New Necklace

I've been working a lot on my jewelry. this is a picture of it is a multi strand beaded necklace with hand painted bone and coral accent finished with a sterling silver clasp. It should be up on Etsy soon.

Oof.

I got my jewelry forms to take pictures with!

Now I just need some decent lighting and, you know, time to take pictures of all of my pieces.

I learned how to peyote stitch at the Bead Box today. It's pretty epic.

I am going to be 26 in two weeks. Pretty wild.

Etsy Snafu

I've been working my balls off on my Etsy store, but it seems I've hit a serious roadblock.

I joined a community called Etsy Success which is designed to be a kind of support group for all the sellers on Etsy. They give each other device, critique photos, banners and store layouts and essentially provide you with a plethora of tools to utilize when monetizing your store.

The overwhelming review of my store is that my photos are the pits.

Sigh, I knew it. But that's OK!

I have already ordered jewelry forms and displays on which to take decent pictures -- The pictures on Etsy now really are only temporary and quickly taken. When I have my forms, and a lovely used light box from Amazon, then I will have sexy, sexy photos. THEN I WILL RULE THE WORLD.

So, Where Have You Been The Last 3 Months?

Making money living as an artist is not easy. But I have to tell you, it's one hell of a lot better than selling glasses.

I said it before I moved to New York, and I will reiterate it here. I want a good story. I want to have crazy adventures and have stories that make peoples eyes bug out of their heads. I don't want money (except what I need to sustain myself,) and I'm not looking for fame. Just stories

My latest story starts with lots of very low months that occured after a serious life change last November. It involves weeks of not being able to leave the house, fear of my phone and the internet and a loss of control. I lost a lot. A lot of people have rightfully given up on me. I also gained a lot of weight.

I even landed a job back in glasses. A good job. Without going into too much detail, it essentially crashed and burned. Or I did. It wasn't meant to be, and it wasn't pretty. I was embarrassed beyond belief and incredibly disappointed in myself. More than ever I was assured that I was a complete and utter loser before I had really even had a chance to live.

All that did was strengthen my resolve to find something else, something new. I humbled myself when it came to my salary requirements, after 7 years selling glasses I was making an OK living for myself... I had to get over that. Fast. I started all over again, bottom of the totem-pole.

I got a job at The Brooklyn Bead Box where I repair jewelry, sell jewelry, sell beads and finding for jewelry, and help people design jewelry on special occasion. I have started a new job without having a single skill in the field, and now I knot pearls like a machine! Even this leap of faith is a baby step in the healing I need to do. I need to heal myself and I need to heal my life and my relationships and my art.

Cornelius Introduces New Chef and Wine on Tap - Prospect Heights, NY Patch

Cornelius Introduces New Chef and Wine on Tap - Prospect Heights, NY Patch:

"Cornelius’ new chef Chris Caracciolo hopes dollar oysters attract a hungry crowd that will drink and slurp, then move on to charcuterie plates of wild boar salami, surf and turf burgers, a duck Rueben with aged Gruyere and daily specials designed to pair well with spirits."

Aaron's sweet new gig. Who's in?

As My Darling Man Points Out:

Don't let the TURKEYS get you down.

I've been meditating. I've been keeping it together.

Had a trip upstate for a few days to see a darling friend. It was a serious collection of amazing travel stories of woe and wonder - as any good trip should be! It's trips like that (travel-wise,) that make you really appreciate all your other decent travel experiences. So I am grateful for the entire experience. It was really educational, interesting, hilarious and fun.

I am ready to bust out of this apartment for the sunny skies. Anyone even remotely friendly with me knows that I am a homebody. I love being in my home, or in my neighborhood. I love to paint and enjoy movies and read and meditate and cook and bake. I love to be with friends and have conversations and craft and create. I love to commune and feel close to my friends.

That being said:

I AM SO FUCKING SICK OF BEING STUCK IN HERE. I'm not sick of the weather, I'm not blaming Winter, I'm ready to GTFO -- Just getting a little stir crazy it seems. Time to go out and play in the thawed out parks and wander through the labyrinth streets of Manhattan and take in the sites. Time to take out my walking shoes and have some adventure.

Robert Webber, a good friend of ours with an incredible talent for circus arts, will be visiting this weekend! Hoping for a brunch at the Sunburnt Cow, perhaps with our darling Devon in tow, and enjoy the Lower East Side and Alphabet City, and maybe some of our local haunts in the 'hood.

Zero arrives April 1st for a couple of months! VERY excited!! Aaron and I had such an awful landing in New York. No friends, no family, no safety net. We paid an ASTRONOMICAL amount of money for a single room in a ridiculous condo in Park Slope where we lived with, well, some AMAZING human beings who were a little bit anal. It was not a good mix. Never any bad blood or arguments or ugliness, we just weren't best friends, ya know? Anyway - we had no furniture, barely any clothing, no bed, nothing. We slept on the ground with blankets for THREE MONTHS when we got here. We consumed SO much MSG and shitty food that our health started deteriorating.

ANYWAY - I'm rambling; The whole point is:

I am SO happy to be able to help someone else's arrival a little more comfortable. This city is awesome. The energy is amazing, the people are powerful and brilliant, and you really can find anything and make any dream come true. However, even though you are surrounded by more people than you have ever been in your life, you can feel extremely lonely. It's not the same lifestyle or pace - and sometimes it takes some time to figure our your rhythm in this race.

Also, for my own personal reasons, I am very stoked to have one of my good friends out here to hang out with in this new Universe!

Job hunt is still chugging along :/ I am so sick of not getting calls. It's never been this hard for me. I don't mean that to sound brag-y. I just mean that... I've never not even gotten calls. And I've ever had this experience of SO many scams when I'm just looking for a job. I guess they hadn't figured out how to super effectively do that to people last time I was looking. Whatever. I go to my court dates, I join all the freaking job hunt websites, I work on my resume and write countless cover letters... I guess I just have to keep on trying. Very hard not to feel discouraged. I send out resumes 7 days a week. Yarg.

I need canvas. What else is new?!

Reiki Level 2 in a couple of weeks. Still manifesting money. :/

Crazy Sun Over Buffalo

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Hey, Universe!

Come on with the job hunt, eehhhh?

:]

I love Franklin Ave.: An Incident on Franklin and Looking Out for Neighbors

I love Franklin Ave.: An Incident on Franklin and Looking Out for Neighbors:

"While it's admittedly tricky business in a rapidly-changing neighborhood where we don't know everyone (and where tensions generated by gentrification work against affective ties), looking out for neighbors isn't just a sign of community, it's a route to building community. This doesn't mean calling the police every time someone looks different, or putting oneself in harm's way. Everyone has different levels of comfort with these sorts of things, but eye contact, greetings, and simple questions can go a long way toward both assessing the state of a situation."

Precept 2

"Do not WORRY, for FEAR is Distraction"

This precept is very difficult for me.

I am a very, very anxious person. I have now meditated on this particular one 3 separate times -- I've done it more than the others (at this level,) because I know it's going to be the hardest to deal with. It's a very intense experience. My body enters this state of discomfort and I feel like I can't keep my muscles still. Anyone who's ever experienced or read about restless leg syndrome - you could easily liken it to that experience. But all over. I can feel my eyelids flutter and my fingers move.

Uncomfortable images come to me while I am in this state. Usually times in my life that my anxiety got to an unmanageable level. Starting a new job and bursting into tears just outside the door. Shaking uncontrollably, losing the ability to breathe properly. It's a mess, and I've been a mess many, many times. I am working very hard at looking at these images as they come to me, and letting them go. These images that come up are representative of an uncomfortable moment in my life that I have yet to work through and let go.

I realize that if I am putting my consciousness towards these things and letting them weigh on my mind and spirit that I am wasting energy - putting my attention towards things that happened 5 years ago (which means I GOT THROUGH THEM,) that I am Distracting myself from the task at hand. It is impossible to pay attention to the NOW if I am worrying and constantly considering the reactions of 50 strangers who saw me really upset on some cold winter morning in 2007. I need to let go of lots of pain and lots of confusion and lots of DISTRACTION.

Onward and upward!

Precept 1

"Do not ANGER, for anger is illusion"

When I meditate on anger this is what I feel.

This precept, to me, came last part first. "Anger is illusion" kept running through my head. As I continued to meditate images of waves crashing on a beach popped into my head and stayed there until a thought occurred to me: A wave crashing on the beach is not the thing in itself - a wave crashing on a beach is merely a symptom of something much larger. A wave crashes on the beach because of the moon and the Earth and the plates moving. Much like a wave crashing on the beach, although it seems powerful and strong thing - anger is merely symptom of a much larger problem. When there is anger, there is imbalance. Where there is anger, there is a distraction from the task at hand - a distraction from NOW. When you allow anger into your life you are allowing everyone else's negative energy into your life.

Anger is a hard thing for me. I grew up in an angry home. I've had a fair share of very, very tumultuous and angry relationships. Anger is almost comfortable for me, to borrow words from a Reiki practitioner that I met in class. Anger was our form of communication growing up - it seemed to be the only way to get a person to listen to you.

My journey through anger is going to be interesting and difficult. I tend to fly off the handle and live life on the verge of EXPLODING into some kind of rambunctious emotion at any moment. Meditation on anger means I am going to relive and be forced to recount unresolved anger living inside me. There are countless things that make me angry that play through my head on any given day - things that happened years and years ago - something that happened a week ago. I am going to look at things moments in time and let them move on - literally and figuratively pass through my mind and be washed away to be let go.

We'll see how it goes. :]

Very Exciting Things

Many things are happening - not much posting - but things in the REAL world!

Reiki level I classes start tomorrow - two days of super intensive energy work! Awesome. A couple of trips are in the near future - a cousin's wedding and perhaps HARRY POTTER WORLD??? What? That's right. Also - LOTS of folks coming to town. Robert Webber is coming to visit for a few days, and then Zero arrives for a mutually beneficial short-term stay! Looking forward to having a Craiglist buddy. Lots of job job jobby job hunting. I also got GOOD news from my family for the first time in, oh, ever maybe. So that's a bonus, too.

The last few days with Aaron have been adventurous. Trips to Milk Bar and friends houses and beauuuutiful walks in freezing cold, bright blue weather. It's lovely.

Still looking to get a super awesome musical project happening - wheels are turning. :]

Need canvas.

Precious Benny and His Nearly Toppled Cup

Too cute.

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Jetplane

Having played muh geetar in yurrs. First thang in the mornin, haven' even used muh voicebox yit.

Ok, How About Something Good?!

That's it.

I need to put some more positivity out there.

It's hard to think sunshine & rainbows when everything has been frozen over for the last 4 months only to thaw into grey and wet, depressing days. It's hard to be positive when job searches are met by nothing but scams and fraud through those darling sites such as Craigslist. (Thanks SO much to Lauren Fiata for the hookup on a couple really awesome job sites!)

I might as well take advantage of this newfound free time even more than I have been. I've been painting often (never as often as I'd like. Serious shortage on canvas around the apartment..) and trying to meditate regularly. I have a goal and a payment plan arranged with The International House of Reiki to start my classes in a few days (March 5th & 6th!)

I do have an annoying ass FOLLOW UP appointment with Workforce 1 regarding my employment. How pleasant. I love being shooed from room to room for 3 hours before sitting with a person who will NOT make eye contact with me for 2 minutes to tell them I've been all over the internet and Craigslist and that I have an updated resume and am actively seeking employment.

What I'd really like to do is start seeing the freakin sites. It's so strange that once I finally had the time that of course the money goes by the way of the dinosaur and then the planet seemed to just freeze over (here in the East, anyway..) and it's been rough going. I mean, who wants to run around when it's -5 degrees outside? We've had more snow in NY than ever recorded on record by over 60%. I was snowed in for the first time in my life -- how crazy is that??

This entry is a little disjointed.

I want to write more, I want to be more active with my friends. I want to go see that statue everyone's talking about, and first Saturdays at the BK Museum. I want to go the East River Park, because it's hilarious that it even exists. (No, really.) I want to go upstate, see people I haven't seen in a long time. I want to keep baking cookies for the coffee shop, and keep working towards getting the art shows up and running again throughout this seemingly endless term of transformation and construction down there.