Retail Therapy

Today I did some random searches and landed on two really cool shops online.  The first being Deadworry on the Etsy website (which I love).  The other is like the European version of Etsy called DeWanda.  Both the Etsy and DeWanda websites let their users sell their homemade wares online.  That being the case, finding something cool is hit and miss.  The treasures you can find are definitely worth the effort though.

The artwork to the left is available on a really cool shirt on the Deadworry site.

Love,

Tiff

My first diary entry (1994)

Age Fourteen.  A girl from Little Rock, Arkansas who has been transplanted upstate to the sparse town of Bentonville.  She's angry.  Anxious to start her life elsewhere.  She does battle with her mother nightly.  As the distant last child, she feels like her parents have forgotten her under the cloud of a struggling family business and the distractions of a four-year-old granddaughter.  She feels like she doesn't matter, and she remembers returning from a two-day field trip when her parents didn't notice she had even gone away to begin with.   In this isolation, the story begins...

Love,

Tiff

22 April 1995

(Written at age 14 to any future children I may have)

Let's see.  What am I up to at age 50?  I'm not going to lie.  If I get married in my twenties than I'm disappointed in myself.  I need to experience life for myself.  I really want to be a photographer.  I'm wondering if I don't become one if you'll feel sorry for me.  Yeah, well don't.  Maybe just show me this and I'll have a mid-life crisis or something.  Really.  Do it.  Fuck my business-compelled life up!

Love,

Tiff

No Baby For Me, I'll Just Have a Gingerale. (18 June 2003)

Sister is swelling fat with pregnancy.  For some reason, it's made her more socialable.  I can't help but speculate that her vanity is being stroked by all the sudden attention.  I took the news poorly.  Complete shock seized my bones.  It made no sense why.  There are no social taboos involved.  She is married and approaching thirty at a rapid pace.  i would assume that is a perfect moment for one add their donations to the population.  However, the very day I received my mother's phone call I feel into a panic.  I called my doctor right away.

I still have the mark on my arm from where the needle was inserted.  When I went in for my first injection of Depo-Prevera I thought there would be more fan-fare.  I was sure a lecture would be given.  Lectures are always being given to me.  Instead it was a quick prick and a demand for payment of $97 (which the nurse made point to tell me that they should have collected it in advance).  

Peace of mind.

Love,

Tiff

Everybody Wants to Be A Writer (20 June 2003)

I found myself in one of those rambling used bookshops.  It's the type of place where the books stretch high out of reach.  The smell is seductively deep and musky.  It's almost overpowering.  A certain surprise hit me to see so many faces trotting around the thin aisles.  A sense of pride overwhelmed me when I thought of this place still standing concrete in the face of bargain monstrosities like Barnes and Noble...

... I've been entertaining the idea of writing a novel.  A little voice in my head laughs everytime I think about it.  It seems pointless.  The chances of me writing anything profound (or at bare minimum, sellable) seems ridiculously slim.

Love,

Tiff

The Old Diaries...

I've been searching for something, and in the process, I ran across some of my old writings.  It will sound odd, but reading these messages from the past has made me so happy to be me.  I've been skinny, fat, blonde, brunette, coupled, and single; but one thing is true.  I'm always the same Tiffany.  My personality has an amazing continuity.

So, I thought I'd share a few of these over time.  I couldn't write the all in one evening.  Let's start with "I'm Sorry Professor" (from 21 June 2003)

His quiet eyes are wandering; looking, but only vaguely understanding what they see.  The theme has been bleak.  A self made bleak.  A sorrow felt.  Not the sorrow of sympathy, but the sorrow of showing sympathy when you can not possibly understand the depths of pain involved that would allow you to show the right kind of sympathy.  Your limitations are evident.  You can only hug.  You can stroke someone's hand.  You can dull hurt through stimuli because you know the human mind is incapable of feeling both things simultaneously.  You take scientific advantage.  You feel like a louse for taking the easy way out.

From "I'm Sorry Professor Part 2" (23 June 2003)

What do you do when someone you care about tells you that their Aunt committed suicide?  There's no face you can make that doesn't look false and uncomfortable.  There's no appropriate thing to say.  "I'm sooo sorry" is weak and useless.  I'm never good in those situations.  I offer a hug, stroke a back, and listen: an open ear to hear everything I couldn't possibly understand.

Love,

Tiff

Just Finished Reading: Lyra's Oxford By Philip Pullman

I think I've told everyone I've come into contact with in the last two weeks that the His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman is amazing.  I decided to read the off-shoot Lyra's Oxford today.  It's charming in a children's literature kind of way.  There's no deeper level that engages a higher level of thought.  

Pullman's additions:  The postcard, pull out map, random book page, and program are lovely touches though.  I love his commentary about random objects.  How, they lose their meanings when they're separated from their intent.

Well, that's short like the book (a slight 50 pages).

Love,

Tiff

Observations during Last Night's Party...

"How did you meet your husband?"

Before the question was complete, she tossed her head back in a dramatic laugh. As she did, her stringy blonde hair met the wind and blew erratically to the side.

"He was a one-night stand!" she blurted. " I was drunk as hell, and he was beautiful."

Everyone laughed. She had command of the crowd around her the same way she commanded over the seventh-graders she taught under more sober conditions.

"I took him home, and he was amazing. So, we did it again. Wouldn't you know it, six weeks later that mother-fucker was living with me."

She blew a puff of smoke into the air. She'd been like a chimney since she got to the patio. They were forbidden at home, but there were no watchful eyes here.

"Now we're fucking married and boring. I hate his mother."


Love,
Tiff

Symbolisms

In January, I tend to make decisions about my investments.  I decided with the economy looking gloomy, I should invest in something more tangible than stocks.  So, I purchased this antique ring instead.  

It's about two hundred years old with sixteen rose cut diamonds and six baguette rubies.  The diamonds are in silver settings and the rubies are in gold.  The band itself is gold, too.  I've been told it originates from France.

I purchased the ring because I like the look of it, but once I got it home, I started siphoning off the symbolism of it.   It's in the shape of the infinity symbol, that's obvious.  The stones themselves have meaning, too.  In that age, diamond stood for consistency and rubies stood for passion.  So, my ring suggests unwavering passion for all eternity.  

I feel a little awkward now that I bought it for myself.  

Love,

Tiff

the free will inheritance

It's that time of year for reflection, review, and best of all, moving on.  For a week my mind has unconsciously wandered down the path of self improvement, taking stock of my imperfections, dreams, and fears.  The entire time I stayed fully aware that which ever aspect of my life I decided to improve it had to meet two criterion: it has to be something that needs addressing and be something of which fixing is within my abilities.  Simple, right?

I decided upon being more deliberate.  I'm a fairly responsible person.  I have a mortgage, car payments, health insurance, etc.  However, like a lot of people, I feel like time gets the better of me on a daily basis.  Every morning I wake up there are a million possible things that could happen during the day, and as that day winds down, as do those possibilities.  If I were a more deliberate person, I could utilize all my assets: time, money, energy, and love to see them come to a more fruitful end.

So, my mission is clear.  Deliberate.  In that process, I'll gain more of my inheritance of Free Will.  It's like wrestling a little with God and destiny themselves.

Love,

Tiffany