58!

Another year. Another year of physical therapy. Yep. November 2013 was when I broke my ankle (into smithereens). October 2014 was a year with multiple screws and uprights and weekly physical therapy. It was the year of leg elevation, lots of ice, swelling everything and pain. It was no fun. Here we are again, in October, 2015 and all the hardware is out (except for one screw that snapped in half and wasn't coming out), less--almost no swelling, more physical therapy (twice a week), and the pain is less and less the more I move this crazy foot, ankle, leg on the painful treadmill. I know I sound like Debby Downer, but it is getting better and I am so optimistic, I have a pen in my hand and I am drawing Bohtas, and thinking advent calendars...so its all on the upside. So moving forward in the age thing...the time thing and the therapy thing is making me feel better, more energy, less sadness, and more like there is an opportunity to get back into things. Hurray! Lets put an extra candle on the cake just to celebrate that!

Plus, with the amazing lessons from my first cousin, Martha--I cannot moulder in the mire. Ya gotta give it all...until it's over...and then (which happened) you gotta give it all in the last demonstrations of your life on earth--to reassure us that we need to even keep that legacy thing of positive energy moving in the right direction to inspire, teach and personally grow.

So up off my pins. Strap on the stabilizing shoes. Grab that bright orange cane and start whacking at my world. Theme for year 58. Get going!!

Happy birthday to me.

Midsummer's day.

Some people celebrate midsummer with parties and bonfires, interesting food and family gathering. We celebrate midsummer with a four day long fest, the Grassroots Festival at our fairgrounds. We celebrate community--with pre-Roots events (a wonderful concert with gumbo at the Rongo this year!), discussions, projects and the close review of the schedule of events by the regulars to pencil in their auditory path of the four days. The tribe comes into town, lining the roads with cars--from Wednesday before the festival through Sunday...and even stragglers until mid week the week following the fest. The non approved vendors set up by the grocery store to sell wide brimmed straw hats, tie dyed anything, and iced cream. Parking becomes a way that the locals, the high school and other non-profits can make a little money to offset the eighth grade trip or personal projects. The gigantic stack outs, the "wall of beer" is found at any grocery store or gas station near the fairgrounds. The air throbs with sound all night and day. Rob and Alex are heavily partaking of the festival, while I work on projects, read and savor the midsummery time. Here we are...the top of the year and often the hottest week of the year--with longer, and colder days happening from this week on. It is the week of raspberries and onions, spinach and the promise of tomatoes and corn.

Alex is home for the festival and is actively delighting in everything from his work, his friends, his new sense of what he can do, what he can accomplish, what he is able to change and affect. He is ready to be in his final year of school. He is at the right level of "baking". Rob has been full bore at the festival from the prebuild of the new bathroom building to the music and full days of friends, visiting and dancing. I delight that he enjoys this so much.

I have a new PT, Ms. Jessie who is, with her gentle, long hands...is whaling on this new ankle...and though I am crippled after her kind ministrations, am getting more mobility, more bending, more ability and interestingly, less pain, after her hard work. Jim has gone on to Duke/UNC for a fellowship and post-graduate work in physical therapy. So, though Gentleman Jim has moved on, I have a treasure in Jessie. Twice a week, no  less.

Happy Birthday #1
Q. Cassetti, 2015
Adobe Illustrator

I am starting a body of work called "Happy Birthday". I found that I was creating some pictures around Happy Birthday, so I figured I would "let it out" a bit...to see where this could go with the little machines and various forms of transportation that seems to be popping up just in my work. So, you will see more of these just to spice up the summer..and to get the gears going for me. It has been a long spell of staleness--and I have to begin to move the needle as I am bereft of not having a topic to think and stew over. There are cakes, and candy, and international traditions here. if anything, I can learn something, and we can see if a card or two evolve. If anything, the pursuit of greasy noses, colorful heads, Brazilian lollypops, pinatas,  or candles burning all day long, sugar roses and "party hats"might yield some fun images. Plus the idea that time is moving is interesting too.

"Today you are you! That is truer than true! There is no one alive who is you-er than you!"   Dr. Seuss

I have been inking a ton of apples these days--inspired by midcentury modern. Apples, pears, slices, seed stars, textures...and they have been applied to a logotype for the Finger Lakes Cider Alliance. There have been some cute offerings emphasizing Alliance, emphasizing cider, emphasizing Finger Lakes. Let's see what they go for....I am hoping no Finger Lakes Wiggly worms...as it has no currency outside of the area...but hey. Additionally, I have posted some of  my logotypes to this page and will add as I go (there are a ton more, but this gets you going). I think a page of labels might be great too. Now now, but soon.

I was on Trend Hunter.

Fatline Experiments, Q. Cassetti, 2011, pen and ink, white out.I was googling myself the other day to find out that my Green Man illustrations (from Behance) was highlighted in “TrendHunter” (08/18/2011) which then spun all sorts of others doing the same…Vital Signs Report>  Rowanberry> and others. I am happy that the work got some traction, however, it would have been appropriate for the editor, Leslie Chen, who surfaced my work, to communicate to me that this was going live, and was it okay for her to post the work. Trend Hunter is a for real, legit aggregator—and thus, my expectations for more above board, more appropriate editorial behavior…but hey. What fantasyland am I pretending to live in?This gives me a bit of a boost re the Green Man imagery. So, I am entering a few of them into the Society of Illustrators NY and the same for LA. Those entries are coming due (LA yesterday, NY a month from yesterday). It is always a good thing to see what pops up out of the blurr of the web, the fuzz of pages of googling. You just never, ever know what will hit—and who will pick that up and where you will end up.

I am working with heavy lines and whiteout these days using medieval woodcuts as the reference. It is another look at the same thing…but bolder, faster, blunter, and more primitive. I do not know where this will go, but it should be fun to do a little deep dive into the medieval, it’s people, greenery, landscape, magic, alchemy. Playing Cards. Holbein. Lines and flatness.

Tomorrow is our Thank You for the Farmers Market. Just checking out what the weather looks like—-dismal and sad…cold and rainy. Yuck. We will be there with cider and pound cake, bread and cheese….and I hope we get one or two people If not, we can pack it all in….and do it again…Maybe.

Today is my Birthday. A quiet, dark, cold day. I was sent some flowers by a friend, a plant from a family member and a hug from my son. We went to the lake to see the work done on the attic. I cut chicken and prepped leeks, celery and soup. Non eventful….another day.