A Working Artist Again

 Here is a mannequin I made for Passion Pie Cafe.  They are using it to display their logo T-shirts that are for sale.  When the mannequin is dressed, you can't see her sparkly lacy red lingerie or her tattoo, but I wanted her to have these features, anyway.  You can't tell what most women are wearing under their T-shirts, but it can make a difference in attitude!  I made the mannequin almost completely out of recycled materials.  In return for this work, I've been drinking coffee at no charge for a while. 

Several years ago, I started being a "professional artist" in Edmonds, Washington.  What I mean by that is, I would make mosaic artwork and galleries would show it and people would buy it.  It was a good gig.  I'd have fun gluing stuff to other stuff, and then people gave me money for it.  What could be better than that? 

Then I took a hiatus because of getting divorced.  I moved to a different community where there were artists in every house and only one for-profit gallery.  After a year there, not getting a foothold anywhere, I got rid of everything, moved into a 22-foot motorhome, and went exploring.  After some months of looking around, I chose to live in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico.  

"T or C," as we call it locally, is a really great place to get your start, or to restart, working as an artist.  There are lots of little galleries.  There are also lots of artists, but there are enough opportunities to go around.  It's taken me a little while to get going, but in December I'll have work in two galleries and two local businesses.   

 Here is the mannequin's tattoo and a glimpse of her lingerie.  She's a really happy gal and, if weren't for that chrome stand, I'm sure she would be doing the mamba.

I'm getting a lot of guidance and support from other artists in the community.  Most of them don't seem to have a competitive bone in their bodies.  They are a big help to me and to others.  We have a monthly Artists Salon where we talk about a topic of interest, such as "the role of the viewer," or "spirituality and art," or "where do you get your inspiration."  Some local artists are nationally and internationally known, and their insights at these meetings are really helpful to me.  I'm learning to relax and not worry about who likes my art, who doesn't like my art, whether my art sells, etc.  They tell me to just do my artwork and keep having the courage to put it where people can see it.  I'm really grateful to have kind, accomplished artists share their perspective with me. 

 Here is the finished mosaic wicker desk that is currently at Grapes Gallery for the Trash Bash Recycled Art Show, which is a benefit for a local organization called The Bountiful Alliance. 

That said, I have to get to work!  I was just allotted 10 feet of wall space at Grapes Gallery for their upcoming "Treasures of Truth or Consequences" show, and I only have sketches so far of local landmarks, scenes and people.  I have two weeks to move from sketches to finished works of art.  I also plan to complete a couple of 4 x 6 inch pieces for the December Postcard show at Happy Belly Deli.  I'll try to take a few photos as I do my work to share on the blog, or at least pictures of the finished pieces.  

 My kitchen window.  I know I am really settled here now, because I have two houseplants.

The rest of my life is going really well, too.  I started out working four days a week at January's, but have cut down to three so I have more time to do artwork and to sell on eBay.  This is working out really well all around--there are two other people working for January now, too, so everyone has some time on the schedule every week.  This means that there will be coverage whenever anyone is sick or on vacation, too.  That's great, because I'm planning to be in Florida for February and possibly ranch-sitting up in northern New Mexico for part of next summer.  Maybe January will even take a vacation!  I hope so--she works really hard and deserves a break.  

I'm experiencing my first cold weather here in TorC.  It's not bad at all so far--temps sometimes hovering around freezing overnight, but it warms up to the 60s on sunny afternoons.  The mornings and evenings can be cool enough to wear sweaters, drink hot chocolate, turn on the heat, etc.  I bought myself a used bread machine at the thrift store this morning, and I just returned from the grocery store, where I bought ingredients to make several soups this week.  I also bought a big thermos, which came in the mail today, for taking hot lunches to work for January and me to share.  

Steve was here recently for a week-and-a-half visit.  It was great.  I miss him, but if he was here right now, I'd have to mostly ignore him and work, work, work on my art.  When he comes back to visit me sometime in December, I'll have all that work done and on exhibit here and there, and I can relax and enjoy Steve's company.  

Life is good.

Cool Times in a Hot Town

Sonja Staying Cool

It's been hot in Truth or Consequences, in the high 90s or low 100s most days lately.  I try to get out on my bike and spend time socializing with friends over coffee fairly early in the day, then run whatever errands I need to, before I close myself up in the apartment with the air conditioning running in the afternoon.  That's when I do my eBay work and art work.  In the evening, we can open up the windows again, the time depending on whether there's any breeze.  

Some new things (cool things!) have been happening here for me lately.  So many I think I'll make a list:

1.  I'm back working at La Paloma Hot Springs and Spa one day a week, plus a few hours here and there, subbing for co-workers when they take a lunch break or go to the dentist or whatever.  

La Paloma was beautiful last year when I worked there and became even more beautiful while I was gone for the winter.  There are more gardens, some bird feeders, and lucky bamboo plants in every room.  All of the bath house rooms have been replastered and repainted, and a well-known New Mexico artist, Tracy Turner Sheppard, is painting mimbres and mandalas on the walls of each tub room.  Tracy is in town working on this project this week, and I'm delighting in getting to know her.

Another improvement, for employees, is that we now get to use the spa's laundry for just $1 per load, which is a great time and money saver.  Yesterday I did my laundry early in the morning before the housekeepers needed to start doing bedding, towels and robes used by the spa guests.

   Watercolor mandala embellished with metallic thread

2.  I'm volunteering at the Community Health Foundation (CHF) Thrift Store that is practically next-door to my apartment.  I spend a few hours each week inside the store, usually rolling up pieces of sewing fabric and pricing them.  

I also watch the loading dock at the back of the store during the hours they're closed.  I try to make sure that the donations make it into the store when they're open again, rather than being stolen by passers-by, which happens a lot.  So I stuff bags and boxes and pieces of furniture that have just been left out on the dock into the big donation drop-box, where things are harder to steal.  Sometimes I bring stuff to my house over the weekend and then take them back to the store on Monday morning.   

Of course, this means I sometimes get first pick of stuff that's donated, so I've been able to buy some pretty cool things for resale on eBay or at January's Gallery, an art and antiques store that is right across the street from my apartment.

CHF volunteers get a small discount on purchases ($1) for each hour of work.   It's a great little thrift store, and I always find something to buy for my own use or for resale.  So I always end up leaving my shift owing more hours than when I arrived!  

 Oil pastel mandala on heavy cardstock

3.  I'm trying different art media.  For the past few years, my emphasis has been on mosaics.  A few months ago, I started drawing mandalas with markers, colored pencils, and crayons.  Now I'm starting to do mandalas with watercolors and oil pastels, and I'm doing some collage and papier-mache.   It's like being a kid again, where you try all sorts of things in elementary school art.

I've also started attending a monthly art salon, where local artists get together and talk about what they're working on, what inspires them, what issues they run into, etc.  
  

I've made some mandala notecards, each one an original piece of art, that are on sale at January's and at La Paloma.  I also crafted some Scrabble tile refrigerator magnets that are available at January's.
 

4.  I've increased my coolness factor a whole lot technologically lately.  My old laptop was being kept on life support by Dave the Computer Guy, but once it got to where nothing would help anymore (not even mouse-to-mouse resuscitation), I needed to replace it.  So I got another Lenovo Thinkpad, at about half what the first one cost me about five years ago.  It's taken me a few weeks to get savvy with a newer version of Windows.  I also had to find a new way of editing my photos for eBay because I no longer had PhotoShop, which a friend had put on my old machine.  But I've grown to love PicMonkey, and now I am back up to speed with my eBay selling.

I decided that since I was on such a high learning curve with technology, anyway, I might as well go ahead and upgrade to a Smartphone, too.  My two-year contract with Verizon was near its end, so they gave me a free Droid Pro.  

Now I'm beginning to understand why so many people constantly have their phones in their hands.  I'm using my phone as a mini-computer throughout the day.  I can check on my eBay sales without having to be at home with my computer booted up, and I'm looking forward to using my eBay app while I'm out shopping the thrift stores in Las Cruces next week, to decide whether things are worth buying before I spend the money on them.  

    So true...but at my house, I'm the one tethered to the phone.  Steve will probably never need or want a Smartphone.

5.  There's a new coffee shop in TorC!  Passion Pie is a cafe owned by several local women who turn out fabulous baked goods every day of the week.  I understand they also offer actual meals, but so far I've never been able to get past the pastry case to look at the menu.  I am still a Black Cat Books & Coffee devotee and I go to the Black Cat every day it's open.  But there are days it's not!

So that's my story of domesticity in TorC.  I'm happy and productive.  I always find plenty of interesting things to do, and the heat isn't getting me down.  I am, however, going to see about trading a few workdays with a coworker in July so Steve and I can spend a week or two in some cooler weather up in Santa Fe and Taos.  We'll need to restock the Guppy with a few things, since we moved the mattress and other items into our apartment.  

All is well with me, and I hope it is with you, too.  I'm off to the Black Cat to read the Sunday New York Times and soak up the local gossip.  

Becoming New Mexican

La Paloma Hot Springs & Spa

Yesterday I started my job as a part-time spa attendant at La Paloma, which offers hot springs baths, massage, lodging and a conference center for retreats. It's a very nice facility, and one of the perks is that I get all the free soaks I want.

The job itself is pretty easy--two days a week, I will take whatever reservations come in, check in people as they arrive for a stay, and do some light housekeeping in the bath house between bathers. Job duties include such things as making sure the New Age music from Pandora is always streaming into the bath house and doing a sage ritual at shift change.

The downside of the job is that everyone that works there is seriously nucking futs. Housekeepers come into the office to complain about everything and everybody. So I'll be learning to have good boundaries on this job. The only question is whether to be really positive or just tell these crazy people I will hurt them if they spew their negativity at me. I'll probably try the nice approach first.

I did talk to a few people that I consider to be sane about the bitchy backbiters at work, and they said, "Welcome to TorC." I could get a job somewhere else, but it will be the same anywhere. This is a town where you are a superstar at work if you show up, do the job, and don't say anything really crazy (such as attributing missing cleaning supplies to ghosts...seriously!), and that's what I intend to do.

Turtleback Mountain just before a monsoon

In my last entry, I wrote about selling both antiques and my artwork at January's Gallery With a Card Shop here in Truth or Consequences. A few days ago, I stopped by with more vintage stuff for January to sell in her shop, and she kindly included me in a "ladies night out" at the new ice cream shop in town that evening. It was really fun getting to know a few more people here, especially since they share my interest in reselling old crap.

I took the picture of Turtleback just as I left the house. Normally the mountain is a dark brown against a light blue sky, but with a rainstorm about to begin and the sun on its way down, the mountain was illuminated against a dark cloudy background. For those of you who know Brian, that's his house on the right with the big swamp cooler on the roof. Brian lives so close to me that I sometimes back the Guppy into his fence, trying to get out of my parking space and into the alley. Not on purpose, of course.

Sonja's kibble in a moat

I didn't know about the monsoon season before I moved here. Coming from the Pacific Northwest where it rains all fall, winter and spring, it seems funny to be someplace where the majority of the rain falls in the summer. But it's also nice, because the storms usually occur in the afternoon or early evening, and they bring cool relief from the hot days. When I was at the ice cream event the other night, the rain came down pretty hard for a while, so we just stayed longer and chatted more until it cleared up.

Another thing I didn't know about before moving here was the ants! Lots and lots of little ants, different colors and different kinds. The locals know their names. I don't. They're all just pests to me. I was feeling frustrated about ants coming into my house and swarming in Sonja's cat food dish, until I talked to my neighbor Janice, who does a lot of pet-sitting. She told me to put Sonja's dish inside a larger dish full of soapy water. This completely alleviated the problem.

Candlesticks painted in New Mexico colors, then distressed

This week I took a major shopping trip down to Las Cruses with my friends Gretchen and Tom. Man, do they know how to shop! I thought I was a shopper, but they wore me out. Gretchen shopped 'til I dropped. It was good, though. We hit some thrift stores that have a 30% senior discount on Wednesdays, and I found lots of good stuff for resale and also to incorporate into artwork. Then we went to deep discount department stores, such as Big Lots and Factory 2U, and I got a bunch of things I needed for my apartment. We topped it off with lunch at Golden Corral, which also has a senior discount, but I wasn't old enough for that one. I don't think I can afford to go with Gretchen and Tom every week (money-, time-, or energy-wise), but it was fun and I will definitely do it again.

Overall this past week has been another social butterfly week for me. This just amazes me, given that I used to be such a loner. I find myself dropping whatever I'm doing to have coffee with Dhultky or iced tea with Brian or a chat with Janice, plus I need to fit in the phone calls to friends and family elsewhere. I've also begun writing a weekly snail mail letter to my son Sly, because sometimes it's difficult to find times that we're both available to talk on the phone. I am changing here...no longer isolating, and becoming a person who values companionship, kindness, and mutual interests when they come my way.

Mosaic birdhouse completed this morning

I do, however, need to grab those times that I have to myself and get things accomplished! I actually do that, but not to the extent of my capabilities. I gather things up to take to January and I do artwork and I eat pretty well and ride my bike here and there to run errands, but I tend to put off the less fun stuff. So today I'm having a Garbage Day to take care of the garbage I'd rather not do, such as pay bills, do paperwork, and clean house. And I'm going to get it all done before my siesta, so I gotta run. I know I'm not completely a New Mexican yet, because if i was, I'd take my siesta first. One day at a time, I guess.