an unexpected outcome

I think I'm finally recovering from my three weeks of visits. What I thought would only take a few days turned out to take nearly a whole week but today I'm feeling like doing something. Unfortunately, that something will probably not be something that I want to do but rather something that I need to do and that something is clean house.

I'm afraid I have slipped back into my more slovenly ways.

When we moved into this fresh new clean house I vowed not to let it get away from me. And I succeeded for a while but apparently, you can't really change your nature. Nature always wins out.

One of the reasons I am feeling more energetic, besides just days of being a slug, is because of what happened last night.

Months ago, our friend Gene encouraged us to submit a piece to Archway Gallery's annual juried exhibition for Texas artists. Archway Gallery is an artist owned gallery in Houston, a very nice space with some very talented artists in all types of media.

Last week we had to take our entries for jurying by the current director of the Houston Center For Contemporary Craft. We got the call on Thursday that our piece had been juried in and they encouraged us to attend the opening which was last night.

The first thing I did was to check that they had our names spelled right on the tag by our piece. Yes! You wouldn't think I would have to do that but for some reason, both our names are frequently mis-spelled at shows.

After saying hello to the artists we knew that were part of the gallery I noticed there were name tags so I went to get mine and Marc's. They had one for Marc (spelled correctly) and then they had one for Ellen Albert. Well, they got three of the letters right anyway. I just cut off everything past the A.

I hadn't really paid any attention to the particulars of the show, only deciding at the last minute what to submit so I was a little surprised to find, once there, that there were awards.

So the time came for the director to read the juror's comments and to announce the awards. I thought maybe we might get an Honorable Mention, (our usual place though we did get 3^rd once).

They called out all 7 of the Honorable Mentions, then 3^rd place, then 2^nd place and I quit listening, turning to head deeper in the gallery where Marc and some friends were standing and then...was that my name?

Did he just say my name?

Why, yes he did! First place came with a $500 check and an invitation to show in their next exhibit.

I'm still dumbfounded but it has certainly put the spark back in my creative endeavors.

Now if I just had a maid.