Revel in the Solitude

That's what I'm doing this morning. Safely ensconced at Starbucks in Lake Placid with my peppermint hot chocolate, and I treated myself to an egg white wrap for breakfast.

I was the only car on the road for most of my drive through Wilmington Notch. It is dark and grey and cold and raining this morning. It's exactly what a Sunday morning in the Adirondacks should be in late October. I saw one car at one of the parking areas near some trailheads, and I thought about the person who parked their car there and then trekked off into the forest there. I know there are a couple of lean-tos up the trail, and I wondered if that person was alone in the lean-to, if they had spent the night there, and if they were feeling the same wonderful feeling of solitude that I felt.

A lot on my mind this morning before I get down to work. I have a tutorial to write and publish, and then some site maintenance to do, and then a newsletter to edit before tomorrow morning.

I started working on a piece last night that I will be auctioning off to help raise money for Andrew Thornton's medical bills. While I am amazed and encouraged by the huge outpouring that has occurred since Andrew announced his diagnosis a few weeks ago, I'm still so sad and disheartened by the fact that this kind of thing is still necessary in this country. We still have no public option for health care, and that means that an independent artist like Andrew has to rely on the good hearts of so many people for his medical care. I've said it before and I'll say it again - I would gladly pay extra taxes to make sure that people like Andrew have access to decent health care in this country.

Last night, I finished the first beaded rope for the projects I'm working on for Marsha Hedrick. I stayed up way past my bedtime working on it, because I just felt the piece pulling me towards finishing it. It's been over a week since I started it, and I was really worried that I was going to run out of seed beads before I finished it. I was torn between going to bed and getting some much-needed sleep or finishing the piece - lucky for me, Colden let me sleep for about two hours before he woke up and needed a diaper change.

And so that made me think about one thing that's been on my mind lately, how I worry about Colden growing up with a crazy artist for a mother. Mothers aren't supposed to play their music too loud in the car when they're alone, or get up at 2 a.m. to sketch out design ideas before they disappear...

I want to raise my son to be happy, creative, well-adjusted. I want him to have the confidence in himself to pursue in life what is going to make him happy. I want him to have a good set of values and morals to guide him. I want him to delight in diversity and marvel at everything the world has to offer.

It's a pretty big job.