Needle, Rock, Paper, Scissors

This morning I sit reading reports of Thomas Kincaid's death at 54 while next to me, Rock Hushka engages in his morning ritual of stitching knots. I realize that I too could be working as we sit here chatting. I recall my friend and "lady novelist" Ruthie Knox saying in a recent interview that she gets up at 3 a.m. every day to write before her son James gets up. Ruthie has written something like 3 romance novels in the past year or so. I meanwhile have been waiting. Waiting - in the early 1970's Faith Wilding did a very moving performance piece for Womanhouse, in which she talks about waiting. She lists all the events of a woman's life in terms of waiting. I am waiting, but like my reaction to the Wilding piece I'm beginning to wonder what for. I believed it was for a "good idea." But I have no shortage of ideas these days. Maybe I have been instead waiting for an opportunity - but I know perfectly well I've had opportunites, and could have made some opportunities (like, HELLO! you have a curator embroidering right here on this very couch!) but I've let these pass, because I've been...waiting? I even recently acknowledged that I am waiting to retire to "hit it big" in my art. That's somewhat ridiculous, since I know perfectly well I'm not going to be able to retire for another 20 years. Am I going to wait 20 years to make art? Not likely. So I guess in short, what I am waiting for is for myself to get off my own ass and get some discipline. I mean, if Kincaid died at 54, there's no guarantee I will live till my own retirement. I cannot let the fear of unsold art overtaking my house have such a stronghold. I can't wait to be "discovered" if there's no work to serve as a conduit to "discovery." Expecially since I already am known to many individuals who - while I've been waiting - have gotten to really good places in their careers through hard work and discipline and have reached the high places of which people speak when mentioning "friends in high places." (Okay, so I don't have a friend at the Met or MOMA but there are a lot of other places one can show their work.) In the meantime, I will wait for a few other things, like that article I wrote about Rock coming out in the summer issue of Surface Design Journal, and our next crop of flax to go into the ground, and for summer...