March Resolution- Cello

When I set resolutions this year, I decided that in March I would Go On An Adventure. But then, I didn't want to, so I swapped with the month whose resolution is Play Cello For 30 Hours. So far, I have got 1/60 of that done, and March is 1/3 over. 

Stringtown, OK, sent my postcard back in a special envelope, probably so their postmark wouldn't get marked over at the Tulsa sorting plant.

I started playing cello in my first year of middle school, but I just learned to distinguish notes last summer. It's hard to stay motivated since my playing sounds really bad. Cello is my favorite instrument, though, and mine glows in the sun. Once I live somewhere permanently and have a consistent budget, I will start taking lessons again.

The Bays

The last year that I lived in Santa Cruz, I was preemptively sad about leaving the ocean. I took a rowing class in the harbor, I took a single surfing lesson, and I went swimming/wading in the ocean every single day for five months. Sometimes I brought my camera and took pictures of the sand, of my legs in the sand, of Monterey, even though I already had identical pictures, just because I felt so lucky to be there. 

And moving away was hard. But I went back this weekend, and I found that I didn't like the traffic and the shops and the population very much. I went to the beach closest to my old house, and ran into my old housemates, which was lovely. I wanted to visit a particular sea cave that probably holds fond memories for every couple in Santa Cruz, but at 5pm yesterday it was only accessible by swimming or by climbing sheer wet stone, so I just sat on the rocks next to it and watched the water. I felt sad that I live so far from the Monterey Bay, but not as sad as I anticipated. 

When I got home, I worried that I might miss the San Francisco Bay someday, so I set out to enjoy it. I didn't enjoy growing up here, but that's not Alameda's fault. It really is pretty. I drove out to the naval base for letterboxing at sunset, and it was really nice. 

I didn't find the letterbox. I did find a huge amount of plastic trash that looked interesting, but it was getting dark and I was pretty far from my car so I didn't investigate it properly.

Little Triumphs

I had a lot of little triumphs today.
1. I sent off my National Parks Service internship application a day early. And, it made me sound really competent and engaged, and I made it out of true things. I have indeed studied Urban Planning and Contemporary Architecture, fixed all sorts of things, and made stained glass windows. Well, one stained glass window. I always forget about my accomplishments after they're a few years back, as though they happened to someone else, and only this week's accomplishments can be attributed to me.
2. I found an old, undelivered piece of mail at work. I always hope this will happen, but the USPS is really good. Right now I am assigned to get all this grime out from the crevices of the mail sorting cases. A mail sorting case is like a metal desk with a metal bookcase on top, and all of the shelves are subdivided with metal tabs, like an alphabetizer. Cases are the worst to clean because there are like 500 of them, so once you've got the last one cleaned you have to go back to the first one. Except no one has been doing that, because the undelivered piece of mail was from 2008.
3. I thought I missed my chance to start my March Resolution on the first day of March, but I noticed  the date at 11:25pm and just got started. The resolution is to play my cello for 30 hours, and so far I've tracked down some sheet music and made the postcard that will get postmarked in Stringtown, OK.
4. I sold a piece of my art for the first time. It was $4 shipped. Only one person viewed it (on etsy) and that person bought it. This is also the only piece of my art that I've ever offered for sale.
5. Reading a website about triathlon training, I learned that runner's feet can't always curl past a straight line from their shin, whereas swimmer's feet can. Runners who want to be triathletes have to stretch their stiff ankles really slowly over time if they want to have good swimming form. I never run and my feet can curl right up. So, without even doing anything I got to be proud of a new thing.

Yesterday I put a coat of paint on my car, and then it rained and rained. But the paint looks great^, and was totally fine. So, that was more "something dumb that I did that didn't have any consequences" than "a small triumph" but I was glad anyway.

^Not objectively great- great like metallic, oil based enamel applied to a giant surface with a tiny paintbrush.

Mail Art: Hollow Books

I am so excited to stop hoarding these painstakingly hollowed books and send them out into the world! 

 This one is for an open mail art show in Sacramento at a new gallery, Milk. It's sealed with glue and it rattles because it is full of little treasures. Revealing all the treasures in a photo seemed wrong so I pried it back open, added a secret treasure, and glued it back together.

This next one-- Let's Eat Right to Keep Fit-- was quality paper, not the lightweight pulp, which meant that it was super hard to hollow.

I have been waiting for an excuse to make this for one of my pen pals, and when she sent me a too awesome collage I seized the opportunity. There's a letter behind the feathers, but I doubt she'll be able to read it.

This one is for my sweetheart. I won't say that he picked his discipline because of Robin Hood, but they go together perfectly.  I have my heart set on using the Love stamps that are getting released on the 14th to send this. I think they will complement the fun printed cover better than any stamps that are out right now. And so, even though I finished this in January, it won't get to its destination until well after Valentines.

 Of course I tucked in a love letter before I sealed it.

Feathers are so frustrating to work with, and there is no substitute. I just love them. I think these cheap feathers look as good as the dyed guinea fowl ones in the Eat Right book, but they were harder to work with. In this packet, about a third of the feathers were unusable, and lots more were sort of chewed up looking, but fine for layering.

These are an absurd kind of decadent, with layers of surprises for the recipient. 

A Fantastic Mail Week

This week my mailbox was filled with an embarrassment of riches. In one week, I received a month worth of wonderful mail. I got postcards and letters and mail art and my own birth certificate and some things I'd ordered- my first fountain pen and my first passport.

 Here is a detail of the lovely two sided collage I got from a stranger in a swap.

 A detail of my passport, which I signed with my brand new fountain pen.

 A detail of my postcard from a Valentine Swap- Thailand does a great job with their stamps!

 A lino print valentine from my mail art penpal Dawn. I should have taken a detail picture of this, because the  orange paint or ink creates a little raised line around the details, like embossing.  I did not know we were exchanging Valentines, so I sent her a regular mail art letter made from pieces of my shoes and stuff. At least I tucked in a little heart woven from patterned privacy envelopes.

 A glittery blue olive branch seal.

This one is a Valentine that I sent to myself via Valentine, Texas. They couldn't fit the special postmark on the postcard without obscuring the note I wrote to myself, which read, "C- Happy Valentines Day! <3 C." Sending myself a Valentine turned out to be a totally unnecessary precaution against sadness. But, last year I sent a bunch of friends re mailed Valentines without sending myself one, and then I didn't have one around to show people. 

Lastly, this "message in a bottle" arrived weeks ago but I got to open it on Valentine's and it was 6oz of lovely treats. Stickers, candy, ribbons, and a lovely letter, among other things. The one I sent arrived took two weeks to get from California to Ohio, so it arrived on the 16th, but I think my swap partner was happy with it. First Class (stamped) mail has to be under 13 oz, and I was so nervous that it would weigh more than 13 oz that I filled the bottle with feathers and old postage stamps. Well, it weighed 1.75oz. 

I don't forsee having a week like this again, but it was neat! 

Post Office Update

I feel like I am not getting very much out of my job, but that is not quite true. I will probably leave it off my resume someday, but I think it belongs there right now since in an interview I might be asked where I currently work. So, I was working out how to frame the job, and I can honestly say I am glad I took it.

Since I love the mail and mail is amazing, I am glad that I got to spend two weeks in the Oakland sorting facility, seeing all the machines and the handlers and the tragic art and signs. I got to listen to dozens of hours of non-public speakers assigned to ramble to the new hires- it was a lot of work to glean anything useful or interesting, but glean I did. I've gotten to dust a crystal ball award that someone got for accruing 1,000 hours of unused sick time- 1,000 hours he could have spent nursing a headache or resting on the couch, which he spent at the post office. One time? I picked up the crystal ball to wipe dust off the shelf under it, and the crystal stand turned out to be a separate piece, attached only by a weak vacuum. I almost broke someone's 1,000 hours of unused sick time... now I let it get dusty.

I have never met so many people who consider their job their forever job. I've just begun to see all the ways that affects people's behavior. They're careful, very into following protocols. They can't work too hard, because they have to do it all over tommorow, and 5/7ths of the next ten thousand tommorows. This is very foreign to me. I have had eight jobs in the five years since I started working, and I feel proud of myself for each half day that I don't drive away forever without bothering to resign.

 I've gotten to meet the Hayward postmaster and dust the letter she has from the City of Hayward proclaiming a particular day a city holiday in her honor, and the pin she has thanking her for 40 years of service. I've learned loads about the different unions, especially the one I am eligible to join (I joined but they lost my info and aren't taking my dues out of my paycheck and are hassling my union rep to get me to join).

I am finding it easy to spend my breaks studying Japanese- I can't relax at work since there is no private space, not even any space where it's polite not to talk to each other, like in a library or a grocery store. Between this small discipline and the audiobooks I listen to all day, I am learning kind of a lot besides what the job itself presents. And yet, apparently I secretly possess quite an aptitude for boredom, and just hadn't had the proper environment to nurture it.

Valentine Remailing

It's the 5th today, and I am sending out my Valentines for remailing from Valentine, Texas. I left it kind of late, and I didn't address it to the Valentine Postmaster very clearly. 

 Here are the valentines, which I put in their own envelopes. I did one for myself as well, a postcard in pen and ink. When it arrives here, I will go over it with watercolors.

 They are all stamped and in a bigger envelope.

 Which is in turn stamped. I think this address should read:
Valentine Postmaster
Valentine Remailing
Valentine, TX 79854
but I couldn't write that, so I looked up the street address on google maps and I'm sure it will get sorted. Since there is a lot of paper in there it might need a 20c surcharge stamp. I'll weigh it at work to make sure before affixing the stamp, though.