Author: Betsy

on the road again.

| Betsy

Some days I feel like a professional mover. I am moving, yet again. Long story short, I am moving somewhere for the summer. I may stay past August depending on what happens in the PhD department.

The best thing about moving is the ideas you have before moving: how you’re going to decorate your new place, how you’re going to stock your kitchen, how this time you’re going to finally designate a space for “work.”

The worst thing about moving: actually moving.

So I’ve decided to take it easy this go-round and load up the Honda with the necessities: clothes, yarn, books, music. Sometimes I feel like some sort of eccentric urban nomad, but then realise that that would be giving myself too much credit.

I also realise that everytime you move you can never move the most important thing: your support network of friends and family. If only I could pack them up, too, into assorted boxes my life would be complete.

Writing about the ethics and politics of craft has made me realise that this whole kooky aura around the idea of craftivism lies in decision-making. Why am I doing what I am doing? Could someone benefit more from this scarf/doll/afghan than me? Do I really need all these craft supplies, materials, excess?

Each time I move (which is often), I am reminded of why I keep what I keep. And how with the power of the internet, I can hold people dear to me closer than ever before.

Now that I’ll finally have a “workspace” in my new digs, I have no need for it. These days my so-called “office” (for complete lack of a better word) is my laptop, headphones and a hot cup of coffee. But I am sure that it will be filled with reams of paper covered with scribbles of stories and queries, skeins of yarn peeping from behind cabinets, and book after book after book.

I have some new projects in the works as I’m trying to crossover from a blog that was created to promote an idea I believed in to something with a bigger scope. I feel like I need to take a step back and look at it all from a wider angle. Because while this whole ‘craft thing’ is tiny, I believe that embracing it has reminded many people of the power of uniquity.

By realising how easy it is to make our own wares, we have simultaneously come to realise that not only is this allowing us to reconnect with our creativity, but also our issues with abundance. In a world of too many choices, we have finally figured out that every decision we make holds power and helps to create change. The thought of people out there making conscious decisions about the way their money and time is spent enlivens me to no end.

I think I’ve gotten to be quite an expert with this moving thing. One day, one day soon perhaps, I’ll have more than just a workspace to fill and more to work on than a laptop that’s heavy. But until I find that place to alit my wings, I will continue to be making each choice carefully and with the best intentions.

friday dispatch v2.0

| Betsy

It’s Friday! Rock on! Which means a little bit of crafty linked randomness for the cubicle-kept and bored…

.check out the work of Fundacion Solidaridad, truly inspiring handcraft from Chile.

.if you ever wanted to learn how to sculpt a Lionel Richie head from clay, this link is for you.

.make your desktop even more badass with Pixel Girl Presents. (Currently the Fury Cow is presiding over my laptop…)

.read about the evolution of hot pants here.

.check out Design is Kinky (Be sure to check out the theory section. To a dork like me, such geekery is hot…)

.read about why my (occasional?) adopted town of Carrboro is cooler than yours in this recent article on zines.

.become as obsessed as I have with Obsessive Consumption.

.learn how to revolutionize your belongings (and get rid of the crap) over at the wonderful DeMaterialiZe. (Who didn’t love the Fugazi lyric “You are not what you own?” Ironically enough, in high school, I wrote that on my forest green Converse…)

.uncover more about the new documentary Jericho’s Echo: Punk Rock in the Holy Land. (More here.

.see how felt is a force to be reckoned with thanks to Hut Up Berlin.

bizarrely, everyone’s favorite fake Russian lesbians, T.A.T.U., has been helping me compile this list. they also helped me get through the last 2,000 words of my dissertation. i don’t quite know what the allure is, either.

roots.

| Betsy

Back from the beach, where I had the pleasure of watching dolphins swim in the quiet Southern Georgia ocean waters and the displeasure of talking really loud to my grandfather (who my grandmother states is “deaf as a post”). It was wonderful to spend time with them (I’m of the frame of mind that grandparents are magical) and just talk.

My grandfather delights in telling stories of growing up in rural Georgia, starting out as a young lawyer in a segregated South and later on becoming a judge. As a child, I was always amazed as we would drive around their town and everyone would stop and wave at him like he was royalty. Later on, I would go and watch him hold court, completely weirded out by the fact that my grandfather (the kindest sweetest man) held the power to put people in jail. He still works some of the time, and I’m amazed at his ability to make fair and just judgements regarding any possible situation.

My grandmother and I have graduated from just talking about school or how I had my hair cut. And it is secretly one of the best gifts I have ever received from knitting. Yesterday we drove around town, took a walk down the pier, cooed over the variety of yarns available in the local stitching shop. You see, I don’t knit because it’s trendy or even because I’m fascinated with historical methods of needlecraft. I knit because I can finally talk to my grandmother. After our afternoon out, she sat next to me on the couch and showed me how to deftly wield a crochet hook, and it was so simple and beautiful that it almost brought tears to my eyes.

In the stitching shop, I was fascinated at her fascination with the way that knitting has gained popularity over the past few years. She kept eyeing the yarns and books and pointing interesting things out to me. Although I was ogling all the beautiful craft supplies around me, I kept getting distracted thinking about how very glad I am that something as simple as knitting as increased my vocabulary with my grandmother tenfold.

Often people say something to me along the lines of “I don’t have the patience to knit/embroider/craft,” “It’s too hard,” “I could never do that.” To which I always reply, “Of course you can, it’s easy.” But what I keep forgetting is that sometimes there’s a reason why we learn to certain lessons when.

Every morning I read a passage from Everday Mind: 366 Reflections on the Buddhist Path. The one that keeps popping in my head is from February 8 by Pema Chodron,

We try so hard to hang on to the teachings and “get it,” but actually the truth sinks in like rain into very hard earth. The rain is very gentle, and we soften up slowly at our own speed. But when that happens, something has fundamentally changed in us. That hard earth has softened. It doesn’t seem to happen by trying to get it or capture it. It happens by letting go; it happens by relaxing your mind, and it happens by the aspiration and the longing to want to communicate with yourself and others. Each of us finds our own way.

On my drive down to Georgia after writing the previous post, I was reminded of this. And how sometimes it’s okay not to officially have a Plan B. As long as you remember to be aware of where you are, what you’re doing and what’s around you. Because sometimes the most amazing options uncover themselves. But only when you’re ready.

Plan B never seems to work for me…

| Betsy

So I’m back at the grind next Monday. But Tuesday-Thursday I’m going to see my grandparents at the beach and hang out with their fellow retiree friends. There will be no canasta or golf, but bike riding and happy hour will be in full swing, I’m sure. As I’ll soon be back in the cubicle, this may be my last time to drive down the coast to visit them for awhile. Plus, I try to never turn down an offer of visits from people who tell me lovely stories all day while also encouraging me to knit.

Lately when looking at job listings, wondering what the hell I’m going to do if the PhD programme I applied for (yesterday!) doesn’t work out. Most of you will recognize this as “Plan B.” I have no Plan B. I have never had a Plan B, which is most likely why I have a resume full of temporary jobs.

I think it’s time to start brainstorming, however, possibly for both a Plan B as well as a Plan C. I actually thought about whether or not I should make a real list on paper or just ponder. Then this made me realize why I’m sometimes slow about things, normal people would just pull out pen and paper and not think about the most efficient way to make a list. Only people like me (the Plan B-less) would fritter away such extravagant time on such a ridiculously trivial matter.

The majority of my problem exists in time management. I have none. I think that difficult things will take no time at all and that simple things will take ages. If only I would think back to year after year to every Science Fair I ever participated in- when the sun would rise and I would furiously be stapling my title (one year it was “Which Fabric Burns the Fastest?” No lie.) onto the board, racing against time and inevitably piercing my finger in the process.

What destiny awaits the procrastinator?

I’m not sure, but I’m pretty sure it probably won’t be grand.

I”m not proud either, but happy that in the end, despite an occasional night of lost sleep, everything gets done. Before the school bus arrives or the deadline passes.

Which brings us back to Plan B, or lack thereof. You would think that seeing all the projects I have lined up craft and writing-wise, I would have no end to careers I could pursue- as lists are my most favorite things.

But there’s something that’s stopping me from making that foray into a possible future into an unknown, outside from the even greater (and more imminent) fear of starvation, the fact that there are too many choices. I could come with plan after plan after plan of what I could do. But that doesn’t mean that any of them illustrate what I want to be doing.

Maybe that’s where I’m erring.

And just need to shoot for something that doesn’t make me want to fall asleep at my desk or run from the building daily screaming in frustration. While I’m plotting and planning something grander and more tailormade.

Even though I see many of my friends who run crafty businesses having difficulties with different aspects of their practice, they make me hopeful of the day that everyone who’s working ‘just to pay the bills’ will step away from their cubicle and live the kind of life they choose, making the world a better place with their creativity and genius, instead of running the cogs of a giant corporate wheel.

Maybe it’s just a pipe dream, but I’m strengthened everyday by your stories and your triumphs and your emails. Strengthened in the knowledge that maybe today, someone somewhere is quitting their 9 to 5 to make their dreams come true.

Thank you.

Many thanks to Belle & Sebastian for fuelling this moment of simultaneous mawkish introspection, revelation, annoyance and rejuvenation….

friday dispatch v1.0

| Betsy

I can’t believe that it’s already May. May of 2005. Which means I will turn 30 in 2 months. (11th July to be exact. Mark your calendars now!)

Despite this somewhat-of-a-watershed occasion, this summer also sees me returning to the temporary battlefield world of office administration. While my resume is rejoicing that I can once again put “temporary employee” in the left-hand column often reserved for “job title,” I am not so full of glee.

So while I get my closet properly stocked with clothes I will only wear in the office, my voice ready and steady to say “Good morning/afternoon, this is Betsy, how may I direct your call?” 4323409 times per day, and a bevvy of lists mentally stored to be expunged on endless reams of pilfered Post-Its, I bring you the first in a summerlong installment of Friday posts.

With ethics and activism in mind (as well as good old-fashioned time wasting), these Friday posts will be written with my fellow office peons and cubicle dwellers predicament in consideration, you fellow compatriots in a war against lost memos and improperly delivered mail where we’re armed with leftover food scraps from board member meetings and a rainbows choice of pen colors. And a reminder that you’re not the only clockwatcher, daydeamer or person-who-wishes-they-were-anywhere-else.

And, of course, all links are worksafe!

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Atleast this gig gave me a window.

*Realise how bad you are at HMTL with the artistic genius of Huong Ngo.

*Craft and snark make for perfect reading over at Threadbared.

*Learn more about why you procrastinate. Although you will most likely procrastinate on clicking this very link.

*Take comfort in the fact that you’re not the only one in a pen, courtesy of Seattle’s Barking Lounge

*No matter what you’re doing, the The Yes Men are doing something cooler.

*You, too, can make a zine in 24 hours!

*Plan your dinner tonight thanks to these free veg*n cookbooks!

*Take further comfort in the fact that someone else likes Lionel Richie even more than I do. (Hmmm…Remember how I said my birthday was on the horizon?) ;)

*Read about the work of Maakin Lab in Shetland. Discover more about how knitting in Shetland contributes to its historical and cultural heritage.

*Learn more than you possibly ever knew existed about heavy metal at BNR metal. Rock!

Rah Rah Rah! Go and listen to The Chap!