For the Love of Amy...

I talked to my daughter last night, and now I just have to write something. She is going to school to become a medical person, and totally kicking booty as far as grades and academic achievements are concerned. She is a late bloomer like me…I did not return to school until I was 35, and for her it was the age of 28. Also like me, once she got her groove on, nothing is stopping her. She has a 4.0 GPA, and she will do anything to make sure it stays that way…well almost anything ;-). I was highly protective of my GPA too. It was one of the few things in my life that I felt like I had control over, and that felt good!


Now it appears that I am to be returning to the world of academia. I have tried everything I can think of to make a living with the skills that I have on board right now, and it just is not happening. My professional skills are obsolete, and my artistic skills have only led me to truly understand the term “starving artist” too well. Something has to give, and once again, it is me. So I am looking into going back to become certified as a teacher. I honestly think it would be awesome. I know for a fact that I no longer want to be a part of Corporate America…. Been there, done that, even got a few souvenir tee shirts. No more meat grinder for this country girl.

I told Amy about it last night and I am STILL overwhelmed by the support and love that she offered up. I am so darn proud of her, but what blows me away is how darn proud she is of me. We are a mutual admiration society of two. She reminded me of a lot of things that I guess I needed reminding of. She reminded me of how all my life I have never given up and how I have always accomplished whatever it was that I set out to accomplish. I really needed to hear that because ever since I lost my job last February, I have felt as though not only are my skills obsolete, but that I am obsolete as well. I have tried a lot of things since February – things that have not worked out. It tends to wear on a person, and at my age that is not such a good thing. But she is right – I will get through this the same as I have gotten through everything else, and I will come out a better person as a result.

So I am going to pursue this teaching thing, and my daughter will be my inspiration. I guess my kids have always been my inspiration, but now that they are grown I have let that slip a little. No more of that! They still need my guidance, and they still need a good example, and it is still up to me to set it. I set the example for her to get an education and to never give up on her dreams, but she also needs an example of how to keep going no matter what crops up and no matter how old she is. She needs an example of how to ease into the granny panties thing gracefully and with dignity. So my new path, my new adventure, my new outlook…it is all…for the love of Amy!

Till next time!

Shopping anyone???

Tidbits from the Granny Panties Crypt

Greetings and Glad Tidings!!! HeHe, I have always wanted to say that. I took a break from everything yesterday, and spent the day with a couple of girlfriends. It was such an awesome day, and I really feel renewed for starting my week.

My girlfriends are Marsha and Diane. They are new girlfriends. I absolutely love making new friends, and these two are very special. The girls came here for lunch, and I made French onion soup and pannini sandwiches. I LOVE French onion soup. I had never before in my life made it though, and I thought that it would be the perfect time to try my hand at it. I found a recipe at allrecipes.com, and the contributor is a woman that goes by the screen name of Jersey Tomato. As it turns out, this is her recipe that she put a lot of years into perfecting. I did not know that at the time, so I very flippantly told the girls that if the soup sucked it was on Jersey Tomato's head. It did not suck. It came nowhere near sucking! This woman really knows how to make French onion soup. Now I will have a new addiction to funnel fat into my body.

During lunch, the talk was just wonderful. It was girl time, and it was good girl time. It is days like that that make me really appreciate being a girl, and all that it implies. When I was younger, much younger, I very prudently realized the value of long friendships with other women. It was one of the very few prudent realizations that I had back then, but I abided by it and have always stuck by my friends for as long as I possibly could. I say that because there were just some friends that would become too demanding in one way or another and those friends had to be let go. As it turns out, I have 3 friends that are in the forever club…you know, those list toppers that would go to hell and back for you, and then so many other close friendships as well. Not bad for a girl who’s moved all around the country. Marsha and Diane have a list topper relationship. They both said to me that they would choose each other over their husbands…and they meant it. I believe them. We all seemed to understand that when it really comes down to it, your girlfriends are ALWAYS going to be there. Husbands and boyfriends come and go, but your list topping girlfriends are ALWAYS going to be there.

Marsha had been getting a big kick out of my Granny Panties commentaries, and it spurred good discussions about wearing our Granny Panties with pride. She was talking about a woman in her office fighting Granny Panties tooth and nail, and you know I have noticed that women who fight it are always noticed as doing so. When we fight it, we stick out like a sore thumb. I myself fought for the longest time, and I know how unbecoming that was to me. What we eventually come to realize though is that Granny Panties is a reward…a huge burden lifted from our shoulders….and the only way to receive the reward, is to accept it.

After lunch, we all donned out Granny Panties Fa La La…lol…just kidding. Anyway, we then went to the Fall Craft Fair here in Washington, and proceeded to have a wonderful time in the sunshine and fresh fall air, checking out all of the booths and spending way too much money...but also having way too much fun to stop. It was a beautiful day! Thanks girls! Love to you both!

And love to the rest of my Sistah’s!

Joylynn
Proud member of the Granny Panties Subset

A word from our sponsers...

Learnin', Earnin', Burnin'

Wow!  I just got notification that my application to Google AdSense has been accepted.  I am SOO stoked!  2 weeks ago I did not even have a good grasp on Blogging much less Google AdSense.  Now, I am a publisher!  LOL... I am not supporting any delusions of grandure as to how much loot I will rake in with Google AdSense.  The whole point is that Google AdSense is a milestone...  It is another chunk in my entrepenuarial puzzle that I am working on here.

There are so many tools!  Yesterday I learned all about HP Media Smart, HP Photo Smart, Windows Photo Gallery for scanning, and PHOTOBUCKET.  I really did not recognize the power of Photobucket before...it was just a place to pick up an occasional photo.  I also got my new scanner figured out which made it possible for me to show you some of my own pix...i.e. my grandma and her sisters.  (I lost A LOT of photos when my other PC bought the farm.  I have been scrambling trying to replace what I had.  Now I have learned...store stuff on the internet.  I had a backup drive for my PC, but oddly enough it bought the farm before the PC did.)  Another thing I did was get a graphics program; it was a trial thing I had on my PC, and it was only $10. to upgrade to the full version... It is not PhotoShop, but it will do for now.

All of this "stuff" is really starting to take at least a shadow of a shape.  It is starting to get a little exciting, and I am really starting to look forward to my digital life each day.  Eventually, I want the digital part of my life to dovetail with the flesh and bone part of my life, i.e. my basket business.  I was thinking today it would be so much fun to get a little camper and go all over the country with Simba doing craft shows.  (Simba is my dog.)  I could get a good laptop and continue my digital life uninterrupted.  How cool would that be?  A Crafty Cyber Gypsy...!!!  My friend said in an email "the world is my oyster"...lol...right?

You are now up to speed!  Peace out!  Love Ya!

Joylynn

Proud member of the Granny Panties Subset

Granny Panties Cont...

My grandma, Helen, was born in 1915. That's right, she is 94. Her sister Agnes is 98 I think. There were 5 girls in her family, and all but one, Betty, are still alive. This is a picture of them all in 1940. From left to right is Agnes, JoAnne, Betty, Helen and Monica.

My grandma lives in her own cabin in Elk Mountain, Wyoming. She has been my inspiration and my rock all my life. Here is a picture of her last spring with my daughter Amy and my grandson Jason.

She has changed a bit since 1940.

Grandma has been the family torch-bearer for a long time, and you can tell that she is getting really tired. We all look up to her and respect her immensely. She is probably only 4'5" tall by now, but we all still look WAY up to her.

She has been through everything. When she and her sisters were really young, their mother Maggie died. My great-grandfather George was left with 5 girls and a son. This would have been sometime in the 1920's. The family was living in a lean-to in South Dakota when Maggie died. George decided to move back to Illinois to be near family, and got a job as a handy-man in an orphanage. The girls were raised in the orphanage for a time, but George was their dad, and a part of their lives. At some point George married Rose who worked in the orphanage. They got their own place, and normal family rituals were once again established. I have to hand it to George though. He did not run off...he did what had to be done.

My grandma married Lester sometime during the depression. They had 3 kids, and then Lester bailed on her. He was not made of the same stuff that George was. So grandma had to finish her story alone from there...she never re-married. She raised her kids by herself, and it would be easy to romanticize it, but the fact of the matter is she experienced a very severe depression that lasted for many years. I am told that my dad who was the oldest, basically took over the burden of raising the family. My grandma worked in a sweat shop, and of course back then, there were no anti-depressants. What we call depression  today was called a nervous breakdown.  The condition was one of shame, and not something you could just call in sick about.  I have experienced depression all my life, and I can only imagaine how difficult it was for her to crawl to work each day and just get through it.  But she did and she got through it, and that really speaks volumes to me about determination and backbone.

Life went on; her children grew up and had children of their own, and we have become an awesome family that I am very proud to be a member of. So much of my essence has been drawn from my grandma, and she is at the very center of my core.

Grandma has always been a very small woman...(that facet of her nature did not make its way into my core!) but this is one very small woman that you don't ever want to cross. Kids, grandkids, great-grandkids, great-great grandkids,,, we all know. To cross grandma is the get the "EYEBROW". Grandma is the only person I know who can literally throw her eyebrow at you. Sometimes it is like a bee-sting, sometimes more like a wasp. But if you really screw-up, it can be just exactly like a king cobra! Trust me.

A little bit earlier today I was doing my morning thing, and as usual my mind was blowing along at 90 miles an hour projecting and yakking and scaring the crap out of me... So many times, I feel like its not my world anymore. Trying to learn all of this new technology, and feeling lost and overwhelmed by the proverbial "fire hose" effect. Then I thought about my grandma. When she was my age, it was 1967. I was 10. On this day in 1967, the world looked nothing like it does now, or now it looks nothing like it did then...take your pick. Talk about a reality check. My grandma was probably a little overwhelmed then by how much things had changed. Because if you subtract 42 years from 1967, that would have been 1925 when my grandma was 10! Are you getting all of this? It puts me in my place as a grain of sand on the beach...part of the whole and totally unique just like everyone else.

The world has changed over the last 50 years because that is what it does. There is technology out the kazoo now, but today's techology is going to be antiquated in 42 years. And it will probably occur at a more accelerated rate because the more technology we have, the more we have to improve and evolve from. Should I make it to my grandma's age, I am going to be more like her. I am going to let others handle things. I am going to sit back and chill and just watch.

In the meantime,,,I am going to keep at it; I am going to learn as much as I can, offer as much as I can, and have faith that the trail that my grandma blazed is as good as it gets.

So long Sistah's!

From the desk of Joylynn...
Dedicated member of the Granny Pantie Subset

Reinventing the Wheel

Here I am, at a place in my life, where I have the opportunity to totally reinvent myself...again.  It's not my first rodeo sistah.  You would think that after having done it so many times before, I could have at least developed a template by now.  But no, once again I am going to reinvent this old wheel.  I doubt that a template would be much use anyway.  It's kind of like no matter how polished and updated you keep your resume, if you lose your job you WILL be rewriting it...many times.

I decided that as part of my entrepenuership plan, I needed a website. So I got the domain name and the hosting service, and all of the tools that it sounded like I would be needing.  In all honesty, I know nothing about website design.  I put one together 15 years ago for my family history, and literally wrote the whole thing in html...by hand.  I know nothing about CGI bins and CSS sheets etc.  But in my last life I was a programmer, so I figured I am a smart enough cookie to pull this thing off.  Today I delved into my goodies, and it kind of scared the hell out of me.  So far....I honestly don't know what to do with any of this stuff.  I selected a template and all that, and I have a home page shell, but I want to change the background and banner and you know...get to work...and I don't have a CLUE how to work any of this stuff. 

I was at a flea market over the weekend, and saw a picture that I wanted, but really don't have room for, but what it said sure has stuck with me.  Now I don't remember the words verbatim, and I don't even remember who said it, but the jist of the whole thing was that when one door closes, opportunity knocks again many times and you should follow the path where it is lit.  I realized that is what my whole journey has come to lately.  Following the path where it is lit and trusting my destiny to lead me where I need to go.

Bottem line?  I am 52 years old, unattached, unemployed, no retirement, no prospects...my slate is wiped clean right?  And I am going to follow this path where it is lit 'cause its all I got.  Make note...this is the initial stage of reinvention.  I don't even know the whole plan yet.  Yee Haw...this is the high-dive, the bungee jump, and para-sailing all rolled into one enchilada.

Stay tuned...

LOL...From the Desk of Joylynn...

Granny Panties Perks and Bennies....

No one notices me anymore.  I can remember when that was one of my greatest fears...that no one would notice me and I would cease to exist.  I used to go to a lot of trouble to get noticed.  There were the obvious things of course like hair, makeup, perfume, etc...but I used to pull a lot of outlandish stunts too.  Oh well,,,who doesn't?  Now I am facing my greatest fear square on and I kind of have to laugh.  It fits me perfectly.

Remember the old cartoons where they would use vanishing cream?  Then they were invisible and no one noticed them.  When I go out I sometimes feel as though someone dumped vanishing cream in my bath and forgot to tell me.  And just as in the cartoons where they suddenly had license to do whatever they wished without being noticed, I find myself enjoying that same liberty.  I can almost understand why older people are notorious for shoplifting...lol.  It occured to me last night as I was dancing in my basement to native american music that even alone...I would never have done that when I was younger in my grubbiest shorts and wearing NO makeup.  So what that told me was that people have never really noticed me all that much...at least no more than anyone else.  All along it was ME noticing myself.  That brings me to Granny Panties Perks and Bennies #1.  A substantial decrease in levels of self-absorbtion.  Woo Hoo!!!  How liberating is that?

Yes, my hair is fading, wrinkles are firmly established and not going anywhere soon, I am overweight and sometimes when I cough my engine backfires, but good god almighty do I ever appreciate myself more than ever before.  And that is not out of self-absorbtion which is my favorite part.  I appreciate myself because I have lived my life and done the best I can, and never given up.  Those things have rewarded me with unbelievable friendships, and close family ties that are worth more than anything else in the world.  And as I become less self-absorbed, and more life-absorbed, my invisibility becomes my spotlight...

Granny Panties

Today I have accepted the fact that the term "granny panties" is now applicable to me.  That is not the strange part.  The strange part is the fact that I don't care, and maybe even feel a little satisfaction and relief now because I can put down my weapons of denial and just wear the darn things!  I gotta admit, they really are far more comfortable and roomy...

I am part of the baby boomer generation, and now I have been assigned to a new subset, the "Granny Pantie Subset".  Who are we exactly?  What do we do all day?  How is it we are all not jumping off bridges like I used to think I would want to when I reached this age? 

We are the women who pass on all of the cute forwards we receive wishing us a nice day and telling us how valuable we are as friends, and how loved we are by Jesus, and how important our continued participation in remembering our troops is, and of course how much we totally identify with Maxine.  We are the women who's children are mostly grown and now we are discussing our grandchildren and wondering how we got here so quickly.  We are the women no one really notices much when we are out anymore, but we are still in our hearts young girls with deep passions.  Some of us may wear red hats and purple dresses, some of us may lead prayer at a pow wow, some of us still like to get out on the dance floor and boogie.  Our bodies age, granny panties become more accomodating of our needs, and our passion for life grows because we are truly starting to see just how precious it really is.  We understand the importance of friendships and sisterhood and sticking together.  We make life more beautiful, and we teach our children how to go even further than we were able.

Maybe that is why I will wear my granny panties with pride.  I have earned them...they are comfortable, and best of all they fit!

So long sistahs...'til next time!

Today...

I have been having a little bit of trouble lately because now I am a place where I am trying to market my product, and I am not sure how to proceed.  When I was in my 20's, I got a job selling typewriters.  It was one of the worst jobs of my entire life, and I have shied away from selling ANYTHING ever since.  So now, here I am, facing one of my greatest fears.  Personally, I just want to sit in my shop and make baskets...obviously that alone will not bring in the dough.  A good marketing campaign is going to take some time to build, and that freaks me out a little because I feel like I should be making baskets.  So this is a big plunge for me - and so that it doesn't overwhelm me too much, I am going to remember to narrow my journey down to today.  I can deal with today.  I can make my little "to do" list in the a.m., and then do my best to accomplish what I can - today.  It gets very overwhelming...all of the things that need to be done to make this happen.  I am just one person, and not only are there a lot of different facets to entrepenuirship...I have to learn how to do them before I can even get started.  But throughout my life, whenever I took on something daunting, I would always try to remember to just narrow it all down to one day, and do my best for that day.  When I do that, things transform and take shape, and accomplishment is in the works.  This will happen too.  I will chisel away each day, and I will learn, and I will accomplish, and I will succeed!