Threads

I am procrastinating a little by writing this blog, but I do it while I drink my tea. I cannot drink tea and embroider… I get too engrossed in the task and forget it, then come to, a couple of hours later when the embroidery is finished, dehydrated, with a cup of cold tea at my side. So like the fine athlete that I am, I like to set about the task well hydrated!

I also find being well hobnobbed is an advantage (in an emergency, being well malted-milked is a satisfactory alternative).

So I slurp the Lady Grey in an unladylike fashion, and make that “ahhh” noise that only happens when tea hits the spot.

I ponder.

I am in a pondering frame of mind today. I have just delivered the first session to a bunch of wonderful people signed up for this year’s artist teacher scheme with BCU. I envy them. I did it myself so I know how it feels.

So… the pondering ensued… I came straight to my studio, flicked on the kettle and slipped off my shoes and lay back, feet on my desk. It is allowed! If you visit me, you will be allowed to do it too as long as you don’t have smelly feet!

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So much of my life has changed since I did my ATS course… can’t believe it. And it is still changing. And it is all as a direct result from doing it. I am a very lucky woman!

 

I have written two proposals very recently, which include these bras I’m working with. In one of the proposal I talk about some of the work as if it is completed, but it isn’t… quite… yet… I have set myself the task of embroidering one of these bras. It is my favourite one, the tattiest, most broken example I have ever seen… and I’ve seen rather a lot lately. But as I stitch it becomes beautiful, the flaws are sometimes hidden, sometimes drawn attention to. I feel such fondness for this imaginary woman. I have pretty much built her a life in my head. This work is hard to let go of. I don’t know how I would feel if someone wanted to buy it… I would feel compelled to ensure it was going to a good home.

 

But come on… lets face it… if you are willing to pay a few hundred pounds for an artwork that is a piece of embroidered underwear, you are probably the sort of person I would say yes to aren’t you?

Today is “Take A Deep Breath” Day.

 

Things are settling down after my husband’s special birthday (I’m not telling, that’s up to him). My eldest son will be going back to his own home today. Tomorrow I have some prep to do for some work on Tuesday morning, then I don’t have any appointments in my diary for the rest of the week. I am planning, however, to cram in as much heavy duty studio time as I can. Because of the shed, and the end of term songwriters’ showcase, and the birthday, I have been really busy, full of family and full of art and music. I have been rushing about. I have eaten all the wrong things at all the wrong times, for three days in a row seemed to be surviving on caffeine and sugar in their various glorious forms. Enough now!

 

I need some time in my own head to process and review what’s happened and where to go next. I have a big list, of the usual making, writing, singing variety, a couple of applications are in the pipeline, and I have another to submit soon. I have another exhibition coming up too.

 

But I feel relaxed about it all.

When I had the job, eons ago it seems, I was not relaxed, I was wound up tight as anything, still trying to get things done, but not doing them well, but doing them half the time because I knew I should, but didn’t have the time to do it all properly.

 

I know myself quite well I think…

I am obsessive.

I do have an addictive nature.

I have very little impulse control.

I react too quickly and too emotionally, then have to pull back and consider, then apologise.

I’m quite often, in company, too excitable and noisy.

 

This means, when I get involved in a project, I run at it like a mad woman, I throw everything I can at it to make it work. The adrenalin and the caffeine keep me going and then I crash.

 

Not having the proper job allows for the crash time… it allows the ebb and flow of my life and personality. So instead of having to go into work after this manic period of creative activity, I really can bring myself down carefully, and build strength ready for the next thing.

 

In the past, after a period like this, the thought of work at 8:30 Monday morning, and the necessity to be sociable and polite has made me almost (and sometimes actually) cry.

Monday:

I’m off to my studio to make my plans for Tuesday, then immerse myself in some embroidery.

 

Tuesday: I kick off the Artist Teacher Scheme for BCU at The New Art Gallery Walsall. I’m looking forward to meeting those artists and teachers who sit where I sat 8 years ago. A lot has happened in those 8 years. It feels weird, but right, and satisfying, and useful, to be on the other side of the table.

 

Wednesday: Studio

 

Thursday: Studio

 

Friday: Studio

 

By Saturday, I will be ready to greet the world again!

 

 

The whole self-employed thing is great, I love feeling so liberated, being able to decide what I do and when. However, after decades of employment and salary, however meagre, the lack of regular payment is hard going. Cash flow is an issue. I had hoped to keep credit card use to the absolute minimum, but if I want to put petrol in the car to get to work, for which I haven’t yet been paid, I will need to use it. I’m sure things will settle down, and I’ll feel a little more in control, but for the first time in decades again, I am reliant on the regular income of someone else to ease out the creases.

 

Today someone said to me “I’ll get the money to you sometime next week”. I felt like screaming at them “I’ll come and get it, I need it now, I have £3.74 in my purse!” But I was polite and professional and said calmly, “yes of course next week will be fine”.

 

I have enough work booked in over the next couple of months to provide me with an equal income to that I had in school. I am working a lot less hours to earn it too. But I don’t get paid till it’s done. Possibly a month after it’s done. I just have to learn not to panic! All will be well. If I eat less and walk further from the free parking to my studio that will do me good too!

 

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Songwriters Circle end of term Showcase tomorrow.

(mac birmingham, in Cannon Hill Park, 7:30 if you’re interested, £2 a ticket!)

I am singing the song I wrote with my friend Nicki, and singing backing vocals on two songs by other people. I started by being so grateful for people helping me, and felt I was taking all the time, but now, a couple of terms in, I feel that I can offer something myself. not much, but something.

I like this song we wrote. It started from a poem I wrote ages ago – March 2011 in fact, which had followed on from some of the “Respectable” work I was doing. The final song is different in tone, and the lyrics are different from the poem… I like the way that the melody and rhythm edit the words, sharpen it up, extraneous words disappear, the scan changes. Sometimes, because of this, the meaning can change too, but I quite like that too really… it’s interesting…

After the show, I may post a recording of the performance.

yep… here it is on Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/elena-thomas/wake-up-live

Here’s the original poem:

 

Wake up

Talk to me

Look at me

Hold me

Explain yourself

Can’t hear you

Can’t tell by looking

Can’t read you

Don’t understand

Explain yourself

 

Here’s how the lyrics ended up:

 

Can’t hear you

Can’t see you

Can’t tell by looking at you

 

Wake up

Talk to me

Wake up

Look at me

Hold me

 

If I look at you now

All I see is a man

If the truth can be told

I don’t mind if you go

 

Every time I see you

See the man that you were

The man I thought that I knew

 

Wake up

Talk to me

Wake up

Look at me

Hold me

 

If I look at you now

All I see is a man

If the truth can be told

I don’t mind if you go

 

Now the truth can be told 

I just want you to go

Don’t want to look at you now 

 

Not here

Not now

Not him 

Not mine

Not mine

 

 

 

Well, it’s over for another year Life & Other Art Festival… fondly known as LOAF, has been packed away. My shed is back in its place in the garden, The musicians have toddled off to other gigs, and the art works and quilts have all gone back home to their makers.

I am exhausted!

It was brilliant! I love it so much, this event we create and curate every July. It is hard work, but by the time the weekend arrives, I can pause with tea and cake, enjoy the art, the poetry and the music, and can chat to people. This in itself can be exhausting. I am on my feet all weekend, existing on a diet of hastily snatched bits of (delicious) cake. By Sunday night I crave savoury protein! This year I also ended the evening with a rare shared bottle of chianti. By 9.30 pm I was asleep (which for a habitual and proud insomniac, this is rare too!) I’ve just realised that reads as if me sharing a bottle is rare, as if usually I drink it all by myself… but no… the drinking is rare! haha!

Today I have slobbed about, chatted with my sons, another rarity is them both being here at the same time. It’s lovely to have my flock safely gathered in!

I was badgered, on facebook, by a couple of friends to do this thing where you post three “happinesses” a day for five days. I did this, and found it a good thing to do. I’ve done it for about ten days now. I have discovered that I am blessed with quite a lot of happiness in my life.

Therefore I should shut up bloody moaning and get on with it.

 

 

 

Day 1 of LOAF14 is over, and it went well I think…

The art exhibition is looking good, I’ll post a few pics tomorrow maybe, if I get time to take some. The quilts look bright and beautiful… true craftswoman-ship at every turn. The shed looks resplendent in her new threads, and the performers are enjoying her shelter from the sun (and a little shower).

Some fantastic music already… we’re only half way through the weekend.

 

Breaking news… I sang, in my shed, at my event, in front of about 10 people I knew!

I didn’t die… or at least if I did, I am blissfully unaware of the fact!

 

It was fun. Every time I do something like this, I feel another cog clicking into place… I’m not going to start gigging all around the place, I’m not that sort of performer. But, I do have a sense of this leading me somewhere. I’m following my nose, being brave, trying new things, challenging and pushing and experimenting. I have a sort of faith. Not faith in a religious sense, but faith in a human sense, that people should make leaps and strike out into new ground. People are astonishing.

 

I was recently talking about the sort of television programme that seems to be all over the place at the moment… television that shows humanity in the worst possible light. And some of the people watching seem to be saying to themselves “well at least I’m better than THAT” then sit back on their smug behinds. I want to watch television that shows humanity at its BEST… brave, creative, enduring, caring… changing the world a bit at a time, affecting the lives of others, having faith in each other. That’s the sort of faith I mean that I have. I want to watch people that inspire, push, initiate, and provoke positive thought and action.

 

Now I’m not for a minute suggesting that me singing a two and a half minute song about a train journey to Crewe is life-changing for me or the listener, but it is breaking new ground… for me. Over the last few years i have had a series of life-changing events. I have come to the practical, not just theoretical conclusion that life’s too bloody short to waste time giving into nerves.

Of course I feel nervous, everyone does. But it feels great to sing a song, and people clap afterwards and tell you they liked it. You don’t get that sort of instant response for a piece of visual art.

 

I have faith that, as time goes by, the reason for these songs and performances will become clearer. But for the moment, I’m happy to just follow the scent and see where it leads me.