a charmed life

trying (?) to have more of this loose, free, spontaneous style in my new layered Photoshop collage work

With the distance I have now, I can see that it was one small thought among all the other thoughts that drift like dust motes through a cluttered mind. But it was a thoughtI made an object, and held on to and turned over and over in my hand, as if it were an amulet, as if it gave meaning to what had come before: and holding on to it changed everything.

This fantastic first short paragraph of Chapter 5 from my current good bedtime book - The Woman Upstairs by Claire Messud really spoke to me. In the same chapter she mentions this first hit from Macy Grey (two of the main female characters are walking outside on a dark winter night singing this song at the top of their lungs - easy I'd think to enjoy doing). I remember I first heard this chart topping song on continuous air play everywhere while I was in Paris in 2004 with best friend Harry, a work trip to the fabulous & fantastic Maison Objet (gift & home decor) show in January of that year. I mentioned in my magic mojo mix post  in that same Cinderella year I went to work in LA for 12 days and then on to Taiwan, Hong Kong & the interior of China (a completely mind blowing, amazing, all expenses paid, 5 star trip - thank you again Jerry Kohl of Brighton). That trip was in April and then in August I spent a week in NYC (at the New York Gift Fair + being a keen touristimo) another favourite place. I lead and have lived a charmed life indeed ... and it continues to become more & more charmed all the time - bumpy sometimes I'll admit but continually tres charmed & charming.

A recent example of my charming life - just yesterday afternoon I received an email opportunity out of the blue, a custom illustration job enquiry, from a big, BIG hip fish company (who'd been cruising Etsy looking for artists) that made me jump up and down and dance madly around the CE headquarters (with Oliver & Miss D) to my current favourite Bruno Mars song - LOVE that song ! of course I can't tell you any more and probably won't be able to mention any details for ages but know that it is a very thrilling opportunity (sung by own personal chorus of angels).

It's the strangest thing about being human: to know so much, to communicate so much, and yet always to fall so drastically short of clarity, 
to be, in the end, so isolate and inadequate. Even when people try to say things, they say them poorly, or obliquely, or they outright lie, sometimes because they're lying to you, but as often because they're lying to themselves. Another killer few sentences from p77 of The Woman Upstairs by Claire Messud

ahhhhh .... Macy Grey's first big hit -Try - I'm adding this fantastic song to ma magic mojo mix ;-)