pandemic diaries: month 13

Spring has sprung!

Poppies in full bloom at Serpentine Prairie.

I wasn't going to necessarily continue these pandemic diaries but it's been an eventful month since my last update marking 12 months of this, so let's make it a baker's dozen, shall we? The biggest development, after 384 days at home, is that one of two kids is now back at school, in-person, for 2+ hours a day, 2 afternoons a week. It's not much but it's better than nothing! 

Not surprisingly, she loves everything about it except for the fact that her older brother and I walk up the hill to fetch her at the end of the day, meaning she has to walk home. Downhill. It's pretty rough. It's only been two weeks - the week before Spring Break and today wrapping up the week after - and I don't expect anything more, either for her schedule or for the middle schooler, who's still in 100% remote instruction, for the remaining six weeks of this school year. Fingers and toes crossed for a full return to in-person instruction for all Oakland students in the fall.

I keep saying anything less will be a deal-breaker for me in terms of my willingness to remain in this city and perhaps even this state. Actually acting on that "threat" would, of course, be much harder to do, but as we've been somewhat casually looking in the Sacramento area for a few months now (feeling pretty lukewarm about the idea of ever moving there at this point), we decided to travel to Portland, Oregon over Spring Break to check out tentative relocation location number two. In a nutshell, we all loved it. 

Neal and Elias at Pittock Mansion, view of Portland in the background.

It helps that the weather was nearly perfect most of the time, but even figuring in the more typical rain, I think we were all ready to pack up and move there permanently by the end of our four-day visit. My favorite neighborhoods are those surrounding Grant Park, home of the Beverly Cleary sculpture garden. Cute houses on tree-lined streets walking distance to a really nice park and great schools...heck, Daphne would go to Beverly Cleary School, for cryin' out loud! It was good to get a feel for some of the other neighborhoods, as well, which we found to be fairly consistent with our general preference for more centrally located areas with walkability over bigger homes and lots in the more car-dependent suburban neighborhoods west of downtown.

A vegan strawberry cake made from scratch!

All that said, a day or two after we settled back in at home, I was feeling a renewed appreciation for Oakland and the Bay Area in general. Oakland, like probably any city, will wear you down after awhile. Violent crime is up, we can hear sideshows every weekend (sure, I made a 16 Candles inspired cake with an Oakland twist - sideshow + fireworks - pictured above, but that doesn't mean I want to experience them every weekend!), the school district is a hot mess, and now we seem to have an arsonist running around setting community institutions on fire! But I guess I'm trying to be really careful not to repeat - and impose on my family, no less - my usual response to conflict which is to run away from it. How do you double down on a place you love and commit to doing everything in your power to make it better, not just for yourself and your family, but for your entire community? That is not a rhetorical question so please, suggestions accepted in the comments below.

I guess one thing that I'm struggling a little bit with that I've been thinking about a lot since the one-year anniversary of the pandemic is how the past year has affected my relationships with the people here (we have no family in the area so we're not rooted here in that sense). Despite my attempts to reach out and find ways to stay in touch and, more recently, see more of people in-person, safely, there are "friends" I haven't seen since before the pandemic began. Are we still friends? Did the pandemic force folks to ghost their b-list relationships? Needless to say I, like many, I'm sure, am feeling quite a void where any sense of community used to be. And I'm not sure what to do with that realization. Not that moving and starting over would make the process of finding and keeping friends any easier, but I feel like that's essentially what I'm up against here, even though I've lived here for years. Is there a dating app for plutonic relationships? Can we start one??

Anyway, we also have a ton of other stuff going on and perhaps toward what finally appears to be light at the end of this long pandemic tunnel is not the best time to put the kids through still more uncertainty and transition. But we'll keep all options on the table and in the very least revisit the topic in 6-12 months if we're still feeling all these feels. That timeline may change depending on what happens with Oakland public schools in the fall.

Walking through an Olafur Eliasson piece at SFMOMA

Otherwise, following up from my one-year pandemic anniversary update, we've now been to the recently reopened SFMOMA and the Bedford Gallery (my family was even featured in their "family art day" social media coverage!). So lovely to see art again. 

We also saw an outdoor installation by Hank Willis Thomas (above, on view through May), who lived in this neighborhood (Temescal) when he attended CCA for grad school (he's otherwise NY-based), and we try to roll by the Roll Up Project whenever we're in Jack London Square. Renetta Sitoy's work is on view there now through mid-May.

In other viewing, we finished Schitt's Creek (loved it), WandaVision (meh, it was okay), and we're already almost done with The Knick (very intense, very good). What should we watch next?

PS - The above cake was made for our 16th wedding anniversary. 16 years (plus about 8 years before that) with this guy.

Multnomah Falls, about 35 minutes from Portland, OR

PPS - oh yeah, Easter. Neal was away most of the day dealing with the ongoing MIL sitch, but we did baskets in the morning and reserved egg dying/hunting for the late afternoon/evening when he returned, so it was all good. Pretty sure the gig is up, though, for the 8 year old, which is honestly fine by me. I'm not a very good liar.

PPPS - I get my first Pfizer shot on Sunday! Woo!!

pandemic diaries: weeks 25 & 26

Yes, I realize we're almost halfway into week 27. The bad air quality that was just starting to improve when I wrote my last update got a lot worse with more wildfires up and down the entire west coast. 

This picture does not do justice to the ORANGE skies we experienced last week, my iPhone trying awfully hard to auto-balance the apocalypse.

On September 6th, virtually all of California was under an excessive heat warning or heat advisory. We've had a solid month of Spare the Air days here in the Bay Area. It's a sobering realization that even if we weren't in the middle of a global pandemic, the kids would most likely still be out of school due to the smoke and lingering air quality issues. How depressing is that thought? I wonder how California artists, famously inspired by the muse that is the California light, will depict this moment for future generations. How long will this "moment" last?

Color of the year? Some other art world comparisons in this thread.

Today, however, we've experienced some relief, the first day in almost a week that the Air Quality Index (AQI) has dipped back down into the yellow/moderate range. With the AQI being so unhealthy we've been trying to stay mostly indoors and it's been tough. Still very grateful for our health, jobs we can do from home, and the ability to facilitate distance learning, but this has easily been the most challenging stretch of the six-month pandemic so far. 

Last night we found a hummingbird's nest in one of our backyard trees. Hope, via nature.

But things are looking up. For now at least. So how did the past couple of weeks go otherwise? Let's start with a distance learning update. The middle schooler's mini-mester is going well, with Friday this week already the end of the first marking period. His grades are good and he seems to be fairly engaged with his classes, only two of which give consistent "homework" which is, frankly, pretty nice. By about 2-3 p.m. I really don't want to have to deal with schoolwork of any kind. The 2nd grader, meanwhile, is in week 2 of her revised schedule and loving the extra time with her teacher and the return of the weekly "specials" (art, music, garden, PE). The workload is very manageable, she's making progress in the basics (reading, writing, math), and there hasn't been too much complaining about it all. I still look forward to the day when they can return to their school buildings, but it feels like we've settled into a sustainable routine and I'll roll with this rhythm as long as it lasts.

I wrote a little bit in my last update about parent artists. Along some of those same lines, Vulture/NY Magazine reporter Alex Jung wrote a profile of Miranda July in advance of the release of her latest film Kajillionaire. July is an artist I really, truly, unapologetically admire, ever since Learning to Love You More, a collaborative project with her ex, Harrell Fletcher. Jung and July are clearly fond of one another so perhaps that helps explain why all the Miranda July haters were out in full force after the profile was published. I won't go into details because frankly it's not worth your time, but there is some really odd criticism floating around out there that says a lot more about the critics than it does about her or her work. As we like to say in art crits, I think they might be projecting. But perhaps that can be said of all haters? All that negativity aside, my favorite part of the profile was learning that July has kept her 2-bedroom rental even though she and spouse Mike Mills have a different home together with their child. She escapes to that rental one day/night a week and that's when she gets most of her creative work done. Can you imagine? A room house of one's own! Even if for just one day a week!! And before you poo-poo the extravagant expense of renting a second home, most artists spend a decent chunk of change each month on a studio. With rent control figured in, I can't imagine her rent is much more than a large, well-appointed art studio.

Speaking of haters, see also some of the online response to the new Dune trailer. I haven't read the book - yet - but I, for one, am looking forward to this film adaptation.

Speaking of studios, what have I been up to in mine (other than work, that is)? I continue to make good progress on the "100 Days in the Dollhouse" project, and little progress on the screenplay. 

Speaking of "projecting."

It's just so hard to write right now. So much easier to just make shit. 

I'm also giving away - for FREE - the craft kits I put together around the holiday season of 2018 to sell in my now-defunct Etsy shop. 

So far I've sent out about half of what I had left. If you'd like a kit, or two, or six (if you want more than 6, reach out directly), fill out this form. I promise not to use your info for absolutely anything else, unless you want to receive a possible, future newsletter, in which case you can provide an email address. Totally optional.

Oh yes I did.

Hair salons reopened, but playgrounds are still closed. Also reopening later this month is the de Young museum in San Francisco! I can't wait to go.

Killer BLAT from The Buther's Son in Berkeley. ZOMG.

Vegan bacon. What more do you need to make the transition? Personally, although I'm still eating eggs, I'm trying to be more consistent about avoiding dairy. It's hard. Cheese is so damn delicious.

In movie night news, I finally finished reading The Secret Garden to the 7yo (mostly; the 12yo would also occasionally listen in). The plan was to watch the most recent film adaptation but after reading reviews and watching the trailer again, we went with the 1993 version instead. I want to see the 2020 version (and maybe the 1987 version again, too, which also features Colin Firth, the father in the newest movie, in a very small role at the end....but wait, there's more! You can watch the 1949 version for $3 on Amazon Prime but the 1919 silent film adaptation is sadly "lost"). We're reading Alice in Wonderland now.

Finally, another post that ends with the yet another cultural loss. RIP David Graeber. Not sure I ever wrote about it here, but his ideas about "bullshit jobs" really resonated when I heard him on the Hidden Brain podcast, about a year after I quit my last job. 2020 is simply relentless.

pandemic diaries: week 24

Air quality last week improved here and there (although there were still a couple of days we were stuck inside) so that was nice. 

Palos Colorados Trail hike on a moderate AQI kind of day.

As I mentioned in my last update, I realized with the bad air quality that the thing getting me through many (most?) days over the past six months is the ability to go outside for a walk, hike, or run. Whether solely because of that or not, the last couple of weeks have been incredibly challenging on many levels. 

7yo is suddenly obsessed with basketball. Unfortunately, we've noticed a ghost town like trend of first the nets and then the entire baskets being removed, to dissuade groups I assume. Sigh.

In distance learning news, the 7th grader finally got his mini-mester schedule so every weekday he now has three classes, plus advisory and Jazz Lab two days a week. So far, so good. It's nice (for me) for him to have more to do. It was a tough week for the 2nd grader, who had to do an online reading assessment that took her four sessions to complete. Not fun. I'm hoping the customized program it generates will be worth the frustration. Her schedule will receive a little shake-up next week when elementary schools (or, at least, her's) transition from the district-wide "strong start" plan to more curriculum coming specifically from her teacher, the school "specials" (e.g. PE, art, music), etc. Distance learning is good in that it gives them something to do and I don't have to homeschool from scratch, but it makes for a rather choppy morning full of interruptions for me. Not exactly the best work from home environment but for now it'll have to do. For a minute there in the spring I thought I might be able to parlay my part-time contract position into regular, full-time employment but it doesn't look like that's going to happen anytime soon and honestly it's probably for the best. (For some comic relief, this is a hilarious take on academic pods.)

I discovered pokeweed growing (or being grown) in our neighbor's back yard, poking through and over the fence into our yard. Every part of the pokeweed plant is poisonous, so this discovery is very on-brand for 2020.

As soon as I went public with my intention to focus exclusively on finishing my screenplay during any free/studio time I might have moving forward (typically a couple of hours on the weekend, at best), I suddenly feel even less capable than usual of writing words (as evidenced by this long, awkward sentence), and somehow more motivated to just, y'know, make stuff. So that's what I did over the weekend. 

The project I've been working on for over a year now, collectively titled 100 Days in the Dollhouse, has started to incorporate remnants of an earlier, mostly failed project called 'Heavenly', and has also, of course, taken on new meaning during this pandemic, 100 days turning into many more.

Speaking of kids and art, this tweet about (female) artists successfully juggling their art careers with family life sent me into a bit of a spiral. In a nutshell, it feels like an oversimplified art world equivalent of the stock photo of a working mom with toddler in tow (you've no doubt seen some variation of this) and I resent it so much, especially seeing that kind of "you can have it all" mythology applied to the pursuit of a creative livelihood, which is very different (though not necessarily harder) than a more linear career path. I'm cheating a bit and skipping ahead to this week, but Buffy Wicks driving from Oakland to Sacramento with her newborn so she could vote is a perfect example of how this country penalizes working parents, in particular mothers of newborns and toddlers.

Finally, RIP Chadwick Boseman. I've seen and enjoyed immensely most of his work, most recently his role in Da 5 Bloods. This is a really lovely art tribute by Senegalese artist Bou Bou Design and this is the moving written tribute from 'Black Panther' director (and Oakland native) Ryan Coogler.  

Fuck cancer. Fuck 2020.

The 8 stages of Moana

I've been mulling over this post for a long while, dipping into a third year, as I am, of unemployment-by-choice, less "by choice" the longer I'm unemployed, but still "working" (maybe laboring?) like crazy: as a SAHM (a title I champion while also admitting reluctance in claiming), as a volunteer at my kids' schools and at the animal shelter, on my podcast, on my writing, and on my art. For zero money and not even a ton of feedback. Sigh. Prompted by this article on Etsy's weird evolution, and inspired by rereading my thoughts on wayfinding in the context of my "burning bridges" series about all the day jobs I've had over the past couple of decades (including my own Etsy business), I thought I'd finally try to articulate how I think of Moana in the context of (primarily) women and work. First, from my post on wayfinding:

I've talked with many women who identify with Moana at various stages of her narrative arc. Some have already overcome some major challenge and identify with Moana at the end of the movie, after she learns to sail and (spoiler alert) returns the heart to Te Fiti. I'm not there yet, and certainly one year ago I very much identified with Moana at the beginning of the movie, when she doesn't know exactly what she's after but she knows she's not happy with her current situation.

I guess you could say, two years after writing this, that I'm somewhere in the middle right now. Or, if we're thinking about this in terms of wayfinding versus navigating, I'm in the middle of this current cycle. I'll get to no. 8 eventually...and then something will happen that will put me right back at no. 1 or 2. Without further ado, the eight stages of Moana:

1. The unhappy girl next door.

At the beginning of the movie, Moana is unsatisfied with her current lot in life. What woman hasn't felt this way at least once in her adolescence or adult years?

2. The restless rebel.

She's determined to do things differently.

3. The defeatist.

As the song goes, despite her strong-willed determination, she loves her family and she's accepted her station. She shouldn't have to choose between what her family needs and what she wants and feels compelled to pursue.

4. The determined heroine.

Alas, she cannot deny her deep dissatisfaction with her potential future, and her strong attraction to the sea, coinciding perfectly with receiving the heart of Te Fiti.

5. Tested and discouraged.

Please note: this may happen more than once in any given "cycle."

6. The obstacle overcomer.

Atta girl. Did you start a new job? Did you exceed even your own expectations? Congrats! You're at stage 6.

7. Relishing in the reward.

Soak it up. Bask in it. You've earned it. You deserve it. Hell, like the slogan goes, you're worth it!

8. Smug sharer of life wisdom.

Yeah...so, note to those lucky enough to reach stage 8: please be sensitive to where your friends, colleagues, relatives, and acquaintances might find themselves in the Moana cycle. Having a drink with someone in the midst of stage 5? Maybe keep your success story on the DL and offer to pay for her cocktail.

What stage are you on?

what I did last year

This is a post I intended to write in May, as my second academic year of unemployment-by-choice, as I've been calling it, neared an end, an end that began with ten weeks of summer break. But in May I was furiously wrapping up the first season of the Artists in Offices podcast. Check that off the list! For now, at least.

But first, before I get into my goals for this year, a (brief) look back, as I did last year, at the half-dozen blog posts I wrote in 2018-19:

• A recap of the first time I spent 10 weeks of summer "break" with both kids in tow 24/7. Over that long period, I managed to carve out just one afternoon alone to go to a movie I really didn't want to have to wait until it was streaming on Netflix to see.
• A DIY version of Arby's Jamocha shake for National Chocolate Milkshake Day. I mean, why not?
• As if my crazy cat lady status wasn't already official, I wrote a cat-themed parody, with accompanying music video, of Sophie B. Hawkins' 'Damn, I Wish I Was Your Lover'. Blog post here, in case this requires further explanation.
• A late fall podcast status update.
• Once the podcast launched, I wrote a fairly thorough summary of how the project went from idea to podcast, and everything in between.
• And, over the summer, a little more about what the podcast is about.

So, yeah, the big project of the year was the podcast. But let's take a few minutes to review my original to do list after I left my last day job just shy of 2 years ago.

• I’m writing a screenplay. 

I'm truly, honestly still working on this, I swear. In fact, I was so inspired by my surprising ability to actually finish something big and creative that I decided, once I get caught up on all the things I neglected over summer break, that I'll work on only this in any kid-free time I have each week until it's done. Like, 100% done. Okay, maybe just the first, rough draft. But I'm still catching up. My goal is to be caught up on all the miscellaneous domestic stuff by about Labor Day weekend.

• I need more time to make art in my cozy little backyard studio.

I feel pretty good about where I am in my studio practice after this two-year recovery period. At some point last year I declared Heavenly a necessary failure that was successful in transitioning me back into a more consistent creative routine. I've since devoted most non-audio studio time to a newer body of work collectively titled dollhouse/100 days in the dollhouse/I see things that nobody else sees (I should probably pick one title at some point...). It mostly lives on Instagram at the moment, but I'm excited to see how this project evolves over the course of the next 9 months or so. Like a fetus gestating in my studio womb. (Too much?)

• I’m starting a podcast (and/or support network) about(/for) other artists in offices.

Done! The first season is complete, with a trailer, 10 full-length interviews, 2 bonus episodes around formal art training, and 2 bonus episodes catching up with the artists who quit their day jobs after our initial interviews. I'm currently exploring next steps. I'd like to continue the interviews, with a season devoted to parent artists, and for any creative book editors/publishers who might be reading this, I really feel like this could be a book. An authored book with contributing interviews and such, right? So call me, okay?

• I'm going to revive my boutique wedding invitation design business. 

Uh, quite the opposite, actually, since I finally shuttered this business in December 2018, after years of limping along (the last time that income from my micro biz offset the minimal costs of running said biz was in January 2013, before my now 6 1/2 year old daughter was born). I'm still interested in design, just like I'll always be crafty and make stuff, even if I never have another art show. But running a business on Etsy just isn't what it was in the early days.

• I’m working on a kids’ book based on the Cosmos series, starring a cuddly tardigrade as Neil deGrasse Tyson.

Zero progress made on this front. Also, do we still like Neil deGrasse Tyson? I'm not sure we do.

• I’m planning to volunteer at the cat cafe until they just give me a job.

I no longer volunteer at Cat Town, spending all of my volunteer hours (about 4 a week, usually on one weekend afternoon) at Oakland Animal Services instead. I spend time in adoption as well as in the back of the shelter as part of both the kitten and cat "crews". If what I do as a volunteer there was a job, I'd apply in a heartbeat.

• I’m compiling a “quit your day job” bibliography that will eventually be turned into a manuscript for a self-help book with the working title: “Little Boxes: How to get out of the office and into the studio...” (or something like that).

This has morphed a bit to focus on the podcast audience in particular, but it's still very much a work in progress. 

• I'm going to figure out how to make hand-stitched felt phone cases for Android, minus the carpal tunnel syndrome.

Nope. Nothing. I got nothin' on this one. Not sure I ever will. When I checked in with Laura Torres, the second artist I interviewed for the podcast, who'd quit her day job for a few months to focus on her creative practice, she wrote this in her email update and it really resonated with me in terms of all the random creative/crafty stuff I think I want to do in my spare time: "When I was working a day job, I always thought I wanted to do all this other stuff. But I am realizing some of that was a sort of escapist fantasy." Same. I can't say I miss making those phone cases, so why devote precious time on that now? (And if you'd like to hear more from my follow-up conversation with Laura, check out the bonus episode here.)

• I’m developing recipes for a cookbook called “Sweet on Oakland: Cookies Inspired by Oakland Neighborhoods".

No cookbook (yet), but I did make a few new cookies over the past year, mainly because I donated a six-month cookie subscription to my kids' school's fundraiser last fall. I still need to post recipes for the last couple I completed. Shelving this project for now to make time for all of the above.

So what's new this year? Well, if my extra debut in Season 2 of The North Pole is not the breakout role I'm fully expecting it to be (I'm kidding, of course), find another day job, basically. In a perfect world, I'd finish my screenplay and find some sort of funding for the podcast while I'm reviewing 7-figure offers on the screenplay and making sure it actually gets made into a movie. But until then, I can't not work forever. So wish me luck, friends, and stay tuned.

Damn I Wish I Was Your Kitty

As promised in my 2017-18 round-up post this past May, I finally finished a pretty silly video to accompany the cat-themed parody I wrote of Sophie B. Hawkins' 1992 song 'Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover'. I have this habit of singing my own lyrics to a variety of songs, made up on the fly, usually while trying to get my kids to do something when they're stalling. It's very improvisational and they're usually pretty corny. But sometimes it works. And singing is a proven stress reliever, so if nothing else, it helps me refrain from yelling at my kids all the time.

This habit overlapped serendipitously last spring with researching pop songs of the early 1990s as part of my screenwriting prep (yes, I'm still writing a screenplay). I wrote the lyrics, loosely dedicated to the plight of the adult shelter cat, in March or so, but finally finished and posted the video just yesterday. It's a little embarrassing and I put this project off many times due to utter absurdity, but always felt compelled to return to it (like my lice-themed parody of Hamilton's 'Wait For it' - video for that is up next! And by "up next" I mean in six months or so). A video of me singing along, featuring the newer addition to our cat family, Wolfi, is cut with shorter videos of mostly adult cats at Oakland Animal Services, where I volunteer every weekend. Give it a watch, share it if you have any (crazy or sane) cat ladies (or dudes), and most importantly, adopt your next companion animal from your city shelter and by all means, spay and neuter your pets!

pay for it

Yeah, so, yesterday was a parenting milestone for me. And by milestone I mean, barring a diagnosis of cancer or death by freak accident, one of the worst days of my tenure so far as a parent. Not only did my newly minted nine year old have the virus his four year old sister had exactly one week before (nausea, fever, congestion, fatigue), on Wednesday evening, in response to furious scalp scratching, I checked and confirmed not one, but TWO cases of head lice. I removed several live bugs from each kid's head. Yuck.

We hadn't yet experienced this common nuisance. For something so common, the level of misery was surprising and is, to some extent, ongoing. Because it was my first time, both kids had it, and I was dealing with it solo, I decided to go to a nit removal salon. Doesn't that sound nice? A day at the spa, if you will. The four year old, with her long hair that takes five minutes to detangle at least once daily,  managed pretty well through what is apparently not a terribly pleasant experience. My son, on the other hand, who refuses to comb his shaggy hair, ever ("I like it messy!"), shut down after the professional nit picker (?) pulled a comb called "The Terminator" through his hair maybe three times. I seriously threatened to cancel his birthday party tomorrow if he didn't quickly learn how to deal with a little discomfort in this life.

Long story short, both kids were treated, the nine year old now sports a summer buzz cut, the house is ridiculously clean, and combing through everyone's hair with a $20 accessory* is now a critical component of our morning and evening routines. At least until we go back for a head-check early next week. I'm feeling pretty in touch with my primate roots, let me tell you.

*Do yourself a favor and order one of these from Amazon RIGHT NOW. If you're a parent, it's only a matter of time before this hell will visit your home. Be prepared and save yourself ten bucks. Then you can go to a real salon and treat yourself to whatever self-care you can purchase for ten bucks (upper lip wax, perhaps?).

Anyway, we were listening to Hamilton this morning, as one does while getting ready for the day, and when 'Wait For It' came on and it got to the part where Aaron Burr sings "Life doesn't discriminate..." I got an idea for a cathartic way to process the big emotions I've been experiencing over the past 48 hours. If you're a parent, a Hamilton fan, and you've experienced this common misery before, this is the anthem for you.

Edited on September 6, 2017 - tweaked some of the lyrics and added a verse to create a complete parody! Stay tuned for the video (no, really).

Pay For It
(set to the tune of Wait For It from the Original Broadway Cast of Hamilton soundtrack)

The kids come home from school at the end of the day.
I’m making dinner when I tell ‘em “put your toys and games away!”
The 4 year old complains her head is itchy,
near her ears and the nape of her neck.
That tickly sensation in the hair…
Infestation, oh heck!

Lice doesn't discriminate
Between the curly
and the straight
It lays all its eggs and it stays
And we keep picking anyway
We cringe and we cry
And we clean
And we wash all the sheets
And if there's a solution, ain’t gonna lie,
After all the other remedies I’ve tried
Then I'm willing to pay for it
I'm willing to pay for it

And now a call from the 9 year old’s 4th grade teacher,
It’s like a really bad horror movie double-feature.
So many different treatments,
But which ones are pesticide-free?
Vinegar and peppermint oil,
Guess it’s better than DDT.

Lice doesn't discriminate
Between the curly
and the straight
It lays all its eggs and it stays
And we keep picking anyway
We cringe and we cry
And we clean
And we wash all the sheets
And if there's a solution, ain’t gonna lie,
After all the other remedies I’ve tried
Then I'm willing to pay for it
I'm willing to pay for it

Pay for it!

This is just one of those things I cannot control!
We practice good hygiene,
Never had a problem before.
I checked their heads after the last outbreak,
The nits were too small to see,
They’ve been lying in wait!

Parenthood feels like an endless uphill climb
Found so many live lice
Put all the brushes on ice.
It could be worse,
but this comb-through’s taking all my time.

(What if I shave her head?)

Lice are human parasites,
You might sleep light
because they bite and they’re active at night.
Their nits warm while they incubate.
Lay eggs every day.
And they’ll mate, make no mistake!

So if there is a cure
That gets my lice-free kids back to school,
Then God dammit
I’m willing to pay for it,
I’m willing to pay for it!

Katy Caboose, Hopeful Romantic

As I’ve mentioned more than once, juggling kids and creativity with the need to make a little cash is challenging, to say the least. But there is one small advantage to having less time to make art: I have plenty of time to think about and mentally edit current projects while I’m wrangling kids, between the elusive and fleeting moments of productivity. This frequent experience forces a somewhat impulsive and impatient person like myself to, as my coworker regularly reminds me, “hit the pause button.” Spending time at work and, more importantly, with my kids, also opens me up to sources of inspiration I might not come across otherwise, like the book that’s been on recent rotation in my toddler’s bedtime routine: The Caboose Who Got Loose.

Katy Caboose is, simply put, disappointed with her life. She dislikes being jostled and bumped at the back of the train, not to mention the endless cloud of smoke caused by the engine up front. Her journey as caboose takes many turns and bumps that cause her near-constant fear and anxiety. But it’s all relative, right? Maybe she just needs an attitude adjustment. Indeed, one night at the train yard, her situation is put into perspective by the sad little shack of the switchman, who envies Katy and tells her that. Taken aback, she doesn’t have a chance to respond to the shack before being re-hitched to the train, but the experience gives her a new outlook on her lot in life, albeit only temporarily. After a short time, she finds she’s still not happy being a caboose at the back of a train, wishing instead to be a tree, or a house, or a little cabin in the woods, with a view and fresh air. Simply put, Katy cannot deny her deep dissatisfaction, no matter how many sad, little shacks tell her she doesn’t really have it all that bad.

I don’t want to give away the ending for anyone who hasn’t read it yet. It’s a great little read with wonderful illustrations by Bill Peet. I recommend you read it, even if you don’t have a kid to read it to. But I will say, following up on something I recently posted on Facebook about how disappointment gets a bad rap (courtesy of the always great Brain Pickings), that I can really identify with Katy at this particular moment in the book, conflicted between her overwhelming feelings of unhappiness, self-doubt around the legitimacy of those feelings, and the fear that comes with making a change. Disappointment is what we risk when we strive for more (not unlike the relationship between loss and love). And that striving is at the heart of what it means to be an artist.  As Geoff Dyer writes in White Sands, “When I am no longer capable of disappointment the romance will be gone: I may as well be dead.” Indeed, I think it’s not only okay to admit disappointment but perhaps even embrace it as a catalyst for closing the gap between the work you do for pay and the work you do for love.

And indeed, oh indeed, yes indeed I really do. At least, I hope that’s the case and that my story ends as satisfactorily as Katy’s, hopeful romantic that she is.

it must be bunnies

It's been an odd couple of months and this post will be a little odd, likewise. Humor me. As the busy-ness of my day job settles down, following the academic year as it does, I finally have a little bit of mental wiggle room to reflect back and plan forward. Let's start with the former and I'll get to the latter over the next week or so. Because I've been doing a lot of planning for summer projects and goals over the past few days, but I need another day or two to flesh things out a bit more, as they say.

A month or so ago, right before Prince died, I was thinking again about David Bowie. His song 'Fame' came on the radio one day while I was in the car, and that song always reminds me of Pretty Woman. And I just thought, how silly it is that all of these people I admire, from relatives to friends to artists and musicians, have these profound memories of Bowie, about how they owned a certain album - on vinyl, no less! - or how Bowie inspired them to be whoever they wanted to be, however unique that vision might be, male, female, whatever... And, me, I thought back to a movie that I watched multiple times as a budding teenager.



Then when Prince died I was struck with an almost identical memory, flashing back to the bathtub scene in that same movie, where Julia Roberts' character is singing along to Prince's 'Kiss', with Richard Gere's character secretly watching her, unbeknownst to her and her earbuds. "Don't you just love Prince?"

I do. Not that the two deaths need comparison, and I was incredibly shocked and saddened by the loss of David Bowie, but Prince's death, as far as celebrity deaths go, affected me a little more. I have so many memories of his music and the movie 'Purple Rain', all of which extend way beyond Roberts' brief bathtub rendition of a couple of lines from one popular song.

For some reason that I think has to do with my recent interest in serendipity and stuff, I found comfort in the fact that artist Amanda Parer's giant, inflatable rabbits (technically titled 'Intrude' which is appropriate if you didn't dig their presence then and there as much as I did) were witness to San Francisco's tribute, with City Hall donning purple lights for one night after Prince died. We had just taken the family to see the rabbits the weekend before and they were deflated a few days after the Prince tribute.

Because who's not cheered up by the sight of giant, inflatable bunnies, you know? (Well, everyone except Anya, I suppose. I can almost always work in a Buffy reference, after all...)

my week: 6 to 7 per cent me time

In some ways having a day job is easier than staying home with my kids, especially since one of them isn’t yet in school (I haven’t experienced this yet so I can’t say for sure, but being a SAHM with school-age children, i.e. children who are gone 5 to 6 hours most days, seems like it might be a slightly different sort of gig than what I’ve experienced thus far, especially for creative types like myself). While I do miss having a little more time with my kids and certainly the flexibility being home provided, I’m enjoying hanging out with other grown-ups and having my own little quiet office nook, even though the work I do there is not my own. 

I love pouring that first little cup of coffee from my Copco thermos after I get in and get settled at my desk. My best days are the busy ones, the ones dotted with meetings, when I feel most productive and, frankly, do less of this dreadful sitting thing. I’m good at supporting other folks’ work and appreciate the sort of bird’s eye view I’m getting of the college by working in the president’s office.

But the past couple of months have also sort of intensified the kind of soul-searching I feel I’ve been doing since last summer, when I made the decision to, first, be a full-time stay-at-home-mom, no longer capable of supporting the cost of childcare through my Etsy shops, and then, shortly thereafter, seek outside employment. This week, during a lunch break at work, I started to list all of the different things I need and, more importantly, want to do in the 168 hours we have each week. It’s kind of stunning how little time I have to tackle the “other/me” portion of my to-do list.

Sigh.

But! I’ve found much inspiration and amusement this week, too, and I wanted to begin sharing/archiving that stuff on a regular basis. Since I’m a self-described "visual artist, crafty generalist, dance enthusiast", I thought I’d categorize my findings similarly.

ART

If you saw my thesis exhibition back in ’07, you’ll understand why I’m digging these “cinema snowglobes” designed by faculty members at the college where I work.

I’ve followed fellow Oaklander (for now, anyway) and artist Lisa Congdon for a couple of years, ever since I learned about how Cody Foster & Co. was ripping off her illustrations.  Potential downside to reaching your tipping point, perhaps? Anyway, for some reason her work and advice have really resonated with me lately, including this week’s interview with Monica Lee of Smart Creative Women.

RIP fellow painter and dance enthusiast Helen Frankenthaler.

CRAFT (and design and stuff)

Early this week, a bunch of puff pieces celebrating the “handmade” success of Etsy seller Three Bird Nest went kinda viral. Abby Glassenberg wrote a post that digs a little deeper (and gained a new follower!). Three Bird Nest aside, Abby’s got a great blog, newsletter, and books for creative freelancers. (Between Lisa and Abby, I have a lot of reading to do…)

Oh, and Etsy is going public. Here are 9 things we’ve learned about the company this week.

It was a busy evening of following links and checking out tutorials on Makezine a few nights ago - turn your handwriting into a font plus a deceptively simple surface design hack.

No baby? No problem! Carry your small dog around in a hand-crocheted carrier. For realz.

When life gives you snow, make typographic messages on strangers’ cars?

DANCE (and everything else)

A conference call in real life. Funny because it’s so accurate.

This article is like the Delaware scene in Wayne’s World but I have to post it here because it’s oddly relevant to the introduction of this particular post. Yep, I’m a clean freak and while I appreciate well-intentioned advice to “let it go” or hire a housekeeper in order to find more time for myself, it’s unlikely to solve my dilemma entirely.

A quick glance at the Lean In Together campaign with Getty Images appears to be setting the same unrealistic expectations on working dads. If you’ve been reading my blog recently, you know how I feel about mixing work and parenthood.

Finally, the dress is blue and black. Obviously.

See you next week. And maybe in between. Have a great weekend enjoying your, if you’re anything like me, 6-7% of you-time. You deserve it.

reverse sweatshop

About a week ago, cozied up with my smart phone after both kids were in bed, I was struck by a sponsored ad in my feed from Minted, urging me to check out their "unique" wedding invitations by pointing me to this design, a truly classic example if ever there was one, featuring a mix of script and block font in black ink on white paper, taking me back to my grad school day job days at Crane & Co. (more on that one-year gig in a future "burning bridges" post). Lovely though that design may be, "unique" it most certainly is not. I fired off a couple of cranky tweets about it, even engaging with the person who runs Minted's tweets a bit, and upon more digging, discovered that the designer, Cheree Berry of Cheree Berry Paper, formerly at kate spade, was the lead designer on that company's line of stationery, which was a collaboration with Crane & Co., a couple of years before my time. So it's not surprising that my first thought when I saw Minted's example of a "unique" wedding invitation was the same company that has printed the "the stationery, invitations and announcements for the White House."

Am I jaded and bitter? Sure. After all, Cheree Berry is living the independent designer's life I've wanted ever since giving up pretty much any dream of my own art practice and/or teaching. To go from working at kate spade (I love kate spade) to successfully running her own design business and custom stationery line is pretty impressive. And I should be happy for others, right? Good for her. But there's part of me that's genuinely disgruntled with companies like Minted, who have managed to create an online shopping experience one notch above Costco Christmas cards, but with the added guise that you're directly supporting an independent designer. You are, kind of. Designers are invited to submit designs in response to specific design "challenges." If those designs get enough votes from the Minted "community", they'll be included in the site's offerings. In addition to cash prizes for 1st place, 2nd place, and so on, designers get a 6% commission of sales. Wow, 6%. Makes the standard gallery commission of 50% look pretty damn generous.

It's hard enough for independent wedding vendors, you know? It's an incredibly saturated market of indie designers alone, on top of competing with sites like Wedding Paper Divas. And don't even get me started on Etsy. Have you seen that Portlandia sketch called "Reverse Sweatshop"? Season 4, episode 7 (I've been on a bit of a Portlandia kick lately.)



That's how it feels to be a seller on Etsy (or, I'd imagine, an "independent" designer with designs on Minted). There's this weird evolution happening, where it began as a forum for independent designers but ultimately followed the path of any big company, where I find myself trying to figure out ways to mass-produce my previously handmade products, now considered prototypes, so that I can attract wholesale accounts that will charge twice what I earn directly from my customers. Wait, what?

Anyway, just as things were starting to pick up toward the end of summer, after fully reopening my shop just about a year ago now, views, favorites, and sales plummeted. Crickets. Seriously. There was much chatter in the Etsy forums about what might be causing so many previously successful shops to die overnight. I'm still not sure. Things picked up a little as summer turned into fall, and I quickly wrapped up a handful of save-the-date and holiday orders, but by Thanksgiving I was polishing off my resume and applying to "real" jobs. Fast-forward a couple of months and I'm now three plus weeks into my latest office gig. I'm not sure what I'll do with my Etsy shops. Business is so slow that it doesn't really matter. I'm working on another post that digs into this six-year adventure a little more deeply. Stay tuned.

I have bitchy resting face.

First there was the art series and street campaign that hit Oakland a few months ago - it was called 'Stop Telling Women To Smile More'. Brooklyn artist Tatyana Fazlalizadeh wheat-pasted large-scale posters of women well, not smiling, in public places. That's cool. I saw one posted near the MLK Jr. Way entrance to the MacArthur Maze. The posters were also on view locally at the Betti Ono Gallery.

How many people do you suppose saw those? 5 million? Ish? Well, that's how many views this video has so far:



Hey, that's the girl from the AT&T commercials! Best part? "Um, ok!" Anyway, I'm so glad this issue is getting some exposure. After all, I too have bitchy resting face. Exhibit A:

A candid shot taken while touring Plymouth, MA, back in '06, which I blogged about here. Seriously, though, who knew this was a common experience for so many women? I can't tell you how many times I've been told, always by a man, that I should smile more.