Just Roll With the Changes

Despite being a Queen, I am not really in charge of anything except my own attitude. I haven't been super good at keeping that adjusted either. But every day is a new opportunity.

Virtual appearances are all the rage, as you know, and we are working on a recorded zoom for our performance for the Jell-O Art Show this year. Maude Kerns has added the capability to project  recordings in the gallery and have been having some movie nights in the last couple of years, so they are all ready for it. We'll show some of the old performances and you all can enjoy them again. They are relics of how it was before, with all that crowding together and eating Tacky Food and hugging.

I hung some stuff in my space so I will have an interesting background for the zoom, and tried it out yesterday for some other meetings, but it needs work. I like visual stimulus (what others would call clutter) in my life so it makes sense to me to create a rich background just like I would for the stage in a typical year. Making the set pieces is always one of my favorite parts. I won't be wearing full costuming most likely, but I don't know that for sure yet. 

I was working on a piece but I think I might just make it into a new headdress for the zoom and call it good. The hours of the show had to be changed to make it possible, and it's now 1-5 in the afternoon. I hate to say this, but I won't be attending in person. This will be the first time if you don't count last year when no one did.

I am planning to donate some fascinators from my vast collection to the gallery for sale, so if you go and you want one, you'll be supporting art in a big way. I still have the blank shirts from last year but I don't think selling t-shirts is going to happen...although the orange color tempts me to do some kind of Covid motif and I might succumb to that desire. Having the desire to create is a big change for me as I am one of those people who spent the last year mostly uninspired and not creating. Again, if I do, they will be sold for donations to the gallery.

I still find it fascinating that I haven't been creative and I can only think that I have been so over-productive in my life that I needed a very long vacation and some semi-retirement. I worked on what presented itself to make money and keep my Market retail going, and did some house repairs and things, but mostly read books and thought and journaled and sat on the deck whenever I could. Also I have a cat now so took a lot of time figuring out and catering to her many needs. She does anxiety for me so I don't have to.

Doing a lot of thinking and journaling and learning is a kind of work, scholarly work I guess, and it will undoubtedly not be wasted time. I got a handle on how to write about the Market, by starting with 2019, our 50th season, which was glorious and in retrospect, so priceless. Having a handle on it means I have started the process and the rest is just labor. That feels like some kind of success.

I have a couple of things I shouldn't talk about that will explain why I am going to Saturday Market for Opening Day instead of giving it all up for Jell-O Art, but that's my decision and it makes the most sense this year. Next year I might change back to prioritizing Jell-O Art. This year survival still outweighs having fun, so that's just the way it is. I can still put plenty of energy into promoting the Jell-O and I apologize to fans of the Queen but you know, if I went and hung out at the show, that would mean one less person could enter the space and that doesn't seem fair either. So I would be hanging out in the courtyard or something, which I trust some of the other artists and Radar Angels might do. 

So that's where I am today...still in the half-grieving, half-joyful mode of the pandemic era. Some things are lost and others gained. We're not finished yet.

At Least We Still Have Jell-O

Yup, that's our theme this year: At Least We Still Have Jell-O. Although the group has some enthusiasm, we are still in Covid-mode and will not write and perform a show as usually done. That's just the way it is.

Our current plan is to record a zoom where we all dress up and dance around...to be shown on social media and maybe projected at the gallery during the assigned time, Saturday April 3rd, 5-8 pm.

Plus some kind of compilation film I guess. I'm not in charge of that though it is in capable hands.

I'm in charge of doing a piece (though I'm uninspired) and figuring out a costume. And I will go to the gallery after I finish up my Market day as that is Opening Day of Saturday Market as well. My loyalties go to the Market for income purposes mostly, and for the survival of the Market. 

The gallery is still going to have a physical show of Jell-O Art. They will photograph and show it online and you can also go to the gallery though there will still be some restriction on attendance. Right now they are operating at the current limits for extreme risk but the County is down to High Risk so maybe a few more people can be in the room.

We've been meeting and are getting a little of the regular energy of irreverent cacaphony. Zoom meetings lend themselves well to everyone talking at once and no one being able to hear much or do much organization. I'm still stuck in the ennui of having a year to myself reflected back in my laptop screen. At least we have video filters!

So keep working on your pieces or your thoughts about them, and if you don't want to actually go to the gallery keep an eye on social media for videos or whatever shows up. 

We'll get it all back someday, we hope. For now, we do have Jell-O. At least.