planting seeds for growth

 Plantable Tags from GreenPost

suffice to say moving to huntsville has been a positive thing even if it feels much harder than almost any other time in my life.  i almost wonder how i can say that as i've had a hard life.  this is hard in a 'going towards health' way.  does that make sense?  typically when you are healing you have crisis.  how one knows the difference between that is usually unexplainable, you just know.  you just have to trust.  i'd say this is probably a healing towards the better because i think i'm learning how to communicate better. i'm being forced to and while i dislike it i know ultimately it will serve me in the future.

forced to deal with an auto mechanic who charged me a good amount and didn't fix the problem.
forced to deal with my own flub of refunding the wrong person on paypal and having to ask for repayment even though they aren't seeing the refund.
forced by dint of selling on etsy to deal with customers having requests or wanting discounts that i just cannot abide by.
forced to push myself and keep moving/going/working even though i feel pretty overwhelmed by my living and financial circumstances.

not forced but pushing myself to have different 'business' interactions.  meaning working out swaps/trades for services with other etsy people...even that is a big deal for me as i get so confused about what is fair or feels right etc.  thankfully those two experiences have left positive imprints on me.  one of them was getting metal flowers from merritt for my metal vases.  its a big deal to spend money right now since i'm barely making it in life, but i felt this was a good business/marketing strategy for the vases so we worked a deal out and i'm thrilled.

the other business deal was with another etsy seller/friend kendra.  she makes plantable tags, cards and envelopes out of 100% recycled hand made paper.  i was getting grossed out by the store bought thank you cards, i mean i'm all about re-using and hand made stuff what am i doing buying generic CARDS?  i decided to find a more creative way to thank people and also send business to someone else that is 'real' as opposed to a machine plopping out ugly thank you cards.  kendras recycled cards come with seeds in them that you can plant! i was able to trade a vase for this transaction and i think we all come out ahead as my buyers will get a nice card (which i dont write on so they can send to someone else next time they gift or write someone) or free little plants, i get to feel better about sending art off and hopefully kendra gets a few more customer referrals!  all of this probably sounds super stupid simple but for me it was a big deal.

so i've been expanding and contracting.  much more involved with people and my surroundings.  making more decisions and probably reaching an emotional level of ...oh 18 yrs old now instead of 5.  only 30 more years to go and i will catch up with myself....

what i have been doing for 3 days straight

here it is...
we left out a handful of 'steps'.  like scrubbing the insides with a wire brush and washing them.  like painting the five different coats of whatever it is i use on the insides... like attaching the bottoms etc etc.  first video tod has ever made and we decided no music or narrative.  its kind of funny if you turn on the volume and just listen to the machine noises.  we still haven't figured out how to make the transition faster for the end where we show a bunch of previous works.  oh hell...just make it a big screen sit back and take a break, it isn't that long.

i'm off to upload my first four skinny reds and four black and blues on etsy.  i have more coming just need to take more pictures and edit them.  hope you enjoy this, tod did a GREAT job of keeping me out of it just as i ordered!

big yellow

this is the front/back view of the newest pipe vase i have been working on.  i listed this on etsy as one pipe that you could customize the length you wanted it cut and someone wanted a 9incher and another person is taking the rest as an 8 and 9 in vase. the 'lip' is about 1/2 inch thick making this the biggest heaviest vase yet!   it challenged my chop saw in a BIG WAY.  i can already tell that if i want to be working on larger pieces once again i will have to wait for more space and more tools.  i didn't realize when i got this pipe that it would put such a strain on the motor let alone eat up the blade.  these pipes are such a bizarre thing...they remind me of ceramics.  and yet...i love that i didn't have to 'make' them.  they already existed. 

tod has a little video camera and saturday he got clips of me cutting this pipe as well as all the other steps i go through to get the finished product.  once i saw what it is i do to make these i realized i have invented my own little process and thats pretty cool.  i worry of course that a 'real metal worker' will see that video clip once tod gets it uploaded and think good god why is she doing all THAT?!?!  i think these pipes are bringing out some deep yearning to do more with metal.  i have no idea how that is ever going to happen, seems pretty far off but ya never know.  i got quite a compliment from a metal worker woman i met from etsy, she said these vases were 'simple and brilliant' and she wished she would have thought of it.  that blew my mind considering i really admire her work and she obviously knows a helluva lot more than i do about metal.  she lives in louisiana and said if i ever come by she'd teach me some things.  i'm on the fence about learning cuz if i dont do it i forget it immediately.  as usual, i always want more than i have.  always want to have the skills that seem beyond my reach.  constantly pushing and butting up against the limit of what i can do.  its a good thing but it also makes me feel like a wild fenced in animal that is always pushing against the wire straining to get out.  all those big pieces of metal i see at the scrap yard...those pieces i can't haul off let alone store...I WANT THEM.  i want to do things to them even if i have no way of doing them or knowing how.  i guess it is the dangling carrot that keeps me trotting down a path.

234 pounds of FUN

thats what i purchased yesterday.  234 pounds of pipe from the scrap yard. tod and i walked the 3 blocks to our little huntsville goldmine.  i call it that now because even in vermont we have never seen so many pipes at one time, and so many that were colored!  usually scrap piles have big nasty heavyily rusted out pipes.  period.  or you get little ones but they are so gross inside it's not worth bothering with.

oh yes, it was indeed a 'sign' if ever there was one.  you paula, you will become the pipe vase maker of all times came a whisper from the heap of scrap which was piled 4 times taller than i.  you will make a plethora of exotic one of a kind vases for the masses dearest little artista.

i knew within a few minutes we needed the car so tod went back for it whilst i fondled and feasted on pipe after pipe.  pulling them and tugging them carefully from the reachable spots hoping that the ton of scrap atop it didn't tumbled down and flatten me.  it still amazes me you can go into scrap yards and just get whatever you want.  most of the ones in vermont we went to stopped allowing people in.  (i got busted with my camera at two places and i know they were probably worried about getting caught for some toxic doings, who knows) anyhow, this place is cool.  the guy appears amused every time tod and i show up in our sneakers and shorts.  me carrying a little old tote bag and gloves and us walking away with long pipes over our shoulders.

tod was gone longer than i imagined it would take, i was getting HOT.  it averages mid to high 90's and the humidity is right along with the temp.  i kinduh felt like i was gonna pass out or panic.  here i am standing around with my pile-o-pipes wondering where is the daddy dog? help me...i'm sweating so much my eyes are stinging and i aint gots no money!  ( i didnt bring more than $16 thinking i would only find a few things).  guess he was searching for some cash at home....he finally showed up and we hoisted the pipes to the weigh station and had the grand total of 284 lbs.  the scrap guy said 'boy i sure can't wait to see whatcha doin with all them pipes'.  when i told him i cut them up into pieces and made vases out of them his eyes almost popped out of his head.  i said people buy em online and he shook his head and said something about people will buy anything.  that made me smile.

so we packed up the car and shoved everything under our little front step stoop.  i of course worry people will come by and steal it all for resale back at the scrap yard but tod assures me no one is gonna do that. can't wait to show you some of the goodies i got.  a woman on etsy was interested in black ones with no bottoms for her kitchen utensils, i found some uber cool pipes that if she doesn't want, i KNOW someone will!

blue collar art

well my blog sure seems to be on the dull side.  pipes is all i got going on.  and thats a good thing for right now.  i seem to have a little schedule of sorts:  i get up and check online stuff.  have a sale to tend to on etsy.  pack up the vase and ride my bike to the post office and ship it.  i've not been to the bone house to do anymore mosaic work since there are cleaning jobs to do before students move in aug 1.  after that i'm sure i will have 1 or 2 cleaning gigs each month and thats IT.  which is fine, i will miss the work YES I SAID MISS IT...its crazy isn't it?  i've been enjoying getting up and working and sweating and making some money.  i think my increased sales on etsy have a lot to do with my mental state right now. when it's just cleaning apartments with no art energy moving life seems hopeless and really fucking hard.  while i know i can't keep making vases forever i am enjoying it while it lasts.  it isn't something i can sustain.  i need lots of good weather so i can drag everything outside and work.  i think our rainy season is coming and then i'm stuck inside and no cutting of metal is going to happen. 

by then i will be ready for something else.  by then the bone house will be done and dan will be working on other projects.  if i am inclined i can keep doing mosaic work for min. wage...his new project is a huge recycling warehouse in houston that wants him to do interior mosaic work on all the walls.  ugh.  its fantastic for HIM and the community will love it, just mosaic still makes me a little dizzy.  i like doing it here and there and will do what i can ~ but day in and day out full time nu-uh.  at least cleaning apartments i can move around and not be stuck sitting on my ass.  funny how we all have our likes and dislikes.  i'm sure there are plenty of people who LOVE doing mosaic work.  god bless em i aint one of them.

as for art of other kinds, i have no clue what is next.  i think about more trays. i think about using those reflectors i found if i can figure out how to get all that tar off of them.  i think about more functional objects to make.  small things.  i'm still working on pushing my larger pieces so i can have more space.  i'm living a fairly simple mindless life right now.  i have to say it is a relief.  i still can't believe i am so satisfied making these vases, there isn't much room for creativity and yet it is so satisfying.  they are just perfect vessels these pipes.  all i'm doing is making them useful again.  maybe there is a correlation between them and me.  i'm just trying to be useful again.  that was something i 'lost' when i stopped being a therapeutic massage therapist.  maybe that is why functional 'art' feels so good to me.  i like things having a purpose.  a use.  not just a visual pleasure as much as actual function.  one isn't better than the other necessarily, just my own preference right now.  maybe i am a blue collar artist.  literally.  i probably will never make elitist works.  it isn't my style.  not me.  i am still a nuts and bolts simple...down and dirty kind of artist.  not slick.  not manufactured.  not learned.  i'm flawed and perhaps i like my art that way as well.