1. the path

I am adding this little preface in readiness for tomorrow, for Steven’s transformative moment meme.  I didn’t write anything new because I had written this already.  This moment, in my young life, was the one that set me in my life’s direction.  I had others...meeting my husband/partner which settled me down, giving birth (Husband will tell you it completely changed me), even taking acid which changed the way I see the world...but the one that empowered me to take charge of my life, to MAKE my life, is here:

Being a self employed artist has its ups and downs.  The ups are being your own boss doing what you would do even if you didn’t get paid for it.  My vocation is my avocation.  Being self employed also means that when I want, I can take the day off, make time for my kids and now my grandkids, set my own schedule.  I can go sit in the sun for 15 or 20 minutes whenever I want or take a long lunch with a friend.  It also means working long hours to get a job out on time, trolling for work when nothing has come in, living hand to mouth, being totally responsible for having money at all.  These are trade-offs.  

When I first started at this adult life in my early 20s, it never occurred to me that I could make a living on my own without a ‘real’ job.  And then I met David, a self-employed artisan, who told me, when I expressed some bit of envy of his life, that ‘anyone can do it’.  It was a door opening and a light going off in my head, a sudden revelation.  I think back on that day now and I wonder, if my path had never crossed David’s, would I still be here?  Doubtful.  It was at his shop where I first saw someone sandblasting a design on glass, however crude the technique.  It was from his mouth that the magic words came.  He was a person in my life for a very short time, probably not even a year, and yet his effect on my life was profound.  With this crossing, a new path appeared before me and I chose it.