Betsy & Iya Jewelry


Archive for the ‘Who IS this girl, Betsy Cross?’ Category

The Way I Am: things that never stop.

Tuesday, March 9th, 2010

I keep waiting for things to slow down… for when I’ll sit down and write a meaningful post, share those pictures with you, reply to those emails, get in touch with that friend I haven’t talked to in so long, workout more regularly, go to Cathedral Park more often, etc etc, blah blah.  I keep waiting for all of these incomparably important busy things to slow to an end and then I’ll take care of all these other things that I really do also care about.

…wait.  …that are also indelibly important things…things that I’m always going to want to get to.

right.  riiiight.  I remember.  I know this place.  I keep coming back here.

I keep coming back here for a reason, I suppose… a great one, that I should be so grateful for—I’m BUSY!!!!  And really, if I think about it—I can only hope it stays this way.  I’m learning that it’s becoming more and more about finding balance.  A balance within me, that extends out to my hands, and beyond my hands, just as it exists in the world.

One of the first ways I’m trying to implement this into my life is by being with W when I’m with W.  I mean, like really being with him.  Road tripping, experiencing Vancouver BC (witnessing Olympic moments firsthand, before the TV footage and even the cameras that shot them), reconnecting, being our most authentically goofy selves, laughing out load (a lot), the tastes, the smells, the friendship     …even if everything stopped:


these are the things that would stay with me forever.


We had a wonderful time in Vancouver.  And even though I was able to focus on all the things that make my heart feel woo wooey,  the things that actually inspire the work… it came too.  I got four new accounts in BC before we headed home.  That’s right, Canada.  In the next few weeks, look out for betsy & iya in these sweet stores:  Riot, Dandelion Emporium, Smoking Lily, and Blushing Boutique.

I am so very lucky and grateful.  Thank you, Canada.

Soooo… stop thinking about it… just do it, you know?  that thing?  those things…  just go and do them.  and do them with every little bitty inch of you.

***Song of the Moment: Tonight by Lykke Li***

Today and Me = a boxing match.

Thursday, February 18th, 2010

This is a fierce one: the calm, grounded, happy me on one side battling it out with the tear-through-the-studio-leave-everything-in-my-wake-turned-upside-down terror on the other.   It’s amazing.

Found these items on Etsy to help express how I’m feeling:

These Vintage Boxers from Xander Graphics

The Fighter, by Tony A Engel

Cat Fight Buckle by Alaska Gadgetry

Toilet Fighting = funny

Bears Fighting, by Dan Bob Thompson

With that, I better get on with this battle, so I might actually get some work done today.  yikes!

***Song of the Moment: Fighting on the Stairs, by The Frames***

Consistency.

Monday, February 15th, 2010

Some things to come back for:

me and the reflection

New Photo Project:  TBA

Things I Like

Random Pop

You Got Style (fashion inspirations)

People Everyday (other people’s outfits…I’ve stacked up quite a few)
Outfits of the Days

Confessions

In the Workshop (current b & i design stuff)

Performing Arts (…the why behind the “Song of the Moment”)
Portland and Me
I bet you didn’t know…
Today and Me
Reflections (another photo project)

betsy & iya: the shop

I’ve loved sporadically sharing things with you here.  I’m just ready to stand more firmly.  Don’t worry, it will still have that same impulsive spontaneous feeling, just with a bit more of a base.  My feet are planted now.

Look out for it.

***Song of the Moment: Walking, by The Dodos***

Portland digs Truth & Beauty.

Tuesday, January 26th, 2010

THREE more nights of performances …for now.  I suggest securing tickets online beforehand.  Thursday, Friday or Saturday  this week … 8:30 pm @ Shaking the Tree Studio, 1407 SE Stark.

REVIEWED;

Portland Monthy Magazine (blog)Preview: Truth & Beauty

Willamette WeekFertile Ground Day 1, Truth & Beauty

Oregonian: Fertile Ground: ‘Truth and Beauty’ is a literally moving production about a unique friendship

a friendship like no other

It’s playing in front of these audiences that has really brought our characters to life.  A few days before we opened, Jessica (co-star, plays Lucy Grealy) handed me a book for inspiration: C.S.Lewis’s A Grief Observed, written after the death of his wife.  His words helped me tremendously:

No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear.  I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid.  The same fluttering in the stomach, the same restlessness, the yawning.  I keep on swallowing. … And no one ever told me about the laziness of grief.  I loathe the slightest effort.  Not only writing but even reading a letter is too much.  Even shaving.  What does it matter now whether my cheek is rough or smooth?  They say an unhappy man wants distractions–something to take him out of himself.  Only as a dog-tired man wants an extra blanket on a cold night; he’d rather lie there shivering than get up and find one.  … The act of living is different all through.  Her absence is like the sky, spread over everything.

There is a sequence in the beginning where Ann Patchett (the character I’m playing) lyrically expresses her grief.  With an appropriate David Byrne song playing and only one chair, Ann’s chair, in just a few moments, she goes down to the bottom and claws her way back to the top—fighting through the mire and muck of sadness to come out on the other side.  Ann wrote the book this way…3 weeks after Lucy’s death.

In the performance, there have been nights when I thought I got there.  There have been nights when I knew I was no where close.  I have 3 more nights to go even farther and I intend to.

Won’t you join us?

***Song of the Moment: Memories Can’t Wait, by Talking Heads***