Last night I leaned of some sad news, Chris Al-Asward also known as Lethe Bashar died in July just after his 31st birthday. This came as a bit of a shock as I was just wondering where he had got too so went to check his twitter profile. Being the brains and drive behind Escape Into Life I hadn't noticed a complete absence as his other twitter account was still going strong being the one that drove his EIL project.
On his profile page was a tweet saying he had tragically died 🙁 I couldn't believe it and felt crushed at the same time and then that sinking feeling of - do I have the right to be this upset - after all I have never met him in the flesh. He lives the other side of the world but he had found me on twitter and had encouraged me in the realms of art and writing.
When I have pain flare ups I sometimes cannot sleep and he was often there to talk too. I started my art journal because of a side project he started with the idea of it being sold in the EIL shop. I've took far longer on this than I have expected but I love working on the Art/Visual Poetry Journal.
It is also through him that I found The Flying Trilobite a young artist who seeks to combine science and art, I can't remember but I think he was profiled on EIL. And it was then through him I found the paleo-art site Art Evolved finially giving me a way to combine the two parts of me - The Artist and the Scientist.
Part of my anguish last night was having not noticed that someone I regually talk to was gone, I know the last few months have been pretty much a wipe out for me but still 🙁 Also as Alaric agreed with me - what of his books? His work? His Art? His Creations? What would happen to them?
I have been told since that there are plans to publish these and everyone is working hard to mantain the websites. The is also a Prize in the pipelines The Chris Al-Asward Prize for braking down the barriers in the arts.
I did cry and it made me realise that my definition of friendship is probably quiet different from most peoples. I am sad that Chris is gone. I spent last night trying to track down all his sites and stuff - getting stumped for a while until I remembered he'd gotten rid of one of his twitter accounts and stuff like that.
I also signed his memorial book.
TYCHRIS
Jean has had a busy week at school full of end of term activities and now it is the last day! It seems amazing that she is at school let alone finishing her first year!
We got her ready this morning with her thankyou cards for the teachers and some oreo cookies and jelly babies (they where going to have home made banoffe cupcakes but the power didn't come on until late yesterday so that was a no go!).
Then this afternoon was the end of year celebration assembly in the village hall - it was sweet watching the years sixes (about to leave and go to big school) go over the highlights of the year and it reminded me just what a lot of stuff they had packed in!
But then came the Prize Givings and the first person called for the Ray Tortenese Competition was Jean! So we now have a shiny trophy cup (for Class One) sitting on the bookshelf next to a citificate and she got lots of other goodies too like a gardening book with an inscription to her in and lots of run recyclables like purses made from old juice cartons!
Jean didn't realise what was supposed to happen though so had to be encouraged to go up on the stage! Then she is so small and the prizes relatively big to her that she looked a bit swamped until help came along in the form of one of the year sixes!
She didn't know what it was about until it was explained to her and she stood on stage looking all wide eyed and bewildered - however since it was explained she hasn't stopped talking about it and how she didn't know she was going to win!
So yes I'm being a gushy parent and probably too proud especially when I think she wont be five until the end of next month!
Obviously due to health problems and the little Jeany I tend to not be able to go out to work as such, even before she was thought of properly and the back problems had flared up so badly I realised that working as a steward at the Student Union was a no go. I headed down to the job center in hunt of a job I could do; I was thinking of envelope stuffing which I was sure would be a job you could do from home.
I explained the issues with needing to do physiotherapy and not being able to sit down or stand up too long and they just told me to go on benefits, which I didn't want to do. And so I began making looking at things I could do at home myself - there was little information then and I went back to college instead.
Then when I got here I was on crutches, so again I went to the job centre when Alaric assured me I would get an interview and they would sort me something out - all I got was rudeness and informed I had to look through all the job options myself and work out what I should apply for - which I did. There was basically nothing. And so I turned to learning web-design stuff and writing my blogs which was a nice sideline to Al's company regardless of the subsequent issues we had with floods and clients not paying.
I feel like I have been stumbling in the dark with a lot of this trying to find jobs I could do from home. Then I found out my friend has as site that covers all the sorts of questions I was asking. Obviously a lot of things have changed in even the last five years but I wish there had been something like this so easily accessible then and even if you are considering setting up your own business with or without the home aspect I think it's a good read.
The site is called Jobs From Home for those who are interested.
June has already been a bizzy month but I feel it is not too late to set myself some challenges. One of the things I want to do this month is focus on art type stuff - so that is illustrations, fimo sculptures and the like along with updating the art and craft blog. I have already started with some of this 🙂
You can now buy prints and things with some of my seascapes at Point Defect. I'm also looking for outlets for wiggly pets and things which seems to be going ok.
So my aim is to spend 30 hours over this month on art - I have already done about 12 hours 🙂
But I always have a second challenge right? I think it is going to have to be blog posts! I will be attempting to write at least 30 posts this month - this shouldn't be too hard actually but we will see 🙂
I'm a bit sad that I didn't get my writing game rolling properlly last month but at the moment money is being the stalling point with that one :/
Tuesday I went into Cheltenham to record poetry 🙂 Cheltenham's Arter Dark magazine videoed me and three others doing a variety of poetry and prose (our own work). It will be appearing on their site in a couple of weeks 🙂
Art and Craft, Sarah, Society, Writing | sarah | 
Fri 13th Aug 2010 11:49 am | 
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