violettawilde

 Hi.

Look, it's a Dreamwidth.

I think it's time to start writing here again.

Once upon a time, there was a man who carved a marble statue. He took great care in its creation, forming it with elegant lines and infinite grace. When it was complete, he set a trap and captured the wild spirit of the North Wind, and he imbued the statue with this spirit, and it came to life, and was made flesh and blood and Wind, and looked like a woman.

The man was very proud, and said, "Look at what I have made with my two hands! I have created life!"

But he had not created life. He had merely enslaved it. And so the living statue whipped up a whirlwind and flew away as if on wings, never to be seen by him again. Sometimes, though, she can be spotted flying through the sky at night, like a wisp of moonlight and dream.

 I should post on this thing more often.

 I'm starting a new art presence on Tumblr.  Sorry about the lack of content; I've mostly been setting it up today.  I'll be following some blogs and reblogging some stuff soon, as well as posting some of my own work.  I'll be using this blog to reblog things of interest to me as well as posting my art.

http://silverflameart.tumblr.com

 I figured I'd drop this here and see what happens.

On my art site, silverflameart.com, I'm holding a fun little art event in which I draw you as a dragon.  These commissions are priced at a pretty heavy discount from my usual rates, and I'll be taking a limited number of them before closing the event down (probably up to 20 requests), but I'm still open for requests.

You can check out the Be a Dragon! page for details.

Here's one I did of kllara :

A short story by Neil Gaiman: The Return of the Thin White Duke.

A fitting memorial to Bowie: his legacy, vision, and otherworldliness captured and woven into a mythic tale.  As it should be.

 My "Be a Dragon!" event at silverflameart is going fairly slow, but I've got one commission from it.  I may need to advertise more?  I may try to hit up my SFA social media accounts to urge some participation.

I'll be working on the one commission today.  Hopefully I'll be able to finish it, though if not, then tomorrow.  

Right now, I'm in a sort of zoned-out place, drinking coffee, trying to urge myself into movement.  I may do some light exercise after I finish this cup, maybe some stretching, get the blood flowing, just for a few minutes.  I'm really quite out of shape now, and do need to start incorporating exercise into my daily life.  It's been hard because I've been struggling with various health-related problems and haven't had much energy.  I've been wanting to start incorporating short bursts of exercise throughout my day: three or four ten-minute bursts, to help boost my metabolism.  It won't do much for physical endurance, but it's better than doing nothing, and it's easier for me to say, "I'm going to exercise for ten minutes now, and ten minutes in two hours," than it is for me to say, "I'm going to do an hour and a half of cardio."  Perhaps, as I begin to do this on a regular basis, I'll be better able to do that hour and a half of cardio on my good days.  I just need to stick with it-- I keep doing it for a day or two and then stopping.

I seem to have found myself once again in caretaker mode.  My mother has been physically deteriorating at a rather alarming rate recently.  She's had a number of physical disabilities for as long as I can remember, but they seem to be spiraling now to the point where she can scarcely get around.  She spends most of the day sitting in bed, uses her walker to come into the living room to sit for a few hours a day, then goes back to bed when her pain gets too bad.  I've been taking care of her as best I can, preparing meals and checking on her throughout the day, helping her when she needs it.  Her mind is still intact, though she has severe brain fog due to her Fibromyalgia and often loses her train of thought, forgets words, and says or does odd things.  (At least, we both hope that's due to her Fibromyalgia and not from developing dementia or some such)  Despite all that, she keeps herself busy, running a blog on Wordpress, participating in a chronic illness group online, doing Dad's bookkeeping for his filmmaking business, doing numerous Bible studies.  She is, like my Dad, very very Christian, of a fundamentalist variety, which is awkward to be around, but they for the most part don't overtly badger me to come back to their faith (they do tend to do it passive-aggressively, but that's a bit easier to ignore).  

Between my own health issues (which brought me back to Houston after living in California) and the duty to take care of family, I expect I'm going to be here for awhile, so I'm trying to make the best of it.   I have my own private space, which does a lot to keep my sanity levels even.  And I focus on building and promoting my freelance work, on doing the things I enjoy such as writing, and on finding my balance.  I've had a difficult time accepting myself where I am right now, feeling like I've somehow failed in life because of it, but I think I need to start shifting my perspective on things. 

 I have been baking today in preparation for the holiday.  Peanut butter chocolate chip cookies (homemade), and pumpkin and cherry pies (Marie Calendar's frozen pies-- not as good as homemade, but not bad either).

Tomorrow, I'll be making Christmas dinner, but most of it will be easy prep (unlike Thanksgiving this year, when I did almost everything from scratch).  Will have a quiet dinner with family; I'm hoping there won't be too much stress.  

Honestly, I've always loved the Christmas season, but I've found it hard to get into the spirit of it over the past several years.  I tend to prefer celebrating with close friends and chosen family rather than with my birth family, who are extremely Christian (in a fundamentalist sort of way) and tend to make things awkward.  So it's become more of a hassle than anything.  But I still engage in some private celebratory things, generally in interactions with online friends, so that takes the edge off of the awkwardness and brings a bit of the warmth I always liked about the holiday.

I know, it's probably a bit strange for an agnostic-type pagan to like Christmas, but I tend to approach it from a mythic perspective.  I like the messages woven into the mythology: of transcendent love, of peace on earth, of kindness and goodwill, of family and togetherness, of magic and the miraculous.  Because of that, I haven't fully given up on it.  

 Trying a pot roast recipe in the crock pot today.  I made a few modifications, partly because I didn't have all the ingredients (it called for fresh sage and thyme and I only had dried), and partly because I wanted a potato instead of a yam in the mix, so hopefully it'll turn out good.  The broth is a mixture of balsamic vinegar and beef broth.  It suggested a cup of dry red wine, but offered more broth as a substitution.  (I think I would have preferred the wine but got voted down)

We'll see how it turns out.  I haven't made many pot roasts and the few I've made wound up a bit chewy.

 I dreamed last night of etheric, hidden whales, creatures of deep magic and ancient wisdom, swimming unseen through the rooms of a seaside house.  A dog seemed to be aware of them, signaling their presence with his barking.