On Crafting A Handmade Book ~ The Road To Dragonfly Cottage…

It is the book I’ve been trying to write for years, but it wasn’t the right time. It is a story that spans more than 22 years, from the night of my 45th birthday when I left my marriage until today, the story of a woman who suffered long-term abuse as a child leading to lifelong mental health issues, was happily married raising 3 children for a quarter of a century — none of which will be part of this book — and on the night of my 45th birthday I, like Alice, fell down a rabbit hole that has taken me almost a quarter of a century to work out. A new life began for me that night and so that’s where the tale begins, and it deals with coming out a lesbian at midlife, and then finding out that I was, due to a basketful of mental health issues, better off alone, to becoming increasingly agoraphobic, withdrawing from the world in stages while creating a life that would be the only life I could live, one of solitude and silence, amidst animals and gardens, writing and making art, visual art, fiber art, and more, creating a number of small presses, and finding my way online which opened up a whole new world. It is the story of being saved from suicide by a magical golden dragonfly, and scores of dragonflies that were always around me, and coming home to myself in a series of homes that I called Dragonfly Cottage, for a long time a state of mind, a vision of life, an ethos, until one day I found my real Dragonfly Cottage. It is about living through the fire that destroyed my beloved Dragonfly Cottage only to have it rebuilt and have to begin again, and a series of traumatic life events which I survived, one after the other, and always, by the grace of God and the magic of the dragonflies came through again and again, and it is the story of a woman becoming more deeply herself as she grew older and would become a wise woman, a crone, a woman of the earth, the moon, and the stars. It is about becoming an artist late in life and realizing that it is never too late to go for your dreams and it is about making magic in old age, even when one is disabled and has what seems like countless limitations, it is the story of the life of one woman, and the legacy she will leave her children and those she loves, and whose work, as long as she is alive, is dedicated to reaching out to others with love, compassion, and kindness. It is about becoming Maitri Libellule and what that means. It is about so much more. And it is not an ordinary book.

All throughout my twenties and thirties I wrote book after book in the traditional way, three times having publishers hold onto a book, sometimes for months, only to return them, and a great many were rejected. The worst part of all of that was that I got such nice rejection letters. They said things like, “We love your writing but it just doesn’t fit the current market.” Finally, in my forties, having published a number of small publications of my own I created The Blue Hibiscus Press and through it published The Contemplative Way: Slowing Down In A Modern World. It was before the days of the internet, I had a little laptop with Microsoft Word on it and I would type the columns and cut and paste them onto pages with copyright free Victorian artwork all around every page. It was on all blue paper and I bought the paper and my husband photocopied the thousands of pages on the copy machine at work, my son helped me hand-assemble and staple them, and I addressed them all by hand, put a stamp on them and sent them out to eventually hundreds of subscribers. They were also sold in bookstores. They were 100 page quarterly journals and it was the happiest, most delightful, fulfilling work I had ever done. Here are a few of them that I am lucky to have because my friend Katya, a wonderful writer, sent me her copies. She had written for the journal. All of my own copies were lost along with decades of manuscripts written before computers in my housefire in 2014. I treasure these few copies that I have left thanks to Katya.

Doing The Contemplative Way, as well as a few other small publications after that forever changed my idea of how I would like my work to come out. I wanted it to be hand-done, homespun, and have kind of a warm, cozy feel to it. And after I finally did get online a whole world of possibilities opened up to me with graphics programs and more. I wanted COLOR, and to still have it feel hand-done and homespun and I came up with a way I could achieve that feeling via digital means. and at any one time I have so many programs and screens opened up on my computer it can be dizzying. The text is written in one program, then moves to the graphics and backgrounds I create and then get turned into PDF’s. I am so happy working on this book it is as if I’ve come home.

I am able to do this new book because of my Patrons at Patreon and I not only really appreciate their financial support, but they are my accountability partners. Working alone can be so daunting but I am sending the book, in pieces, to my Patrons as PDF’s so they get to see the whole book being made. And I will go into detail with them about how I create my books now, which programs I use, I am working on a video to show them just these sorts of things, and they also get to see my artwork of Maisie and her world and get free downloads of Maisie art once a month. Patreon has changed my life. It is bringing me much needed income so that I can do my work, supplement my social security to help me get by, get the art supplies and other studio supplies I need, and I give my Patrons a lot of content in thanks, blog posts several times a week and my whole life here at Dragonfly Cottage. Just this morning I sent them their first 18 page PDF which includes the pages up at the top of this post and much more. They are with me on the journey in so many ways.

If you would like to see more and hear more about this whole process, and help support me to do my work you can go to Patreon and have a look at what is there. I am currently merging 2 tiers into one and offering a sliding scale for what I now call “The Everything Tier,” in which I offer a great many things, and there are group gatherings on Zoom, and one on one sessions with me on a very limited basis.

Today I have been up working since 5 a.m. and I am pooped! I am going to get this blog post up and then take a nap before I have an afternoon one on one session with a Patron. These are busy, happy days, so even a disabled old lady can have a deeply fulfilling, joyful life. It’s what my work is all about. It is never too late to go for your dreams, remember that. And I hope, dear ones, you are going for yours.

Blessings to One and All…