i know i'm quiet, and i'll continue to be. i did want to say that roy is fine - he weathered that awful onslaught of horrendous high winds and flooding, had the wisdom to park his car in a different spot so that the inevitable big limbs would fall not on the car but in the drive, has power again, is fine. me, i'm frantic with preparations to head out again, first to alabama to be with my mother for a few lovely days (she is doing well, considering) then from there on to the other world of colorado.
i'm looking at the jewelry pieces i've created this past week and am amused to see that i've abandoned my fervor for knotting pearls and 
gemstones on thin silk cord, for now; i'm choosing instead to string rows and rows of stones and beads closely together, to wrap those rich strands with beautiful, earthy, ravelled and frayed bits of fabric and thread. the rawness of this - something that was born in australia and new zealand, something now strongly brewing in my mind - the rawness appeals to me in the deepest of gut-wrenching ways. i seem to be heading into a different direction with my work, and the amazing thing is that i see it comes not only from where i've been (australia and new zealand) but also where i'll be going (the highest rocky mountains of colorado). just imagining myself in that rugged environment has made my jewelry take off on an altered path. i was saying to a friend the other day that i'm not sure which direction i'm heading - then laughed and said that i suppose it is simply straight ahead. and so it is.
throughout the years - how many are there?! - friends from near and far have sent me snippets of things they think i might like to use in my work: ribbon, beads, feathers, stones all have found their way into my mailbox, and from there to the studio, sometimes to sit and percolate for months, sometimes for years. one friend in particular, lorri scott, has once again quite recently been sending me bits of her own work (dyed fabric and ribbon) and sometimes treasured beads - vintage russian baltic amber, here, from strands of family trinkets that she feels would serve a lovely purpose in my work. 
i thank all my friends for having that much faith in me - they always have - and for sharing such beautiful bounty. i carried with me ribbon that lorri had made all the way to the western shores of magical australia; some of those pieces i used in class, some was used in an art piece i made while students worked on their own shadowboxes, some i shared with a beloved aussie friend. i think back to those
days of teaching down under (and yes, i will write about my round the world trip - maybe even while i am in colorado, who knows?!) and remember the way that the sunlight hit the bits of deep red resin that jacky had brought back from the bush; now i am working with amber, a resin from another part of the world. it all seems connected, somehow.... the resin, the glow of the afternoon light, the rugged raw colors, the stone. all of it. i smile when i look at this photo - one of probably 100 that were frantically snapped while jacky and i watched the last of the afternoon light shoot quickly across a little church's cemetery and stone walls. i titled this one "magic hour at a roadside church"; i look at it and smile, because there are so many many incredible memories all wrapped up into that one brief moment, there in the last of the golden afternoon sunshine with beloved jacky, there in a really powerful, magical, treasured part of this world. there were parts of that trip, taken so so soon after daddy's passing, when i felt a little like a little girl dumbfounded by what was surrounding her: things seemed upside down, in an alice-through-the-looking-glass sort of way, and i wondered at the time how the trip would have its effects on me. all of that seems much clearer now, the effects that will stay with me forever; my work seems bolder, stronger, more direct, even while maintaining that quiet storytelling factor that i like to thread throughout.
i thought i'd share with you a couple of other pieces that i've worked on this week, in anticipation of sharing my work in yet another different environment - one just as rugged as australia, quite parallel in so many ways. this piece was more than two years in the making: i had purchased the tiny little faceted sapphire stones years back with the intention of incorporating them as "stars" set into precious metal clay. originally i had meant to pair them with blades of grass, little blue orbs hovering over summery growth. i'm not quite sure why i decided to use the little dress, except i recalled standing on that cottage verandah in the late australian winter night, staring up at the stars, watching the southern cross, marveling at a constellation that i cannot usually see. i remembered the little girl feeling of utter amazement and awe, and somehow this piece fell quickly together after that.
on the back of the dress piece, i engraved these words: "In her dreams, she plucked the stars from the sky and fastened them like buttons to the front of her dress". 
the fabric snippet i used is yet more of some beautiful antique kimono silk that lorri had dyed and given to me, back in winter when i visited california. it all comes together, you see?
i worked on something, too, this week, that i based on objects that had been kicking around my studio for over ten years. the notion came to me like a quick blast of light one day while i was walking out in the back woods behind the house with walter, and it was all i could do to get back to the studio and execute the designs. i absolutely love the idea of combining birds' nests with parts of a musical instrument - in this case, antique ivory piano key pieces - and bringing all the visual components together with ones of emotion. the cicada wing is something i found while out on our walks this past month here at home; it seemed to go perfectly with the nests. how i will use it remains to be seen; colorado will enlighten me, this much i know. for now, i've used one lovely nest, and named it Grace.
because, as you all know, life - and this great big world - is all wrapped up in it.
so, off i go next week to the wilds of colorado - but really, more to the wilds of the unknown, the unfamiliar, the naked new. i'm more than a little anxious about this experience, but also i am excited. my son robin will be there, and so will the beauties of colorado. come see me, if you can. i'll close with a quote i read earlier this week, from alan alda: "You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you'll discover will be wonderful. What you'll discover will be yourself."
goodness, yes. thank you, mr. alda. and thank you, friends, for all of your lovely words of encouragement and support. xo
