Happy Beads
These past couple of weeks, I've been feeling sort of like a faded version of myself. Some days are better than others; I try to focus on the good things in life and sometimes that works. There are good things. There are lots of good things. But other days, I feel like I'm just barely holding everything together. This part of me that I don't like, a part that had been hidden away for a very long time, suddenly reappears and drags me down to a dark place I don't want to be. I really hate feeling this way, which only makes it worse.
Anyway. I've been trying to spend as much time as possible on the torch (no, it just seems like I've been trying to spend as much time as possible in front of the TV). A couple of days ago, I found myself staring at the week's fresh produce: a pile of focals sitting by the sink, waiting to be cleaned. For some reason, I thought I had been working with bright colors all week. Things didn't turn out as I hoped. I was standing there glaring at a pile of stone-cold silvered ivory, sad black, boring Raku that decided not to do its thing (hey, it's everything-must-go-wrong month), muted blues and purples and dull greens, which all looked dark and gloomy even though there was some dichro in there somewhere. I didn't feel like cleaning them out. I didn't feel like photographing them, let alone naming them. Some of them might have actually been good beads, but at that moment, they all just looked the same.
"You are all STUPID."
"YOU'RE stupid." My beads know how to stick up for themselves.
"No. You're stupid. You all look the same. You're boring and depressing. I don't like any of you."
"But look at me! I sparkle!" says the dichro one.
I frown and shrug. "You're just not doing it for me. None of you are."
"Hey, don't blame US", says a boring silver glass bead. "YOU'RE the one who made us."
"Oh, shut up."
I took the entire pile of beads and dumped them into the orphan box (some talking orphan auctions will probably be coming soon), cleared all the dull colors off my table and replaced them with a bunch of colors I don't normally use. I tend to stay away from the rods that remind me of plasticine, thinking that the results would look unsophisticated. But on days like these, I guess I just need ridiculous colors in unlikely combinations. You know, a "go wild" sort of thing. Yeah! I'll make "happy beads"!
Here's a taste of the results. There are a few more on Flickr, and a whole set of them coming tomorrow. I think I might even be making more.
Definitely not my typical colors, but I like them. They're fun to make. They kind of remind me of cartoon characters.
Hey, at least the beads can be happy.
These will be on eBay tomorrow.
I'm off to bed. Sorry for being so depressing lately. See ya soon.
Don't worry - bead happy!!
I think you should try facing that plasticine fear and etch some of your bright happy beads - they'd look wicked!
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Sorry you are having a crappy February. But I love the new things you are doing with this brights!!
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Hey there Sarah, remember you're coming to Australia!! beach apartment, BEAUTIFUL Queensland, laid back Aussie folk keen to learn. I'm flying up from Victoria (the bottom of Oz) and can't wait to have some fun making glass with other crazy glass loving people. Send the faded gloomy sarah back to the basement or bring her here - she'll disappear in the bright tropics of Australia anyway (we all have THAT side of our personality to wrestle with). LOVE your brights and stripes and swirls. You still got it.
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