BE PREPARED… it is long…

As I sit day after day and love my life, I often wonder what life might have been had I followed my heart instead of what everyone else wanted me to do and to be. I spent way too much time working my way into a Bachelors Degree after allowing everyone else to guide my way and then somewhere I decided money was the way to happiness. My dream never really was to save the world. It was to move to West Virginia with my best friend in high school and go to college down there – at that time I had no idea what I really wanted to do. I just wanted to do something. However, I do believe deep in my heart I knew what I wanted all my life. I wanted to be an artist – I wanted to go to art college in Chicago. This I learned while spending my days in in school suspension. I would finish my school work for the week the first day or two and then have many more days to do what? So I drew and I wrote and I sketched. That was 25 or so years ago. I never really followed either of those dreams. I followed the path to the money because growing up so poor you have nothing to eat wasn’t what I wanted for the rest of my life and when I found out I was pregnant with the greatest love of my life – she would not grow up the way I did – bounced all over everywhere never knowing where home was. That I managed to half do – for about 2 years – oh I was all over and so was she. She will tell her story some day. I was running to the money and away from the life I never wanted to return to. In the end I came back… but not the way I grew up. I have spent many an hour in therapy (they finally told me there wasn’t much more they could do for me – I had reached all the goals we had set and then some) and then many more in recovery and working my program. It was here that I learned how to be me. The authentic me. The one that is sitting here writing this with tears in my eyes. The one that is allowed to have tears in her eyes ever so often – the one that knows it is ok to be sad for a loss – the loss of a person, family, pet – including chickens, or the loss of the innocence of my daughter. In all my heartbreaks, I am confident she broke my heart the most. I knew she would some day move away, what hurt was the way things happened. Oh, no I was not the perfect mom, hell I am not even sure I was half a good mom. I do know most of what I did was for her – I wanted her life to be better than mine. I didn’t want her to be sitting here in this moment writing something like this. Wow, ok, so I digressed a little. I live in what feels like me to be a mansion. I have lived in places like 6 times smaller than where I am now and some places a little larger and in more dangerous places. Anyway, I digressed just a little… I wonder what would have happened if I had followed my own heart? I have always been an artist – I have something I drew from when I was younger and in PA with my grandma at the cabin. I look back and see just how far I have come. I have done some amazing things and been part of history in the making – the kind that is in the history books. I am published, and will be again before the end of 2022. I believe everything in my life has led me to this moment. I do not believe in fate or destiny. I believe we make our own decisions and we write our own path. I am an artist- I am a pretty amazing one too. I have allowed my work to be auctioned for a good cause. I have not one but two mosaic tile benches to attest this also. I look at some of my work and am amazed at how good I am. I look at my photography and am amazed… I still prefer film over digital. In the end, I manage to capture that one second in time, that instant that needs to be remembered. My mother dotes on my photography, while at the same time putting herself down saying her art is not good enough – her stuff should be in a museum somewhere. I am currently curating my own photography showing – I am attempting to capture the unsung hero, you know that farmer you drive past on that back road and do not even see, that farm house that sits in the middle of 100 acres, the corn rows as they emerge from the ground and you do not even notice, the man and woman and children that get up to make sure you are fed. That is who and what I have captured. I have captured it without barely a human in sight… it will be a sight to see… I believe it is one of my best works yet. Ah, yes then there is one of my other passions, sewing – I have been given the opportunity to make this my life, my business, mine, all mine. But it is not all mine. It has been a 37 year road with so many bumps and heartaches to get to here. My beginnings go back to my grandmother and most recently (thank you Covid for some positive) the other unsung heroes – those that have allowed me to learn from them through virtual workshops and other “classes”. I have studied the basics, the couture, and am most enthralled with historic. I have spent most of my life with my head in science and theory. History allows me to have my head in reality and theory and use the best of all my abilities. I can research and learn and then come up with a potential topic and then research it to see if it has been done, if not, I can then write about it. But most of all, I use not only my intellect but also my creative when I am designing garments or a custom sewing job. I have one more passion that I never even considered. Horticulture! This is an ongoing adventure – and most of it is gardening – this allows me to “put up” food to save money the rest of the next year. But when I am out there, even when it is hard work and HOT (sometimes I have to come in for a few) I get to play in the dirt – I know some might not quite see that as playing, but really, at the end of the day and I am sore, I can tell you it is worth every single minute. It is not only healthy food, but healthy work. I prefer to be outdoors. I may not live in the Appalachian Mountains, but I live in the foothills and I can go home to those mountains in just a few hours. My grandma once told me (made no sense at the time) “you can take the girl out of the country, but not the country out of the girl”. Here today in these foothills there is really no place I’d rather be – ok, maybe Northern Georgia or Tennessee, still the same – I live in a rural county and a rural community where neighbors know each other and talk to each other and HELP each other when times are rough and people are down – or all at home because a global pandemic created a new opportunity to get to know those neighbors we might not have really known before. I could probably keep writing but the moral of the story is… after so many years, I am following my heart… I am letting my intellect take a time out… … I will add some photos another day and maybe some links… I am on Instagram and my business can be followed – https://lucky-7-studios.com – there is so much more… there is another post in the near future,…

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