how does that saying go...

...when it rains, it pours?

It looks like our semi-retirement is soon to be over. For the next 6 months or so anyway.

Monday I finally got the go ahead from the general contractor to submit an invoice for the deposit for the two big walls I have been consulting on and writing proposals for and attending meetings for since January. The client has already moved into one of the floors that one of the walls will go on. Heck, they might have moved into the second one too by now.

In case you forgot, this is the job with the two 16' x 9' walls (originally 20' long), one with an image of a map of the world in diagonal lines and the other with an image of their mountain logo.

Of course we finally get the go ahead that I've been waiting on for months right after I received a deposit for a very nice residential commission which consists of two door panels, laundry room and pantry, and the shower door and big window over the tub in the master bath.

Also on Monday I received an email from a client that I submitted a proposal to almost two years ago for three large fused glass panels for a church. Really, I had finally given up on that one even though the art director would occasionally contact me about possible funding coming up and which never materialized, at least not for our project.

Apparently he's got another interested possible donor he's meeting with later this week. I'm not holding my breath on that one though cause there have been too many false alarms but it wouldn't surprise me now if it did.

Oh, and there are also the two gallery shows coming up. Fortunately, I have work for those already though I am trying to get one more piece completed for the show in October, an ode to the peach.

Well, I'm very happy to have the work and not complaining as it's been a very meager two years but it would be nice for it to have been spread out a bit.

I didn't mean to get political

Today is the last day of my two weeks of full time employment. After today I go back to my 3 or 4 Saturdays a month and the occasional day filling in. Not tomorrow though. Tomorrow my sister is working, an arrangement made when I thought we would be doing a workshop that weekend. And next Saturday the store will be closed because it's the annual Juneteenth Festival.  I guess the store will be closed on the 30th as well as that is the Freedom Festival, Wharton's 4th of July celebration.

The store is closed on those days because the square and surrounding areas are full of people and parades and booths and activities which is not conducive to business.  People aren't on the square to visit the local establishments.  When they come in the store it's to get out of the heat or to ask to use the bathroom.  I don't know what the other stores do, but Miss Hattie's closes.

I like living in this small town even though it is very conservative, very religious, and, quietly, racist.  Well, I don't know that it is any more racist than any other part of this country, and by 'this country' I mean the entire US,  but I've recently had a few encounters here where the person with whom I was speaking let their racism bubble to the top, one even using the 'N' word, something I haven't heard in a very long time.

I don't like that word (or any of the words used to malign people with racial or cultural differences) with it's inherent connotations of shiftless, lazy, ignorant, deceitful, useless, especially when it's being applied to a person who is working to improve his life or a group of people who are gathering for a celebration of their release from slavery.  I don't chastise the speaker for their choice of words when I find myself in an unpleasant conversation but I do speak up for the maligned individual or group.  

I think white America tried to convince itself that racism was a thing of the past in this country when Obama was elected president.  Considering the obstructionism from Congress he has faced since taking office, I'd say that racism is still alive and well in America.  His opponents and detractors are quick to assure you their position is not about race, blaming him for the results of 8 - 10 years of Republican policies, but the fact is, the old white men in our government closed ranks the day he moved into the White House.  They  were quite public and vocal about their intent to make him a one term president before he ever got a chance to govern.  Never mind that he has continued most of Bush's policies.

When your hatred of a black individual causes you to vote against policies that are good for the country and your constituents and prevents you from doing your job of representing the people who elected you, when your stated intent is to run that guy out of town on a rail instead of giving him a decent chance to govern, when you blindly blame him for the results of your own misguided policies of the last white man president who moved massive amounts of money out of the hands of the middle class and into the hands of the already rich, when you vote against bills that you previously supported because they might make that guy look good, that, my friend, is racism.

The hatred and vehemence spewing out of the conservatives these last four years is unprecedented and I for one will be glad when white people finally become just another minority in this country because I am sick to death of this attitude of entitlement and superiority.

shop girl

Working at the antique store every day leaves me little time to do much else. I've been taking model making stuff and working on my current botanica erotica wax which I think I am nearly satisfied with now. I also finished cleaning up an oleander bowl wax. And I have plenty of time to read and comment on blogs. The browser on the computer at the store doesn't play nicely with blogger though so I can't really post.

Today is my day off and I only have, oh, about a million things to do on that one day. I have three azaleas that are in desperate need of planting, 20 ears of corn that need putting up, the oleander bowl mold to fill, and finish up my W post.

OK, not a million. Half a million.

Monday I'm back in the city for another meeting for these now mythical walls, still all talk and no action. I am showing the new samples of the more detailed version of the mountain and the design team is going to pin up the full size drawing in four sections. These samples are much bigger and heavy, 18” x 24” and 18” x 30” on 3/8” glass. Marc made me a nifty little dolly to cart them around on.

And then Tuesday finds me back at the shop for four more days. It's been very quiet this week with no sales at all the last two days. But at least people came in.

So I try to check the garden in the morning and evening, picking fruit and picking off bugs, cutting away and removing the decaying material. It all goes in the compost pile with the intent of returning it as mulch the next time. The tomatoes are finally starting to ripen.

The female cardinal that built her nest in the rose bush on the fence by the gate to the Little Back Yard continues to sit on her eggs. She's getting pretty used to me. She won't fly away now unless I get too close or go through the gate. I try not to go through the gate. This is the second cardinal nest in a rose bush I saw this year. The first was out in the bush in the day lily bed but one day she and her eggs were gone.

Update: one baby bird now in the nest. Looks like it just hatched. The other egg was pushed out and I found it on the ground. I tried to get a picture since mom wasn't sitting on the nest but dad was very unhappy with me so I just shoved the camera in and snapped. Not a very good effort as you can see.

Miss Hattie's Place

Friday I worked at the antique store and then the first three days of November I will also work.  I had to open the shop and handle any sales and phone calls, then close up and lock up.  My sister prepped me a couple of weeks ago when we thought I was going to work a day for her back then, but the jury call was canceled. So knowing me as she does, she had all the important info written down for me, everything I needed to know (where all the light switches are, how to write up a sale for the different vendors, how to handle it if someone wants to haggle, how to open the cash register).

I actually made two sales and helped one move out a drum table which my sister was thrilled that it sold. One of those pieces. You know what I mean. And it was.

I was talking to my daughter last night telling her that I would be working at the store today and getting paid.

"Wow, Mom," she says, "that's like a real job.  Have you ever had one of those before?"

Yes, actually I have but it's been many years.  In fact I think the last time I had a job where I had to show up and work for 8 hours a day every day was back in 1974.  I've been self-employed since then doing the artist thing.

It's a sign of just how bad the economy is now that I've never had to seek employment during all that time.  Never until now when I am most grateful for these few days in the store and hope they become fairly regular until things improve.

But if I have to have a 'real' job, working in the antique store is an OK one to have.  I'm surrounded by lots of cool stuff and I get a rare chance to interact with people.

Miss Hattie's Place is in one of the old buildings on the square and faces the courthouse that has recently been restored.

Besides some very nice furniture...

buffets, dressers, wardrobes, china and display cabinets, chairs, tables, and couches

you can shop for vintage costume jewelry

miniature tea sets

tin boxes and a Goofy pez dispenser

kitchen and farm implements

quilts and tablecloths

china and crystal

depression glass

a ceramic parrot and a blue glass pegasus

and just so much stuff...

As you can see, there is plenty of stuff to look at.