Author: Betsy

here comes the rain again.

| Betsy

This summer marks the 14 year anniversary of my first independent music purchase, Yoyo Recordings comp, Throw:

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The fact that I am actually reminiscing about the passage of time makes me break out into a cold sweat. Suddenly, my mind conjures images of my dad’s friends cornering me during holiday parties telling me about how they weren’t quite sure how they ended up an accountant or stockbroker instead of a ship captain or national Scrabble champion.

Then I turn on the television and am bombarded with diet ads and Bob Greene telling me it’s “never too late!” What if you wanted to circumvent the party from the beginning? Not because you wanted to be unruly or angsty, but because you had a better party to attend? Everytime I hear that it is “never too late,” my brain reassembles it to scream, “why did you give up in the first place?”

I feel like we have come full-circle from 15 years ago when I was loving my green Chuck Taylors and swathed in flannel and rabbiting on about new releases on this great new label called Kill Rock Stars. I hadn’t start to care about politics yet (outside of every 7th graders devotion to Greenpeace), but was loving the repercussions of a Republican-era, the rebellion of art and music.

When Dubya was ‘elected’ in 2000, there was talk of taking solace in the fact that whenever our country is under a conservative regime, creativity flourishes. There were some spits and starts, but nothing really like what I saw taking place in the early 90s. In a fit of summertime remembrance and nostalgia brought on by boredom, I have pulled out my old Nirvana and Bikini Kill and Hole albums and have begun to remember that sense of hope that I had when I was 15.

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I have tacked old skate photos on my home office wall and shutout all the bad memories of jaded people wearing ill-suited clothes babbling about ill-suited careers. (The above photo of Sam Cunningham (who is still skating!) is from the August 1988 issue of Transworld. Even though I was horrible at skating myself, skating has never ceased to inspire me.) Because as I scream out lyrics from my teenage years in the solitude of my home, I’m not trying to relive high school. I’m trying to revive some semblance of faith that there is a creative bounty on the horizon.

the start of summer, the end of burnout.

| Betsy

I saw my first firefly Friday night. It blinky-blinked its tail once before disappearing around the corner of my red brick apartment building. In that split second, I was reminded of how life in general is the best when comprised of a multitude of beautifully perfect blips in time. Those seconds that we might miss if we were to blink.

Last summer I returned back to the American south for two weeks, vowing to never spend another summer here where the air is thick with humidity, your pores consisently expel the heat and time seems to slow down because it’s just too damn hot. And yet, here I am, one year later, back in the American south.

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But as I constantly have to remind myself, ‘everything is possible.’ And in this jobless annoyance, I’ve been paying more attention than ever to the possibility that new doors may open if I actually open my eyes.

I’ve been wearing flipflops everyday even though it requires vigilance on keeping my toenails polished and non-chipped. The flip-flop-scuff sound that they make on the asphalt as I walk around town reminds me of the summer I lived at the beach and would take refuge in the roar of the ocean after the sun went down.

I’ve been applying for jobs that are never quite the perfect fit and writing and creating at weird hours and attempting to get hip to the idea that this summer malaise has just begun and will linger until late August at best. In my downtime, I’ve been reading about others who are also stuttering and watching as time flits past and soldiers on as they remain paralysed against an invisible force of inertia. Just when these stories seem to make me feel even more powerless, I discover one that is full of hope and strength and power-rending all the former tales of sorrow useless.

The kids on my street are out of school for the summer and lately they seemed to be delighting in leaving tiny bicycles in the middle of the street, creating an obstacle course for my big car. Hearing them yell and play outside reminds me of the last day of school each year, when we would tear out of our classrooms screaming in excitement that at last freedom was here. The time for swimming and running barefoot and catching fireflies was at hand.

What is it about fireflies that sets my imagination free? I wonder if its the irridescent glow that shines so bright for a second then disappears only to reappear again seconds later in close proximity, but never in the same spot twice. Lately as I continue to read tales of creative burnout and lack of energy, I just want to close my eyes and wish upon the burnout bearer a moment by the edge of the woods at dusk.

If you find yourself in the concrete jungle far apart from the woods, then I bestow on you an extra second to look up at the stars tonight. A moment where you look up in the hope that a shooting star just might pass, that wild crazy sense of hope that has probably been hidden since you were a child, a blip in time where everything seems right and kind and possible.

I’ll admit it, summer is my least favorite season of the year. But somehow, throughout time, it continues to endear itself to me in the tiniest and most astounding ways.

friday dispatch v5.0

| Betsy

Hooray! It’s Friday! Again!

*The work done at Cloth of Gold warms my heart. But then again, creative collaboration is one of my favorite things.

*Go read This magazine, if you don’t feel like perusing the site carefully, I suggest reading this article.

*H-net is good for anyone with a computer interested in the social sciences.

*So is Sage Publications, loads of other nerdy soc sci reading. Thanks to Sage Journals online you can dork out on your desktop, especially useful if you are currently sitting at a desk with no work. Use those brain cells!

*If the thought of reading academic works makes your head hurt, go read about celebrities at Pink is the New Blog!

*Create a Favicon for your website. (No I haven’t made one yet…but one day….one day…)

*While I may not like big companies, I did enjoy learning about the history of the Tater Tot.

*Wash away the corporateness of that last site with a visit to the wonderful Microcosm Publishing.

*Ever since reading a recent post over at Sheep in the City, I can’t stop thinking about sushi cupcakes.

*43 Folders makes me happy. The post about writer’s block has been especially helpful recently!

Go listen to Airiel. Jeremy is rad.

little tools, big message.

| Betsy

Craftivism. What a crazy, combined, silly little word.

However, it exists everywhere. The second you decide to make something instead of buying, the moment that you create your own patterns, the thought you had on the street one day about using your crafty skills to make the world a better place. In case you didn’t already know, craftivism is something that can be done on the comfort of your own couch or in public as a way to show your resistance.

If you are going to be in London June 6th, please consider joining my lovely friend Sonja as well as others for Make My Cross Count:

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A note from Sonja:

Ever been to a cross stitching political demonstration?

Craftivists will be needling politicians outside Downing Street on Monday with a mass stitching of a MAKE MY CROSS COUNT slogan to stir up support for the Make My Vote Count campaign.

Electoral reform is a hot topic after this year’s worst election ever – we’ll be stitching to keep it in the public eye and under the politicians’ noses.

Did you know that:
a.. For every person who voted Labour, almost two voted for other parties and two didn’t vote at all?
b.. It took 26,877 votes to elect a Labour MP compared to 44,521 to elect a Conservative and 96,378 to elect a Lib Dem MP?
c.. In England, Labour polled 50,000 less votes than the Conservatives yet won 92 more seats?
d.. In Tony Blair’s 1997 manifesto he promised a referedum on a change to the voting system, which he hasn’t delivered?

Did you also know that cross stitching is fun? Please come and join in with crafters, activists, MPs and personalities.

Date: Monday 6th June (one month on from Labour’s win)
Time: 7pm-9pm
Place: Richmond Terrace, on Whitehall, opposite Downing Street
Contact: Sonja Todd : sonja@sewkits.co.uk
More information: sewkits.co.uk

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One of the most marvelous by-products of combining craft with activism is the way that people interpret the concept’s hybridity as well as possibilities.

In my heart of hearts, I hope to open up my email tomorrow and have similiar invites to post up here regarding various crafty political events. But if not, that’s okay too, as long as you realise the power and the punch of just one single stitch made with change in mind.

p.s. hooray. it’s june!

memorial day.

| Betsy

The other night I caught a PBS documentary about WWII doctors. I almost threw up at first, but then was entranced by the calm manner in which these once young soldiers, now elderly gentlemen, retraced their own histories. A few times you could detect the interviewee getting a bit misty and shaken remembering the trauma, horror and uncertainty they experienced over half a century ago.

I was reminded of my grandfathers (as well as numerous other male relatives) own WWII stories that I grew up hearing, not really sure how to process them. As a child growing up in the early 80s where Pong was a super fast action game, I didn’t have video games to remanufacture a battlefield. I can only imagine the disconnect that must occur to children today when they hear war stories… ‘oh, that’s just like Level 5 on….’

What did I do today? I went swimming at the lake. My only act of bravery was forcing myself to dive headfirst into water that still gave me goosebumps. I also drank a cream soda, but that was mainly due to thirst brought on by swimming and by the fact that it was tasty.

I also brought my knitting and discovered some rogue embroidery floss in my wallet along with a Peace Rally bus ticket from 2003.

I was reminded of this


(more information here )

as my thoughts drifted in and out during the day of veterans and peace and war and crafting and cream soda and bravery and the luxury that is the 3-day weekend.

Here it is, 12:26am, the day after Memorial Day. I didn’t call my grandfathers, even though I meant to. Instead I read a bunch of magazines on a friend’s lakeside dock, chatted and paddled around on a bright green raft.

I watched the 11 o’clock news with grim stories of war and hate and horror that was patched together with video shots of Memorial Day festivities from neighborings towns. I just wanted to call my grandfathers and say ‘thank you.’ As well as my cousin who got back from Djibouti last fall and my second cousin who is currently in Baghdad. But I didn’t.

I didn’t because I knew that it would eventually turn into some political debate regarding current politics that would disrupt the phone calls’ original intentions. Because sometimes I’m rendered speechless by the way that “peace is patriotic” and “I support our troops” sound in the same sentence. It sounds awkward and clumsy, even though I believe both sentiments wholeheartedly.

I just hope that in 60 years time, someone does a documentary on the current war and that the elderly men and women who served our country in this current war can hold their heads up high- although whatever the outcome I know I will be holding their hands close.