to be able to serve my organizational families in this way, but there is the risk part too. I can't make up or reveal intent that I might see but is not really in the words; I can't use my knowledge of the person or outside factors that weren't actually stated at the meetings. It can be really hard to just stick to the slippery type of facts in discussions. Even when things are said with conviction, they may not be factual, and I can misinterpret just as quickly as the next person. Some things are crucial, although most are not, and all of the minutes are reviewed by the groups before being adopted into the public record, but still, they have to be right.

I don't feel that as pressure most times, though I do get overly conscientious and pedantic about some things. I like motions to be in formal language, and I dislike using people's names, not wanting to set anyone up to be a target for something they said in a semi-public meeting. People say the most shocking things as jokes, and I have to know when they are kidding. It's usually not that difficult, but I get frustrated with too much flippancy. Anger and confrontation, of course, really derail the meetings, and damage everyone there. When those come up, everyone thinks about quitting and never attending another meeting.

There's one kind of knotty aspect I worry about: the recordings. They are actually not the public record, as only the approved minutes are. The recordings should probably be discarded, although back when we used the little cassettes we saved them all, and occasionally someone had the need to listen to the original discussions for some fine point. Lots of fine points are left out of the minutes, as well as who expressed them, so there is some value in the original recordings, and I also take detailed notes which often include names, but those are also my interpretations. So the recordings are valuable, but again, I don't want to be a party to making anyone a target. Interesting that when I listen to the recordings, if there is anger or confrontation, it is never as shocking as it was when I was in the room. At that distance, I can hear behind the anger.

You wouldn't think I would have to worry about targets in these very human organizations, but irrational and angry people are everywhere and hippies don't have a corner on human understanding. Everyone is capable of going instantly to a defensive stance over any issue and often that is the default, before they even consider the other aspects or ask for clarification. Close observation, mostly learned from co-counselling, has increased my ability to see through these defensive patterns, to a degree, but if I am attacked, I can go into altered states of intense anxiety, so I'm pretty protective about interactions with angry people. A lot of my avoidance patterns are simply to keep myself safe from the anger of others. I quail and am useless in person, but in the safety of my kitchen, I find I can do written analysis fairly well and respond to it in a fairly helpful way, if I take the time to make sure my thoughts are clear and get over feeling irrationally targeted.

It's kind of simple sometimes, just asking the question "Is that me?" In other words, am I coming from my own defensive stance, or an irrational place of my own? Again, very subtle stuff at times, and often about deep fears and what is called occluded material, things you are yourself not really able to be aware of or access rational thought around. Deep, deep stuff like trauma and loss, separation and fear.

So writing letters concerning kicking people out of places they love is really hard. I merely walked by a young couple last night who were blanket-vending downtown, and being arrested at that moment, and my heart sank. I wondered all the way home why things had progressed to arrest. The police seemed nice enough, but they were charged with enforcing the rules, and the couple had no doubt been warned. I had seen them in another spot before the meeting and guessed that they were doing that shuffle of desperation when you move across the street or down the block and set up again, thinking maybe you won't be noticed, will wear the authorities out, or somehow escape the fate you probably don't believe is coming. That couple probably did not believe arrest and an expensive ticket would add to their problems, and they surely had some problems if they were trying to sell jewelry from a blanket on the sidewalk. It was just sad, and I wanted to save them, but of course I just walked over to the Kiva and then home so I wouldn't miss Jeopardy. Oh, the irony of it all.

The concept of jeopardy has been on my mind, as over the last two months we (the RadarAngels) wrote the show for the Jell-O Art Show performance, a parody of the TV show which will of course be hilarious, to us at least, and we hope to our audience. Early on I felt that everyone in the place should experience some subtle type of jeopardy that they could easily overcome, a symbolic growth pushed by art, in particular Jell-O art, kind of like the unfolding maple buds which made it through the snow and pinked up anyway, and the loved ones who lived their lives and then found the lives over, as we all will. Deep stuff about safety, risk, our short lives, our world of things, houses, craft objects, and all around the circle the way things always go, but made light of through music and fun, and resolved in a positive manner so we all could leave feeling safe.

So to go on just a bit more before everyone gets tired of reading, I have to use all the skills I've got to do difficult things sometimes, but with support, I can do them, and it gets easier all the time. When I first started to volunteer for OCF, there were a lot of major shifts in my thinking as I joined with thousands of people to not just experience the event, not just participate in it on my level of using it as a part of my income stream, but to deepen my commitment to making it work well for not just me, but others like me, and even others who were not like me. I felt compelled to speak from my experience for the mutual understanding of others with different experiences. I was a lot more selfish at first. Gradually I have started to join those who are caring for the event/organization long past our individual lives, way outside our own country fair. (You know the way there are thousands of different country fairs going on at once out there, simultaneously.) I certainly am not at the decision-making level on any big scale, and don't want to be, but in the craft realm I have begun to be able to take a stand and have some clear convictions. It's not easy! It's way easier to reserve judgement, continue observing, and allow, than it is to take action and make something change.

The current struggle, which is not a new one, is at the core one of the survival of the craftsperson. To continue to thrive making things by hand, one at a time, out of the impossibly vague recesses of our individual creativity, taking raw materials and ending up with an object of beauty and utility--this is a delicate and tenuous thing. Jell-O Art in it's gorgeous impracticality shines an important light on this, but you'll have to read about that in the other blog (Gelatinaceae.blogspot.com). To cut to the chase, I have begun to fight for the survival of the handcrafted artist. Not just to fear for her. Not just to observe the increasing difficulty of staying important and current, not just to make my own adjustments to fit the conditions, but to join with others, to fight for her. And him, of course.

I'm not a visionary, but I also tend to not dissove in fear of the future. 3-D printers will change everything, just like computers and cell phones did, but I don't fear that. Small factories are a common and adaptive reponse to the marketplace, and I don't fear them, but I have to take a stance against that erosion of the hand and heart connection of the artist with the appreciator, through the fingerprints of the artist on the object and the face-to-face interaction between the two. I have to be willing to draw some lines and stand on one side of them. I wouldn't be able to do it alone. Thankfully, the nature of my membership organizations is that we all care so deeply about this and the related issues, that there are plenty of other members willing to stand with me.

What makes it hard is when people take aim before they take the time to see what we are so passionate about. To the small factory owner, who is still passionately involved with their objects and has not changed their own heart connection, it's hard to see the shifts and why they matter. I've been there, I've had employees and moved more to management and done less production and felt that discomfort. To be honest, I still feel like I am in a grey area of the crafts world with my decoration of commercially produced items, be it as it may that I do the handwork necessary to qualify and my objects are certainly crafts. Now that the little factory is long gone for me I can see the contradictions better than when I was creating the contradictions.

But the issue remains that the craft artist is up against a world that could cease to value her. Spending low-paid hours to take pains to perfect objects of sometimes limited utility with relatively high prices is counter to the way the world markets are going, and that is perfectly evident everywhere. Doing it without employees at a volume necessary to survive in this world is not only difficult but might become impossible. We could be a dying part of the art world, but I am convinced that we are not. I'll die, of course, and join the crafts fair in the sky where we just get to sit there and collect good feelings instead of dollars, and make only what we want instead of what will sell, but art will never die. No commercially manufactured object, no matter how complex, is going to affect a person the same as a handmade one. People will still seek those out and marvel at that transformation. And to quote one of the songs I'm valiantly practicing this week to stand up in front of strangers and perform art through: "tell me love and hope never die."

Love and hope never die. Craft will survive the present challenges, and I will survive whatever confrontations come my way just as I will survive the two performances I have gotten my chicken self into (thank goodness for costumes.) Challenge is just as much a creative process as handwork. You dig in, you gain skills, you use those skills to gain broader skills, you pay attention, you learn from the work of others, and you pitch in and do what presents itself to the best of your abilities. You use your creative abilities in every way you can. And you try to leave your anger and irrational attacks on others out. You try to learn to ask the cops what you can do to find common ground rather than getting mad and calling them pigs, or whatever mistake that young couple made yesterday. 

My very first thought, when I saw the couple with their blanket, and I was going to a product screening for the Saturday Market, was to invite them to come along. I wish I  had. I didn't take the time, and was involved in my own work. I saw the buds, but I didn't see the frost that was coming for them. I hope someone at the police station told them about Saturday Market. I hope they told them that you can pay your membership fee in installments, and that you can join one of the most benevolent, easy-entry, loving and caring networks in the known world. Love and hope never die, friends.

And just to end with that irony that we all love so much, the guy who did some  the most virulent gay-hating in our times just died, and though I really don't believe in heaven and hell, I wonder what he might be experiencing as he left his realm of hate and moved to another. I'm guessing either it was over, and that was it, or he opened into the greatest space of love and hope we could possibly imagine in the most creative moment we ever had. I have a friend who tells me that we do not die. I won't try to explain that, but just imagine it and how that might work. If there is anger and hate there, in that dimension, seems like we would all be able to see it in the most transparent way. We might even laugh at it. We might be wise enough to see it as a tool we do not need, one that hurts, not only those that it is directed at, but our own selves. 

If you are angry, that means you care and you need something more. Figure out what it is, and how to get it without hurting anyone else. Don't be a bully. Demands separate us. Join, somehow, the other caring people and find the common ground. Persistence is a good quality when used in good ways, but sometimes you can't have what you want. I'm haunted by the downcast look of the young woman who sat handcuffed with her necklaces while the second officer negotiated with her partner. She was compliant, yes, but ashamed and bereft. She got damaged there. That shouldn't have happened, and I'm not faulting the police either, or the laws. It just was an ugly bit of jeopardy, not caused by art, but in the interface of art and society.

Next time I want to know what to do and do it. Love and hope will keep me growing, keep me helping, keep me living while I am here. Let's focus on that this spring, the season of opening and beauty. Did you know this is apparently the International Day of Happiness? I'm celebrating.

Sisters and Photos

It's my little sister's birthday tomorrow, so I was trying to remember what might have been going through my head at the time. I was just about to turn six myself, and was the second of three girls at that point. I was comfy in that spot, I believe, at that age, though the previous Thanksgiving must have been the one when I got scarlet fever and an intense dislike for turkey and hospitals. Maybe Mom was pregnant, and that was why they put me in the hospital. Don't remember much except vivid memories of

the separation and the shots. This was undoubtedly the first time I was really apart from my siblings and parents, in my conscious memory anyway.

So it was probably just fine and normal to be getting a new sister, though there was likely some discussion about "it" being a boy this time. I know we were all aware of Dad wanting a son. Getting Paula was terrific in every way, to my mind. She was always the most fun of us, at least until my little brother appeared to steal her spotlight six years later.

But Paula was not in the famous picture I have of the three of us in our matching Easter dresses in 1955, a year before she arrived. My grandmother made us new dresses every Easter, and I so loved those dresses. When I asked Mom about that time, she told me that they had searched for a house throughout that pregnancy (we were living in a semi-row in downtown Wilmington, across from a park and in front of a gas station.) When we moved it was into the country. (Of course it isn't the country now.)

She said they stumbled upon the house, selling by the owner, and it cost $22,500, which was their budget at the time. The house wasn't that special but the yard was divine. And the yard was always my favorite part, for sure.

But we moved that July, right after Paula was born, and right after a vacation at a lake which was probably just another bunch of work for Mom, but a change of places to play for us. I was a big explorer/scientist so was happy in nature anywhere. I'm so glad Mom chose that yard, though. It had a huge effect on me. It was practically a farm. The last photo shows Paula and the sister formally known as "Butterball" (drat that yellow dress) on her first birthday, on the front porch of our new house.

Most of the pictures from that era were of Mom sailing our Lightning, which we did every summer weekend. Imagine that with four little girls. Mom at the tiller was a strong childhood image, even more precious now. My mom was amazing, and she still is, inspiring and supportive and practical and strong. And Paula has grown up to be that way, too.

She runs marathons, even 50-mile races! She fronted bands and did a lot more with her musical abilities than any of us, and still sings wonderful harmony. She is a kick-ass Mom and hard worker and so very dedicated. She can do things that would make me a quivering mess. So it's her birthday, and this isn't a proper shout-out, but I love these photos and thought they would be fun to share. I love my family!