Coming around again....

I gave only one side of the story, in focusing on the negative. It was the side I was seeing and living at the time, of course, but it's still only one side. Today I feel so much better - as if I have come out of a long dark tunnel of a week. It's been very stressful, but last night I slept on our new bed. I can't say I'm thrilled - the DH agrees, the mattress is firmer than the one we tried at the store, which is the same kind - so we are hoping it softens over time and hopefully not too much! If not I'll put a topper on it, as it's definitely uncomfy. But I think our new bed is beautiful, and the room is clean - I'm not thinking about the library across the hall where everything went to get it that way, though!



I felt horrid. My allergies were in full swing, my eye was so watery and vile I wondered if I had something worse than allergies. So I washed my face and my eye, and then I took a morning shower. (I never take morning showers. My hair takes forever to dry. For-freaking-ever. Something about it being long enough I can almost sit on it...I love my hair but it does not dry fast.) Used a hair dryer, which I almost never do, until it was mostly only damp, then simply let it air dry as I prefer not to blast my hair (and that, too, takes a while and gets boring anyway). Then brushed it. My allergies have settled so I must have cleaned off something that didn't belong (and I doubt it's the bed; I've lounged on it for a bit since and am still fine). And I feel so good with my hair flowing all silky over my shoulders and arms. I love my hair.

Today I will go to the grocery store and the library, in another couple hours. I mostly need to return books to the library, but I do also need to pick one hold up, which I figure will be much easier to do if I wait until they are open. :) Hehe.

I've been catching up on reading the AW blogs - still not fully caught up, but getting there! I am feeling back in control. And in a bit, once I post this, I'm going to take the next step in one, maybe two of my artificial-water projects. (Does anyone know where I can find clear easter eggs, or clear plastic globes that can be opened and shut, not Christmas ornaments though? I could really really use these. And I cannot seem to find them just searching around!)

Last week I did make two pieces of progress I think are really important. I listed out poetry publications to consider submitting to (and perhaps I was partly avoiding this as my week went all chaotic? It is the big step for something I've wanted to do, after all--though I doubt the bed arriving three weeks early can be blamed purely on avoidance! *laughs*). And I also went through two community colleges that have classes near where I live and/or work, and the one arts college in the area, and circled everything that appealed. Then I went back through and crossed off the ones that didn't sound worth my time (they may appeal, but I don't actually want to do them enough to do them if that makes sense!), and the ones I couldn't do because I don't have those dates free.

I haven't yet gone back through and signed up for any. They start in April, so I have some time, but I plan to do that this week. The local arts college has an open life drawing studio! I am trying to decide if I want to go. Drawing is not one of my big passions - not the way that language is, or photography. But I do occasionally draw - and almost invariably it is people I want to draw. So life drawing could be good - plus, I can just go on the days I want to, so the fact that I wouldn't go when I was on call for work would be a complete non-issue. (That doesn't start until May; it runs through the summer. Still time to think about it, but I will probably go at least once, to see if it's something I want to do.)

I wanted something a little less whiny than my checkin up. Something that seemed to carry in it the possibilities that are pulsing beneath today, something that matches with the inspirations I was posting (and writing those was one of the bigger creative things I did last week - I had fun with them!). Yes, the AW itself as a program is not fitting perfectly right now; but it's not failing either, and I've survived the Early Bed and am still alive, still breathing and laughing, still making and thinking and doing.

Speaking of which, I'm going to go do some more with fake water. I'm working on what's ultimately going to be a floating rose in an ivy bowl, if I get it right. (If I don't, I'm not trying again. This uses a bit too much water to be worth it. Unless I were selling it - I've seen the prices for what's made with this stuff, it would be worth the cost and time - but I don't want to make more than one that works, I just want one for me!)