Thanks Giving

"Silver Lining" by CarleyB

I've had my share of challenges in the past two years.  And I seem to enjoy wallowing in them and garnering sympathy just a little bit.  I guess to a certain extent that's normal. (isn't it?)

This afternoon I'm faced with the realization that when other folks say of a horrible challenge in their life "I'm not glad for it to have happened, but I wouldn't change a thing", they're absolutely right.  I never thought they were.  I thought it was their inner Pollyanna rising to the surface to please what ever interviewer was trying to elicit a response.  But it's true.

If not for my accident, I wouldn't have been house bound and immobile for three months.  If not for the fact that I live alone, I wouldn't have had to find ways to entertain myself during that time. If not for the fact that I had absolutely no energy to do anything but stare at the computer for hours on end, I wouldn't have re designed my website.  And if I hadn't finished that task (which had been on the list for two years), I wouldn't have started this blog. And if I hadn't have started this blog, I wouldn't have a list of all the lovely things that have happened this year.  I would have allowed my faulty memory to hide them in a dark corner, and my 'woe is me' tendencies to dwell on the sad and troublesome aspects of my recovery.

But it did happen and I did start this blog and today I get to add another lovely happenstance to it's cache.

I went to my mail drop and there, waiting for me, was a white envelope containing this year's PMC Guild Annual. And I'm in it. For the second year in a row. On pages 91 and 112. And many of my friends are in it too. Chris Brooks and dona Di Carlo are members of my local Guild chapter and Marsha Thomas, another member of the chapter, shot all of our photos. Catherine Witherell and Jennifer Smith-Righter are members of the Etsy MetalClay Team, and Deb Fitz is a former member. Marco Fleiseri and Tonya Davidson are members of the blog carnival that hits town every month. Donna Penoyer is a lovely friend whom I only get to see every two years, but now I own one of her whistles and can think of her every time I look at or wear it. Maggie Bergman was one of the jurors and is one of my very best friends, the entire Pacific Ocean notwithstanding.  And Holly Gage, another juror, is a great friend and published yet another photo of my work in her calender for the second year.

Dante's Beloved

In reading back over just the posts from this summer, I have to realize how lucky I am.  So I want to thank the doggone Smith Little Torch gas lines for entangling my right foot.  And the blogosphere, which I had resisted ever since I knew it existed, for seducing me into not only keeping up this blog, but learning from it and enjoying it.

Sconce Pin #1

And thanks to you too.  Without you to read my scribblings and free associations, it wouldn't still exist and I might be a sad, depressed woman who doesn't have a reason to focus on the silver linings in her life.