The building used to be a grocery store, so these transom windows hinged at the bottom, opened by one of those grappling hook poles from a hundred years ago.

Now there is a sort of drop-ceiling loft, at a level where the windows are readily accessible.

When the glass in one broke this summer,  Steve took them out and rehung them so they open sideways, using the original latches–snap!

Today we put up a chandelier in the downstairs front window, and Ann brought a string of twinkling white lights, too busy for home–here they almost compete with STICKY written in light rope to the west, and the Christmas tree lot to the east.

I have wanted to light these windows up from day one.  next plan, a word in my windows, too.  What will it be?

It’s more than just My Story, it’s embedded in the daily ritual passed on to me.  For the first year, either the Expert was there, showing me his way to do things.   Then he would come to “help”, when I really needed information, and he would send me on some frantic errand, upbraid me on some idiotic detail such as something I didn’t clean correctly, as if it were still his property, as if I were an idiot, an interloper.  It finally broke free for me when I found a big mess of ink in the back sink–which I just left, without saying a word.

I am still shocked when I see the original photographs, remember the details of the rusted sink, the darkroom light switch I had to stand on a riser to reach, the panic of running out of supplies I didn’t know how to replace, the anxiety built in to every little task.  Even now, just figuring out cool, new, different ways to do things, it’s based on something I learned from The Expert.

Constant upgrades and changes,  putting down colorful wool rugs, painting a purple wall, writing on it in yellow chalk, entering my own password in my own Imac.  My personal values of saving energy, making friends with people who come in or call, making a community, a community center, piece by piece.  I often find myself lost in routine rather than ritual, although the actual business is not nearly as time-consuming as it was even a few weeks ago.  The mental hamster wheel is gone, replaced by my own natural calm.

Just now I am beginning to go through my Prints, to sort frames and move the t-shirts into the background, really get my Gallery space realized for the holidays.

Pivotal to this will be finally getting the metal counters out, that will be a huge breakthrough.  I am composing a romantic craig-list ad, I have photos, I have dimensions–just do it!

Saturday September 1, 2012, marks one year I have been in business.  August was a wonderfully long month, the rent is paid with the deposit on the latest job (finished and home at 9:30 last night–with the Moon!) shipping out today.

I have a couple of helpers, although no one is getting paid but the landlord, the dentist, and the suppliers, and the utilities, and the dented can store.  The ink kerfuffle is sorting out,  my neighbor is donating a big glass display case–careful! !  Moving that sucker in.

I am still trucking things back and forth from shop to studio–the camera is here, the scanner there, the card-reader here, the email there, the blog here, the contact list there, the antique, squirrel-driven Mac at the shop, the PC at home, all wickedly, incomprehensibly incompatible .

When I find my camera I will take some photos to post the calligraphy job that came out so beautifully.  .  .  .  also at my facebook site

Months go by without a post, worse, without any new art.  There are sketches and

a simple sketch

scribbles in my notebooks-

I feel I’m not making much headway artwise .  At some point the tide comes back in and I start drawing again.  i turned this into a screen and printed a line of t-shirts.  It turned out very well.

Inevitably, what I am learning technically will translate into screenprints .  .  .  or vice versa

discharge, water base, and oil base inks

I spent quite a lot of time the other day posting about my new wall, but for some reason did not show up.  What is that about?  It seems a lot of hinky electronic anomalies are making themselves known lately, I can only hope that some of them work in my favor  .  .  .

Here is the miraculous Red Wall Ann painted for me at the shop.  ‘nuf said,  it makes everything so much more alive.  The landscape on the light table is my painting of the Mesquite Springs Campground (Death Valley) conflated with a Phainopepla–a bird native to Southern Arizona.  The one on the floor is a clash between the Sonora (Saguaro) and Colorado (Spanish Bayonet Yucca) Deserts.

While taking photographs of the shop, I did that thing I have done before, looking through the camera without a spotter, I tripped and fell on my lens.  Alas, I let my warranty run out–but I never liked that camera as much as the one I put in my pocket and leaned on the fender of my truck and  .  .  .  I have been wanting that small credit-card Nikon with the sliding cover, the S100?  with 16 mm and 5x zoom–that would be easier than getting a bigger purse.   The AW 100 is good, too, designed to take a fall or a drop in the    .   .   .   bathtub, or worse.  And the S1200pj–with a projector.  I have always liked that feature.  So, anyway, in homage to my first digital Nikon, coolpix 5600, here are some photographs I took from late 2005 and onward.

Stone in stone, Yosemite

winter sun at Sea Ranch

Last light, Anza Borrego

China Spring near Darwin

In my element--off-kilter-Sequoia

After a long week of hard work and gardening, I am planning to go to the shop and feel the energy there.  Sticky Art Lab is holding am Sunday classes with the biodiesel folks, bees, chickens, house rabbits.  I don’t know what class is there today, but I intend to go sniff around.  I have shied away from opening the door, it’s all so familiar, but uncertain.  What t-shirts do we have?  Halloween, the Ramones,  miscellany.  All will be revealed in time, after breakfast.