ontology | you must be the seed. descend into the earth.

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you must be the seed. descend into the earth.

I remember, back in the days when my family's life was pretty bleak*, my mother used to say: God is good. All the time, God is good: because He is, as a fact, not a trait, not something He's doing right now, not because He just did something noticeable for you -- in the slums, He is good, and in the starlight, He is good; when you weep, He is good, and when you laugh, He is good then too. Another way of saying it might be: God is Love. All the time, God is Love. Because Love properly is essentially Good -- the word's got cluttered with a lot of other meanings over the last few thousand years of English, but I think the the purest white heart of Love is the greatest possible expression of selflessness and goodness and God. When you act out of Love, you are acting as the hand of God.

I'm reminded of this because it's really both those times -- I'm trapped in this ugly little town, I'm struggling to find work, still fighting off clinical depression, lonely, in debt, not in college... but the sun is blooming through hazy clouds, and there's a little fluffy calico kitten in my window, and I have some of the most amazing friends anyone could possibly ask for, and my parents are fun and thoughtful and aren't fussed when I bake in the middle of the night or run outside in the rain or listen to deeply weird music, and my bedroom is full of little clothbound worlds I can slip into, and I can write. And God is good.

* About four of the six years we spent in Massachusetts (when I was ten to fourteen) were by and large hellish -- Dad worked an endless series of jobs, some of them far beneath his expertise and intelligence, because we were desperate for money just to live on. We lived in one half of a duplex, not very large, that, while reasonably respectable, especially for our bad-reputation town, was in desperate need of repair. We had one car, which was mostly with Dad at work, and he worked all day and sometimes half the night (sometimes we barely saw him for days) -- which meant that the rest of us were essentially trapped in the house, especially as we couldn't afford to pursue many alternate routes of travel. We were isolated in our community, and the church we attended was a forty-five minute drive, and almost everyone else who attended was upper middle class, with beautiful homes, who didn't need to worry about food or new shoes or car repairs. In addition, we were still dealing with hurt and bitterness resulting from my father being told to resign from the ministry position we'd moved there for. I remember being in tears once because we couldn't afford to buy me a cheap camisole at Walmart to wear under a too-thin shirt for some occasion or another: not because I couldn't have a thing, but because of the humiliation and despair of not even being able to manage that much. It's a testament to how much we all loved the Boston area and New England culture that we still love it, even after that, and that I in particular want to go back.

* * *

So, anyway, I'm doing well, I think. When returning from holiday I tend to fall into something of a slump, and it's no different this time -- especially with the additional stressful circumstances -- but I'm stretching myself a little more every day, trying to make sure I accomplish at least one meaningful thing, and go outside, and drink enough water (I always forget to drink water unless I'm terribly thirsty... have recently begun to think my psyche might be vastly improved if I drank more). I'm thinking about alternate, outside-the-box ways of earning money, although my bucket's coming up a bit empty at the moment, to be honest. I'm a member of several money-earning websites, where you read advertisements and take surveys and things, which is great for, you know, a little extra pocket money, but the emphasis is on a little and extra. (Haven't got any actual money yet, because I haven't reached the pay-out rates yet.) I have a reasonable amount of things that I could sell, especially old clothing, and even a few books, but I'm not sure of the best way to go about that -- apparently eBay costs you money, too? and I don't know how regular a seller I could be, anyway, or if anyone would buy my stuff on the internet. We might have a yard sale sometime soon, in which case I could sell a lot of clothes for fifty cents or a quarter, and would probably make a pretty decent amount of snack/book/online music money from it -- ten, fifteen bucks, maybe, I don't know.

I'm thinking about things I make -- I'm a good cook and baker, but how do you go about peddling your wares, especially in a small town? I could make pretty fantastic jewellery if I had the supplies and learnt a few tricks, but supplies are expensive! I have photography, which might actually be a reasonable commodity, especially if I go through some place like deviantART so that I don't have to print things myself. (I can't take pictures for money, because my camera is sort of rubbish. A few more paychecks and not-being-in-debt-anymore-ness, and I can start looking for a good price on, say, a Canon Digital Rebel, but of course we're looking at three to five hundred dollars there. Then I might seriously look into getting photo commissions for portraits and events and things.) I make music... a little... I'm actually seriously considering, right now, writing a few songs, experimenting with found sounds and weird percussion -- gathering up scissors and windchimes and pots and pans -- and seeing what I can do. Maybe I'll come up with something halfway decent (if incredibly lo-fi) and see if I can get a few friends and relatives to buy it for five dollars.

Speaking of music, uh... a friend of my father's, who is an amazing guitar player and tends to accumulate quality guitars in much the same way his shelter-running wife accumulates homeless cats, just unloaded me with a beautiful professional quality Yamaha acoustic-electric guitar. Which retails for about two thousand dollars. My father just wanted to borrow an amp for our church picnic on Sunday, but Mr Fitzgerald gave him the amp, and threw in the guitar for me. He's always been sort of interested in my music -- he and Dad have written songs together and things, and he's kind of a gruff guy who I think must be even more of a softie inside than my father (who is far, far more sentimental than he lets on, and he comes across as a reasonably sensitive guy anyway, albeit a very masculine sensitive guy with a great beard). Also he gave me a really nice electric guitar a few years ago. You guys, I can't even. Seriously. This guitar is gorgeous, and it sounds as good as it looks, and, again, professional quality. There are probably some well-known if independent musicians who haven't got guitars this nice. It's very unique and very me, visually, with whale-tail fret markers made of abalone, and a setting-sun-in-the-ocean motif rosette (it's an Alaska guitar! ^-^) .

I kind of figure that after this, I owe the world a little bit of music, at least. So here's an extremely rough and lo-fi cover of Patty Griffin's "Poor Man's House". (The yelling you hear at the end is Leandra, who really, really did not want a nap.)

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Your first paragraph is beautiful. I said that today in the car to my mother. "God is good." I've just today had this greater awareness of the goodness of God, and it's a funny thing that you said that today as well. Everything seems clear and I can breathe, and God seems to be here. I mean, He always is, but his presence is so sweet today.

The guitar is beautiful! I'm very happy for you. My father is getting back into his old music and writing songs. I probably should get back into guitar except that it's fairly hard for me to find chords to songs I like. I've thought the exact same about gathering up pots and pans and things that make interesting noises and recording something with a microphone. I can't play anything too well, but I can sing and I love to experiment.

I love to hear people make such sense (as much sense as can be made) of God. There are so very many people who can't get it, who can't see goodness when things are going badly. They assume things are bleak because they look bleak, just like they can't see that God is good when he may not look so good in their eyes.

Money is so damned troublesome. Not having it is more troublesome. But to quote Doyle, "It's not all about money; what about friendship and family and those things that are priceless, like they say on the credit card commercials?"
Though it is so annoying when people tell me I have 'champagne tastes on a beer budget'. I know I do, and sometimes I think I do on purpose. Maybe because I don't like beer ;)

On the subject of beer, I don't usually like it either: however my father has been buying this blueberry lager which is really quite delicious, if rather startlingly purple. (Also the drinking age in Canada is nineteen. ^-^ So I got to have blueberry beer and red wine, which is very peculiar but eventually nice. I discovered why people in old books always have wine given to them when they're sick from the cold.)

Drat, I wish I'd thought of that during my horrible and murderous cold a few days ago. "But Daaad! It's for medicinal purposes!!"

It is? It's 18 out here in the west...weird!

According to Google, it's nineteen in most places but eighteen in a few? Whatever the case, I'm legal everywhere in Canada. :D

(Disclaimer: no desire to get drunk. Ever. Ick. But I do like certain alcoholic beverages rather a lot on occasion. ^-^)

Hm. Well that's quite interesting.
And grats on being legal ;)

Yeah, I don't understand the allure of getting drunk, either.
But I don't like the taste of alcohol itself, so the odds
of that ever happening are pretty slim.
Though I suppose one should never say never O.o

Well there's certainly nothing wrong with a bit here and
there! If you like it, that's great :)

I think it's cool how far you've come...and even though the
old familiar sad/hopeless things are rearing their ugly head,
you can remember that first bit. God IS love.
So many people (myself included) need to meditate on that more
often.

Wonderful blessing, that guitar. I am so pleased for you!
That is one of the things that makes you sit back in amazement
...one of those things that I've heard referred to as a
God-thing.

I say...that is *you* performing "Poor Man's House"?!
Just to clarify, I am a bit dull sometimes..

Ok, of course it's you, and I'm dense.
But...wow. You have such a rich, folksy voice!!
Beautiful, really. And you play so well, too!

Coupled with your writing talent, heaven's, girl!
I should love to hear more of your work..

Out of curiosity, what did you use for recording?

Awww, thankee. *turns strange colours*

Currently I'm using a free programme called Audacity, which has a lot of nice basic editing tools as well -- the song I'm working on at the moment has multiple layers of sound in it. I'm learning a lot. (I, uh, also use this programme to edit other people's songs, because I hate when more than one song occupies the same track, or when there's too much or not enough silence at the end, or whatever. ^-^)

Oo, Audacity is awesome.
I made them use it (ok, I use it) at the church for sound
files, too.

Layers are so much fun to fiddle with. That's a really
good one to do it with, too.
Garageband is awesome, too, but it's a Mac-only program.
And I think Audacity is simpler to understand.

Oooooh edit songs! You are too smart.
I hate tracks with scads of space in the middle and a tag
sort of song at the end. Bleah. I might just do that
myself with a few...marvelous idea.

...your voice is amazing. I am almost tearing up over how lovely it is. Perhaps God gave you this guitar as a sign? Because makes beautiful things like your voice to be used?

I wish I had something more coherent to say regarding this whole entry, but right now, your voice is currently playing out of my computer & all that I can really think to say is, um, more songs please? This is gorgeous, Jolene.

Oh Jolene. That is going on my iPod and never coming off. I've mentioned to you before that I also feel a connection to that song, and you singing it...wow. Your voice sounds so much older than eighteen, and almost smoky. Beautiful. Girl, you need to record some songs!

...and now I realize that you are recently turned nineteen. So sorry - I've thought of you as eighteen for so long.

Well, yesterday I caught myself thinking I was still seventeen. :p

OH MY GOSH I DID THIS FOR SO LONG. and now i am going to be twenty, what. this is madness. /o\

Part of it is probably that I really liked being seventeen, even if that year kind of sucked (but then, most of my years since the age of ten have kind of sucked, so I stopped bothering about that much). And part of that was because seventeen is such a nice number; I like the colour of it (mint green with an undertone of sage), and the sound, and the pleasant asymmetrical quality...

That is a beautiful guitar, and a rare instance of generosity for it to have fallen into your possession. You should treasure it as thought it were one of your own children.

Ebay's worth a shot. The fees are not significant and people do buy things. The key is to provide a detailed, accurate, and appealing listing of the item, and a good photo goes a long way. Regularity does not matter. Sell one thing, sell thousands, it doesn't make a big difference.

I would buy an album if I knew that the music profits were part of a plan to save for a specific goal, like a camera, music equipment, or a college fund. Something that is purposefully building something bigger, rather than recreational expenses.

honestly, i take exception to that. i think you'd be allowed to put that kind of caveat on a donation, or even a loan, but if we're talking art? buy if it speaks to you, don't if it doesn't. and having listened to the track

faeriemaiden uploaded, i think there are enough of us to whom her art would speak that she doesn't need to be made to feel as though it's a charity project. i mean, i'd pay for an EP because i think i'd love it—if all i want to do is give her money, there's paypal for that. (which, that reminds me, i should really get on dealing with!)

(anyway sorry to be a drama llama in your comments, jo! ♥)

A+ WOULD DOWNLOAD AGAIN. :D

Be warned, this is an obnoxiously long comment full of nothing but ideas on how to make money, so...I don't know, really.

Could you maybe do something a little like "the girl who circumnavigated fairyland" (which I keep meaning to read and haven't)? Dunno what exactly, but maybe set up something where people could choose to donate some small amount for writing and/or music? Especially if you did an EP, which I'm sure you could sell, with arrangements of found noises like you talked about (and you could, like, overlay parts of it with Eliot and stuff!) and your own songs and...things. Especially if you know someone with a halfway decent microphone you could use and also on a quiet day when Leandra isn't there to yell. :p Or maybe you could sell layouts; I think

scholarsicons has done that successfully.

Um...there are sites where you can sell your stock photos, but I haven't tried that yet because they all demand higher-resolution photos than even I have, and mine are pretty big. I should send you links to some of my various make-money-online sites, because I've saved several I keep meaning to look into (plus others that give you ideas and whatever) only I haven't. And I don't really have time at the moment to go dig up the whole list. >_< Oh, but definitely recommend you go look at the Online Writing Jobs (http://www.online-writing-jobs.com) site I think I linked you to earlier; might find a proofreading job or something, for instance, that would pay decently and that you could do from home. Some are steady jobs and some are one-time projects, so it's good to keep checking back (I have several sections' RSS feeds in Google Reader). Oh, and you might want to try checking Craigslist for Pittsburgh writing gigs or something--might find something that could be done largely or mostly long-distance.

This (https://www.mturk.com/mturk/preview?groupId=1XV4JBZXABXZRDNFQYY0). Most MTurk stuff is worthless (like, you're going to pay me one whole cent to tag a couple hundred photos? Yeah, no. But while this one doesn't totally make sense to me, the description does say that it's 1-2 hours work, so $25 for what is hopefully a relatively quick and easy task is pretty good.

And like I mentioned, since you've got five guitars and they obviously go for pretty good prices, do you think you could sell one or two? That's something you could probably sell on eBay (which yes, it does cost whether the item sells or not, but listing fees are like...10 cents as a base, probably, and 35 cents with the Buy It Now option or something). Half.com is absolutely the way to go with CDs, DVDs, video games (...any your brother no longer uses?), and books, because there are no listing fees--only a small commission after it sells--and it's a store, not an auction, so your stuff can stay up indefinitely. eBay you can sell basically anything. Generally my stuff's sold fine as long as I take a good picture of it, provide all the necessary info, list it in the right place, and start it at a decent price. For the latter, you want to look for similar/identical items and see what they're selling for, which doesn't count if there are zero bids: it only helps to see what people are actually willing to pay.

Oh, and sites like InboxDollars and such where you make most of your money from offers--credit reports tend to be a bit dodgy, but one you definitely want to do is eMusic, assuming you haven't before, because not only will you still get the 25 free mp3s, you'll also get paid like $6 for it or something. (You should sign up for CashCrate (http://cashcrate.com/1156601) too--they seem to pay a lot more for many of their offers.) With that one, too, I can tell you from experience (uh, like three times, with different e-mail addresses and credit cards) that eMusic is totally legit, and it's very easy to cancel before you start getting charged for membership. VistaPrint might be a good one to try too since I think you can get, like, free business cards and also get paid $4 or something?

Holy crap, when I said obnoxiously long, I did not realize it was almost twice the character limit. D:

You might also think about one or two of the credit-card offers on CashCrate because they've got a couple different Discover cards with a $40 payout (I realized this, of course, after I got one of the same cards through InboxDollars for a $15 payout, grrr). You have to make and pay off a purchase with the card to get it, but as long as it doesn't charge any fees and you just do the one purchase and pay it off right away, it shouldn't be a problem. ...Of course I guess you'd need money first to do that. Does look like CashCrate has more offers with good payouts...oh, and definitely try Nicole's Savings Advantage through them, because not only will CashCrate pay out $7 for doing it, you'll also get a $25 Target gift card and a $25 Starbucks gift card, and that's still cool even without either of those in your area because I checked, cards like that sell for just barely below their value on eBay (like, $20+). Follow the instructions here (http://www.littlepeoplewealth.com/2009/07/50-gift-card-to-starbucks-and-target.html) (just go through CashCrates' link to get there) so you get the cards without paying $12 or whatever for the first month of a service you don't need to make sure you get the cards, because I thought I should wait until the card came and it took kind of forever. But I wouldn't have had to. And I didn't know to go through CashCrates. Frell. Maybe I can do it again with a different e-mail address...? >_<

Remember to use Ebates any time you buy online, too. Or MrRebates or CashBaq or even some of the other sites like InboxDollars and CashCrate, because those give cash back too; you just want to compare them, because they all seem to work with different stores and give back different percentages. Unfortunately I don't think any of them work with, say, any of the places I keep buying t-shirts like Threadless and Teextile and DBH because right now I have $273 in my cart from DBH's big sale. D: Time to start weeding.

Oh also don't forget Swagbucks, at least for extra Amazon money--a $5 Amazon card is 45 SB (I've gotten $15 worth of Amazon stuff from them...which reminds me, I really should actually spend that, plus the $20 card from Cat...), and now they have a thing where they'll send you actual money by PayPal, 70 SB for $5.

Also I've got this Google Docs file I can share with you with links to some of those "free" offers with big payouts...you know, like the ones in banner ads that tell you they want to give you a free iPod...but none of these require referrals, and they say how many offers you have to participate in (most are free, some cost a little--just like the offers at InboxDollars et al. except without immediate gratification), and while you would not get money immediately, I do know that it's not a scam entirely because 1) this is what ProjectPayday is based on and I know it works, even if it's not as easy or profitable as they want you to think, and 2) Kelsey actually did one of these once and got a $500 Victoria's Secret card in the mail weeks later.

Oh, and these people might still be trading software for reviews...I got a couple of the HGTV programs off them because they retail for a lot and I figured, hey, I'll use the program, review it, and sell it on eBay. Got the CD-ROMs, never had time to use them or review them because of school and then ZOMG THESIS, and...they have never bugged me about the reviews, months later. I still guiltily feel like I had better do that, at some point, before I sell them, but...yeah. ANYWAY. The point is, see if they're still doing this and if they are ask for whatever the most expensive programs are, and all you have to do is use them enough for a short (like, for Amazon) review and then sell them on eBay.

Also, I have told you in person that you have a fantastic voice, and hearing you recorded just makes me remember that, so...yeah. Anyone can put music up for free on last.fm; might be a way to attract at least a little attention and get people to buy an EP or something? (And if you can, I dunno, figure out a way to make weird noises like crying babies work, that would be cool too. :p)

Wow. You have an absolutely gorgeous voice, and yes, absolutely, more songs please!

OH AND don't forget the Survey Doctor thing, because that's a fairly easy $13 right upfront and they do pay pretty promptly. Plus I exported my Google Bookmarks (http://sharecash.org/download.php?id=70420) and pretty much anything under blog, work, or financial could be useful, "work" being the main one (I think there might be some stock-photo-selling stuff under photography too). Probably. I haven't been so good at actually going through the sites or anything.

Hello,
My sister and I have made quite a bit of money baking over the years. Easy cookies are good, as are holiday themed things such as pumpkin logs for Thanksgiving or heart shaped cookies for Valentines Day. Cinnamon roles or bread are always hits as well. We make several boxes of samples then send one box with Dad to work, along with an order sheet explaining when the goodies will be delivered. Then we go to various businesses where we know someone or have some connection and give them samples and ask if people would like to order the product. Generally people are so desperate for anything homemade that a lot of orders are made.
I hope this helps!

♥ This was a lovely discovery, dear.

I'm grateful that, no matter how bleak things may seem, there are still little ordinary miracles to brighten up circumstances - everyday magic, in a way. I'm glad you have a new guitar; I've downloaded your song and can't wait to hear it once I'm off work.

As for the slump that follows holidays...I can relate to that, I think. There's something discouraging about spending time in a place (and in a culture) you wish was yours, and then coming back home. Displacement is a wretched thing. But, after all, there is still art, there is still writing, there are still little clothbound worlds (a beautiful phrase, by the by) to slip into. And I'm sure you will return, in time.

Your voice reminds me of Aoife O'Donovan's, but yours is much richer and prettier.

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you must be the seed. descend into the earth.

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Baking

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