What I've Been Up To

The book right before (and I do mean right before) The Book That Would Not Die is called Designing with Tile. I created the shelf unit in this picture for that book. Yes, indeedy. I spent months dreaming up inventive ways to use tile and then weeks and weeks conveying my ideas to a series of editors and then more time describing my methods to the tile-book buying public. This is one of the results.

Just as there are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground, there must be hundreds of ways to make a living with words. Writing D-I-Y books has been an interesting career and one that's been very good to me, but now even my dreams are telling me I need to explore other ideas.

Last night I dreamed that I was in Telluride in a lovely hotel room with my folks (who were their ages now) and my children (who looked like they did at about 10 and 5). I was supposed to be flying to Phoenix for a meeting about the DIY book I was writing, but my folks were intent on keeping me from that meeting. They absolutely would not get their stuff together or get in the car. I yelled and stormed, but it didn't do any good at all. In the dream, I could feel the physical manifestations of my fear of losing the writing contract for the book. I was very, very frustrated.

And then Mom and Dad spirited me off to a mountainside, where I met a series of people in gorgeous settings. After talking with these people, I began to understand that I was meant to miss the plane, meant to be introduced to new possibilities. Some of the things they showed me were absolutely beautiful and they kept telling me I could use them to make a living. I bought a couple pieces of stunning handmade jewelry for my sister and then went off into the woods alone to contemplate what to do.

I don't know what any of this means. I do know that I want to add new revenue streams to my world, and I am hereby announcing this intention to the Universe.

If anyone has any ideas, I'd love to hear them.