Fall Yard and Gardening Day One

I am so grateful to have Frank helping in the complete overhaul of my yard into a functional raised garden and zombie apocalypse, preparedness zone. The goal is to have four garden boxes, a hanging plant awning, and a narrow herb garden by November, winter planting season in Arizona.

The compost is evolving wonderfully! It is turning into a bit of a habitat, which is much more than I expected. I assumed an open compost pile would attract flies and ants, but it did not cross my mind that the garden lizards that roam the yard would also get fat on the spoiled vegetation and the insects. I think we have the largest lizards in the development. The most difficult part of using an open plastic storage bin as compost in Arizona is the consistent need to water it. I save jugs of water in the shed in case of a not so rainy day, and typically have to pour six gallons every other week into the bin. The pile fortunately does not smell as bad as I expected from rotting vegetation. The most exciting part, I began with very little actual soil and now the tub is nearly full to the top with rich black dirt!

With a ten gallon tub of fresh made planting soil I need a place to use it. The ground in the yard is incredibly hard and not conducive to growing at all. Add to the soil issue, the former home owners installed a sprinkler system that has fallen into complete disrepair. Without large sums of money the system is neither going to be repaired or removed. So, I have a large hard surface that I cannot feasibly till into even if my compost is the natural born Miracle Grow. Time for higher thinking and rocks.

Yes, I have half a lawn filled with river rocks! I cannot stand to look at them there are so many. But, rocks are great for potted plant gardening. Placing rocks in the base of a pot allows the water to drain away from the dirt and not over saturate plants. Who needs a pot though when I have plenty of rocks! The plan: lay out a grid of rock bed rectangles. Each bed in this case is about five foot by seven foot. Once the bed is made we will place a fencing stake at each corner and frame the bed with chicken wire. I am not certain on height yet, maybe two feet. Six inches from the internal frame another stake and frame will stand. Now the fun part – use more river rock! Sandwiched in the wire walls we will stack more river rock and create a stone box to fill with compost, soil and tasty, tasty plants!

I am very excited to see this project finally coming together. Granted, Frank and I barely created a single bed of rocks this afternoon, but it is a start and I am proud of it.

Admiration Update

In early March of 2005, I wrote a short journal entry on admiration. This was likely due to a prompt drawn from a bowl of papers with questions on them.

The one person in the world that I admire more than anyone else is.... I really do not know. I mean there are a lot of people in the world who are doing a lot of good things. I admire all of them. At the same time I cannot stand them, because they stand up and say, look at me, I am doing something worth while in the world and you are not. Then they want you to follow them. I guess the people I admire more are the parents of the litters of children. I mean I realize they are getting gads of financial help from doing interviews and ads, but what about the emotional support? I mean, they have to deal with the raising of their kids and making them look and act perfect in front of the world. I can not even raise one emotionally stable child, no less six. If the world were watching me raise my kid I would be the poster child for every abuse case I am certain of it. I am worn out, and stressed out by one kid. I could never, never live through six.

I was knee deep in preschooler troubles at this time and of course, all the cool and collected parents awed me. Admiration ideals have shifted since then. I still commend anyone able to properly raise a functional human, or several, but my son is twelve and very self-sufficient. I must have done something right. Today, I admire anyone willing to risk it all to make dreams happen. This economy especially makes dreaming difficult. I am lucky in many ways. I have an aforementioned well behaved child, a husband willing to take the lion’s share of the bills and friends who support and assist in all ways possible.

I admire those who support me even more than other artists in my position. Zane Grey said something about how he married as any writer should, into money. He was right in that artists need a steady income coming from somewhere. I admire anyone willing to put up with the unstable paycheck, and equally unstable mental state of creative types. I spent my share of time stressed over budgeting, jobs, groceries, and I still do stress, but over the years I have developed a support system that makes it that much easier. Without people to believe in dreams as much as the creator trying to make them solid where would the dreamers be?

My parents never saw the work side of what I do, whether that is writing, dancing or entertaining. They enjoyed the finished product, but never understood that more hours go into that than the final polished piece. It is something taken for granted by many who consume rather than create. It is not their fault, no artist wants the rough cuts out on display, but maybe it would be beneficial. Those who are supportive have seen the work. The late nights, up all nights, and early mornings that lead to a strange sleep schedule and often a moody artist, it makes us hard to live with. It is probably rather like living with a temperamental teenager.

I admire artists who do the dreaming on their own too. Working eight to ten hours per day, sometimes more than five days a week, and drawing up the energy and the will to spend remaining conscious hours doing that work no one will see or understand. We produce what we can, when we can and face the rejection letters, vacant gallery shows, small crowds and cruel reviews of others who have no idea the blood that went into that morsel they devoured and spit out. When it is all over, we return to our offices and workshops and try again. Why do we try? Why do we try to impress people who do not understand? For that dollar, that is why.

And, after we impress the masses enough to make our living through god given talents that will never make us gods, what then? Then, it is still Monday morning, all that we worked so hard to make ours, to live our dreams and make a living doing what we love, it is all drudgery again. We work longer hours, for less pay, doing that which we always wanted to do! Some days, just like those who work the mindless, soulless cube jobs or hard labor, we do not want to get out of bed, but no one understands that. The artist who wants a day off is lazy, a prima donna, possibly strung out. No one ever thinks that for so many years this sleep-deprived individual used to work overtime hours, take care of children, and still made time for his dreams. Can you really blame him for wanting a weekend? There is no such thing as a paid vacation or sick leave in this line of work.

I still admire parents, especially parents still supporting children who grew into artists, but even more, I admire the artists, and more still, those who stand by them. Thank you, from one of those crazy artists.

Bisbee Arizona

Bisbee Pirate Days was the last Arizona stop before the New York leg of the Blackstrap’s Ecstasy Book Tour. The event was wonderful, the bookstore hospitable, and the town of Bisbee, adorable! This was completely worth the four-hour drive into Southern Arizona from Phoenix.

Similar to Jerome, artists and antique dealers reclaimed the former mining town of Bisbee. I love these little towns. In contrast to the bustling, commerce-centric ideals of Phoenix, Bisbee is slow, and friendly and fun. It boasts having the “most perfect year round climate”. It lived up to the motto while I was there. So much cooler than Phoenix though slightly humid, I was actually a bit chilly at night.

I really do not know where to start in explaining the town. We drove in and again much like Jerome worked our way up narrow winding streets with barely a yield sign to direct traffic. I didn’t see a single traffic light! It reminded me of home, in upstate New York. It is much easier to get turned around in Bisbee thought. While Jerome is essentially one winding street up the mountain, Bisbee has a few branches that twist on to one another. Our hotel was blessedly on the main road and at the top of the shopping district.

The Inn at Castle Rock is a lovely 1800’s era hotel and I absolutely recommend staying there if you visit Bisbee. A warning from the start, the parking is severely limited. Carpool if ou intend on going in a large group. The rooms are very small, but in a cozy sort of way, not like a living in a broom closet sort of way. Each room has a private bathroom and plenty of storage space. Our room was quaintly decorated in a Coca-Cola theme; not my favorite, but still Americana cute. None of the rooms have the typical modern hotel frivolous amenities like a television, or an office work area. This is a classic old west set up. There is a very welcoming family room with a television and comfortable seating on the second floor, and a kitchen area with a microwave and fridge, fresh fruit, snacks and coffee. Both areas are open at all hours and completely complimentary. Most of the time, we saw hotel occupants and locals lounging on the verandah or the sitting area on the first floor. If you do need to connect to the modern world, there is free wi-fi. JD made fair use of that while Max and I hit the after hours pirate events.

Day or night there really is a lot to do in Bisbee. From a tourist perspective, the shops and mine tours are absolutely worth a look. Locals have a plethora of friendly bars and restaurants. The town does cater to its artsy denizens but it is family friendly as well. About half the bars welcome families well into the evening. We had to visit Old Bisbee Brewery to seek out Vanessa (my contact for the Pirate Days) and it was the best of the bars, for certain. The brewery has seven of its own ales. Max and I tried two of them. I am sad to say I do not recall the first one, but we fell in love with the Mountain Lime. If you do go I recommend trying the Flight. It is a ring of cordial sized glasses of the seven locally brewed ales. It is a great way to sample and see what you like. When you do make a choice, buy the Growler to take home! A large glass Old Bisbee Brewing Company jug, filled with your choice of beer only costs $16.00. It made a great souvenir to share when we arrived back in Phoenix.

So, I covered accommodations, entertainment of the liquid variety, how about food? Keep in mind you are paying mid-range restaurant prices for quality vittles and nothing near fast food, and you will do fine. We ate breakfast on the second day at Sully’s Café. I wouldn’t say it was a disappointment, but if any of the other places had been open, I think we would have chosen elsewhere. The food was decent for basic ham and eggs. The home fries left a bit to be desired though. Service was reasonable, but you could tell, locals visited to shake off a hangover or for coffee talk. Not horrible, but there are much better places like Screaming Banshee Pizzeria. Max and I were drawn to the pizza place for the rum tasting, and JD was drawn to the idea of pizza and wings for dinner. The rum was mildly disappointing having had the best of the three choices before and not liking the other two at all. The food more than made up for it though. Fresh is the word. Banshee pizza does lean on the gourmet pizza side of the line, but not in the “this is not a pizza” sort of way. It is classic toppings, pepperoni, sausage, veggies, but of a gourmet quality. The cheese was fantastic and gooey without being like a second sauce. The chicken wings were not typical, but again, still great. I am pretty sure they were a Pirate Days special too; Jamaican jerk style flavor. They were very tasty! The atmosphere at Banshee was again a sort of small town bar and grill with an artsy flair. As the evening wore on people mingled and chatted on the porch until the wee hours.

The town of Bisbee exemplifies in my mind how things should be. People take the time to do things and to do them right. Nothing is a slapdash job. Life is slow but steady not lazy but comfortable with little need to rush into anything. Time is valuable to the people of Bisbee is the assumption that can be made by looking at the care that goes into attending to their town, preparing their food, and welcoming their guests. I do not think it is any different than what the town used to be, but they have taken a different spin on it. The miners who once ran this town were salt of the earth, hard working men and women. They had to look out for themselves. While most people did not tour a mining town, people did pass through on business and for business to boom care must be in all that you do. In a way the pendulum has swung for this town, but has not changed course to drastically. The miners came to make something of themselves by taking from Earth’s offerings. The artists are here to care for the wounds left by this but make a living just the same. Bisbee would not be what it is without the work of both types. I hope to take a bit of this hard working mentality with me wherever I travel and in everything I do.

Track Your Time

Track your time. For those who work a drone job in the nine-to-five world our hours are clocked, calculated and compensated. We know if we read that pay stub at the end of the pay period we will see tangible evidence of the energy expelled during that time. Time, our time, has a value, based upon an agreed standard between employee and employer. Is time, not tracked, worth as much? Is energy expelled and not monetarily rewarded still valuable? That is up to he who expelled the energy. So, are you worth it? In so many ways society tends to take for granted the labors of those who do not punch a clock.

When I was a full-time housewife and stay-at-home mother, I did not track the time it took to make meals, clean house, maintain finances, heal the sick, mend items, grocery shop, chauffer, and attend to the plethora of other tasks required. I wish now that I had. To have tangible evidence of just how much energy used in that time would be very motivating in the times when I feel I am not doing enough. In the grand scheme and purpose of the universe, it might be that was the most important job.

A few years ago, I began working for a small business owner. Kathy ran a thriving online storefront selling books and other items. She taught me the value of time. It was the first job I had ever had that demanded I demonstrate how I valued my energy. Kathy required that I track my hours at home as well as in the office (her home); how far I drove, how much money spent on supplies and how to save time and costs. She taught me that everything has value. As a small business, every penny counted. Kathy explained how an ounce and an inch can make a difference in the cost of shipping items out. She explained how she planned her driving to diminish second trips and unnecessary distance. I am grateful to Kathy for so many reasons but her value placed on time most of all.

Today, I apply the lesson Kathy taught to everything I involve myself in. I have a very basic spreadsheet that I open as soon as I turn my computer on in the morning and it is the last file to close before bed. I do not work ‘normal’ jobs. I do not receive monetary compensation all the time from all of my work, but it has a value. The volunteer work I perform for various groups and organizations is valuable to the events and projects they maintain. The housework I complete has value to my friends and family who live or visit with me. My writing hours may not pay off right now, but with dedication those hours may become the most valuable to me personally. I track the hours I put into dance and classes even outside the classroom or performance venue. All the behind the scenes hours count toward that final product the world has privilege to see. I am on the clock as I type this, because it cost something; time and energy! I will never gain back the time and energy, but somewhere, down the line I hope to gain compensation of some form.

Compensation, a word on that; recompense does not have to be monetary, though it is the intent that in some way the return will support my person and if possible my family and household. Much as an internship does not pay the student for work submitted, but in turn offers training in the field he is trying to enter into professionally, some reimbursement takes the form of information without monetary cost. On the flipside of information trade situation, I offer free rehearsal time for two hours every week in my home studio to my most dedicated students. The students receive a free lesson that is fast-paced and challenging. I receive stunning examples to display the work (students) my classes produce. It is advertising with no monetary cost. Trade is often the most profitable option in the current economy and often more valuable than the not so all mighty dollar. Trade, of goods or services, offers both parties the ability to give directly from their personal value system and for each to think about the value of the trade. Volunteer work offers the chance to leave our mark on events and projects and often free or low cost access to things we might not have otherwise been capable of affording. Energy is a resource we have personal command over and complete control over access.

Lack of compensation should be assessed with equal scrutiny! If you are spending more than you are making the system is not working. Do not devalue your work, doing so devalues the work of others in turn. In the years, I have done work with event planning groups I have discovered that emotion costs can get quite high. In tracking hours on a project I makes notes as to how much stress it caused and how much thanks I received. In cases where stress, drama and dealings with easily bruised egos over shadowed the gratitude I count the project as a loss. While I cannot regain lost energy any more than lost money, I can add value to the lesson if I make a promise to myself not to fall into that situation in the future. It only remains a loss if nothing is learned. Evaluate stress and drama in accordance with all parties involved however. Was it only on the part of the other that trouble occurred? This is part of the lesson. If a larger portion of the issues involved your approach, be assured it will happen again. If ultimately the projects that continue, or are projected, to cost more than the return, it may be time to let those projects go.

Over time, no matter how much energy is expelled in the learning process of gain and loss, at some point balance happens. Balance also does not last. Nothing is stagnant and that is good. I am constantly learning how to balance my time and energy budget; some years are better than others. There are projects I am still waiting for a return on. There are projects that ended in an unexpected deficit that the lesson will be the only recompense. There are more and more projects though, that even through trials and glitches have come out more profitable than anticipated. That is the best part of this process. There is no glass ceiling, unless I make one in my thinking. There is no getting fired only finding a position more suitable. The rewards are not always immediate or clear but no matter the debt left, it will be repaid. Always track your time and energy. This is your best method to view how much work you put out. It helps to make decisions concerning future projects. It helps to decide who to work with on the future projects you do decide to work on. It helps you see your faults in dealing with people and situations. Weeks, months, even years past, I have looked back at timesheets and laughed (or cried) at how naïve my view of a situation was.

This is the point I state my opinion; nine-to-five jobs are overrated and undercompensated. I like knowing that I earned the payment I received. I like learning how to make that compensation ever more profitable by learning through mistakes and adjustments in thinking. “Normal” jobs do not reward forward thinking nor educate based on poor judgment. “Normal” jobs punch the clock at a set pay rate the same for every person in the same rank; whether he stands in a space and breathes the air, or runs his mind and body through the motions feigning a hardworking attitude, or creates new ideas and methods, takes risks and makes choices that save the company time and money. This may be the primary reason most people feel the jobs they are in are soul-sucking moments that they will never get back.

I am not making oodles of money, nor do I live a great big house on the hill, but with effort I know I could and that is the most important point. The time and energy that I put into a project, overtime, will multiply to equal success in however I envision success. As housewife and mother, I envision my success as a happy comfortable, welcoming home; an intelligent, polite and healthy family. As business woman, I envision success as making the next year earn more than it cost. As a dancer, I have well educated, confident students. As a writer, I have words I am proud to share with others. In event planning, I am pleased most with an event that covered its costs and allowed other and myself to experience enjoyment. Money is wonderful, but success is not only measured in dollar signs. I live in a comfortable happy household, the people around me are typically entertained and never bored, I go to sleep every night blissfully exhausted, and eager for the next day’s games. And it is, as so often I say in other subjects as well, all just a game. It is all about the Monopoly Money and when the game is over, all the pieces are returned to the box no matter how much anyone compiled during the course of the game.

The items listed in Kathy’s store serve a value lesson as well; all of the items are cast offs scavenged from estates and secondhand stores. Everything has a value to someone and you should be the most valuable item on your list. Please, check out Kathy’s stores and my stores and classes on writing and bellydance. I am, of course, a fan of fair trade for most items, services and lessons. Please, do not hesitate to make a deal!

www.amazon.com/thekatsmeow

www.ioffer.com/stores/thekatsmeowstore

www.amazon.com/80sixed

www.ioffer.com/stores/80sixed

Balance

This is my last calm weekend until all manner of events spanning the next four and a half months! Today is also the most motivated I have been in a very long while. So, the bookshelves are dusted and arranged; all furnishings knick-knacks and surfaces are polished and shiny; old clutter is weeded; compost is full and refrigerator is unfuzzy. Jessica and Shaun mentioned that this is not what a dead weekend should be for. I disagree, when else will I have a full day to take care of much needed expulsion of dirt and disarray?

Before heading to Bisbee this weekend for the Pirates of the High Deserts festival, I am optimistic that I will complete the task of listing stacks more items in my 80Sixed stores on Amazon.com and iOffer.com. Weeding the stacks always feels great and can often be quite profitable. I am a scavenger, primarily, and I am not ashamed at the amount of money saved and made due to this. Listing items is a Zen art for me. It appeals to the library trained cataloger and archivist. It is a project with an end. It has creativity and logical thinking; research; understanding economics; and marketing. Do the words written for each listing count toward my writing word count goal?

While the online store work, writing and housekeeping appeal to my hermit side, I do not mind the adventure of book signings, workshops, classes and performance events. Planning the events has become more appealing though as the years pass. I love writing press releases, meeting with vendors and venue proprietors, contacting media and coordinating participants. Younger, prettier and more energetic individuals are welcome to take over the frontline jobs that the public gets to see. So while I am looking forward with much excitement to the next few weeks of book signings and performances it is good to have a balance.

It is not all work this weekend though we will be grilling and movie watching all evening on Saturday and possibly Sunday too.