I was in a bit of a slump there for a while. I wasn’t working very much. I’ve been tired, so I’ve been working on those little embroideries, which seem to take me forever. 

While working on those, I can at least listen to audiobooks. I don’t know if that slows me down or not, but it’s seemingly making me get them more precise as I go along. I guess practice makes better, but never perfect. I have to wear those crazy magnifier glasses, though. They aren’t the most comfortable, but my eyesight is the worst it’s ever been. I really don’t have a choice. 

I see now that the pill bottle embroideries take at least 5.5 hours. Sometimes more. I was just thinking of how to price that whole installation, and there’s no way I’d ever sell it or even really make my money back, even if I gave myself a lower hourly wage with the cost of materials. I guess it’s just for the point of it to look cool, if it even does. The “Me” embroideries take less time, but I don’t know by how much yet. I haven’t been keeping track of those because I’m trying to get the harder ones done first. I only have eight of the pill bottles done so far. Sixteen of those more to go, and eighteen more of the Mes. It’s going to be a while.

If I think that’s going to take a bit, I started the triptych that’s also all stitching, which is more of a pain than I expected because it’s been super duper tricky to poke and pull the stitching from behind the stretcher bars at all the edges. It would have been easier to stitch the whole thing off the stretchers and then pull the canvas over the bars when it was done, but I can’t do such things, don’t have the tools anymore, can’t afford to pay someone else, and don’t have the hand strength. So, whatever. Doing it the hard way. 

I do have a curved needle to help out a little, but I’m pretty lazy about constantly re-threading. It will take as long as it takes.

I finally pulled in the bigger canvas that had been sitting in the garage for a while. Early this morning, I sketched out the basic composition that I’ll be painting on it. Do I like it? No idea, but I’m going to execute it the best I can. The skeleton is there, and I have a few ideas on how to make it interesting-ish. We’ll see. Now, it’s a matter of not procrastinating and actually working on it. (By the way, these pictures are dark because it’s still dark outside right now.)

I also have a very small linen piece I’m about to put the sketch onto, too. It’s an ode to The Birth of Dan, and it will be called Gimmel Machine.

When I’m working on a lot at once, I get a little overwhelmed, but it’s also nice to have a choice each day when I wake up. I’ll ask myself, what do I feel like working on? The answer is usually, I don’t know!

That’s my life.

I’ve also been planning (already) how many pieces (and which pieces) will be going in my show, which is actually pretty fun. It’s all a temporary plan for now, but it gives me an idea of how many new pieces I’ll need to make to fill the space.

I’ve also rethought the little installation corner. I’m making it a “healing corner” instead of that shaman thing I decided to get rid of. It will just be a shelf of small healing items, like prescription pills, an apple, tea, vitamins, band-aids, chicken soup, etc…

All I know is that I need to work. It’s all for distraction. It’s all toward the show, yes. And I enjoy it, but if I don’t work, my mind wanders into dark territory. It’s exhausting. I wish I could talk/write about it, but I can’t publicly say everything I’d like to. A lot of it has to do with the reports I’d made on my childhood sexual assault that I mentioned a while back. Even though I thought I had no recourse, there was an investigation after all. Well, it’s brought it all back into the light. I’m having a shit time with it. It’s bad.

So, I’m doing what I can to get my mind in a different place. I’m scrambling. It’s not easy. I often need naps. I work, I sleep, then I do it all over again. Thank goodness for them gummies.