It's true for many things, isn't it, that once you experience something better than what you're used to, it's terribly hard to go back.  And maybe that's what keeps us stiving and not settling, so that we can move ahead and up.

It works not only with entrusting my Belle Pietre babies to retail consignment shops, but in handbags, travel plans, and most everything in life.

I'm happy to report that the seemingly endless hours of work required to save a whole collection of my jewelry from their tarnished, mis-treated doom at one location, has already nicely payed off! 

I had news last week from Reg Grant at Grant Jewelers in Skaneateles that he's had great interest in my work, and a number of sales to show for it already!  Not only did he call me personally, but he put a check in the mail that day, and has already requested more pieces!

The owners of Adornamenti are just as particular about the shop.  I visited there not long ago, and Michael - a man after my own heart - had lint roller in hand, tidying up the black velvet display stands!  Now THAT'S how I want my baubles to be treated.  They deserve nothing less.  And neither do I!

Of course it takes seeing something better, and taking the plunge to invest in it, to know that what you're used to is just not working anymore. 

Take the brown leather tote I purchased last month.  It was more than I usually spend (which has always amounted to the best of the cheapest on the sale rack) but I loved it, and felt grand with it thrown over my shoulder.  The fun striped lining now gleams and glams up at me every time I open it to put something in. 

Could I go back to "Pleather"?  Only if I really LOVED it!

Tomorrow I leave for Istanbul.  The opportunity was given to me by my darling student, Ayca Yesim, who presented the offer twice.  In the fall, a trip to Turkey seemed far, far out of the realm of possibility.  When she invited me again in March, her question of, "Why don't you come?", turned rhetorical. 

Why don't I come, indeed!  It's taken some planning, a small dose of courage, and a larger portion of throwing caution to the wind, but I'm leaving tomorrow! 

If I keep settling for what I've always had, that's  exactly what I'll keep getting.  And there is SO much more, different, and better in this world to experience, to explore, to enjoy! 

As Mame declares to Agnes in THE best line from Mame:

Agnes Gooch: "Live?"
Auntie Mame: "Yes! Live! Life's a banquet and most poor suckers are starving to death!"

It's up to me to grab the biggest plate, tie a long linen napkin around my neck, and belly up to the banquet table!

Yes!
Live!
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As I was chastising myself for not putting fingers to keyboard here for more days than I have fingers to count on, it dawned on me that I'm surely NOT the only one. 

How many blogs must there be in the Blogosphere that were started with a bang, and not a little self-satisfaction, and have now fizzled out to an inglorious standstill like so many car parts in a junkyard.

These blogs were all created with good reason, having a burning desire to say something important, or a vehicle for expression where one wouldn't have their words squelched.  For me, it was to keep me accountable in this creative process, for I know that when I put a commitment "out there," I'm more likely to keep it.

Human nature, for all it's wonders, let's self-doubt speak louder than the creative impulse, it let's the force of inertia either keep us in motion, or slow us to an inevitable, grinding, stop.

I love music, and reading, and art.  I can only imagine how many potential Mozart's, Shakespeare's and Renoir's there could have been, had they not been stopped, not by lack of talent or acceptance by critics or the public, but by Human Nature. 

And how many other things of life have begun - and ended - that way, a diet, a project, a plan for the future? 

For today, it feels good to put fingers back to keyboard here, knowing that by doing this, I will more likely finish the pieces of jewelry that have remained incomplete this week due to the Stuff of Life.  And by doing so, they will NOT number among so many Things Gone Unfinished.
 
With that in mind, the words of Robert Frost pop into my head, thanks to Mom, who reminded me of the poem during one of our recent tangential conversations.  By my not succumbing to creative inertia, I am taking "the road less traveled by," 

TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,  
And sorry I could not travel both  
And be one traveler, long I stood  
And looked down one as far as I could  
To where it bent in the undergrowth; 

Then took the other, as just as fair,  
And having perhaps the better claim  
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;  
Though as for that, the passing there  
Had worn them really about the same,
 
And both that morning equally lay  
In leaves no step had trodden black.  
Oh, I marked the first for another day!  
Yet knowing how way leads on to way  
I doubted if I should ever come back.   

I shall be telling this with a sigh  
Somewhere ages and ages hence:  
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,  
I took the one less traveled by,  
And that has made all the difference.  

With thanks and so, so much Love to my Mother, who instilled in me her great love of Nature's Beauty & Bounty, an appreciation for Knowledge & Learning, and who modeled Courage & Stick-to-It-iveness to me my whole life, by how she lives hers. 

Happy Mother's Day, Moomie!
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