I Can See Clearly Now - Almost

I'm now almost one week past my long-anticipated cataract surgery in my right eye.

I was born with bad eyes. My left eye turned out and was only partially corrected by doing much-hated eye exercises as a child. I was so near-sighted my good vision was about 2" from my face in my left eye and about 4" in my right eye. Way past legally blind. My world was blobs. I learned to read holding my books very close to my face.

This was normal for me. As with anyone who has a different normal, I learned compensations. I hated the thick glasses I had to wear and was very grateful when soft contact lenses were introduced and I could afford their very pricey cost. Even with contacts, my left eye was pretty much useless. I was in the "oh, you poor dear!" category.

That changed about a decade ago when a cataract was discovered in my left eye. Yes! I was young to have a cataract! Following surgery I suddenly had good vision. I could actually watch TV. I finally had depth perception! Although I had contacts for both eyes, I discovered that I could do quite well with only a contact in my right eye and bifocals tuned for my computer distance. Because of the power difference between left and right eye, glasses only were impractical. Think of wearing a lightweight glass for one eye and a very heavy lens on the other! No way! And no need because the contacts did a great job of correcting the vision to about 20/30.

At the time my first cataract was discovered I was told there was a slow-growing cataract in my right eye. My OD watched it and finally told me I was at the point where I needed to consider surgery. Night driving was becoming especially difficult. Streetlights were fuzzy globes. After wending my way through the conflicting medical/vision providers, my opthamologist and I made the decision it was time for cataract surgery.

Most people want to have near perfect distance vision for driving. That wasn't my choice. My right eye was like having an 8x magnifying glass. When I did my handwork or beading all I had to do was bring the work close to my eye and I could see perfectly. I didn't want to lose that! I took in my "Begin" project and told my doctor that I needed to be able to see well enough without any correction to continue that kind of work. We made the decision my correction would be to remain nearsighted.

So the surgery and eye measurements were scheduled. What I hadn't realized was that for a week before the measurements and surgery I would not be able to wear my right eye contact! Oops! I've moaned about the result -- I couldn't see at close distances! The left eye was great for driving in daylight. At night or in rain, the right eye created globes -- no way to drive! No glasses and readers didn't work either. My eyes were constantly at war for near vision. About all I could do was beadwork ... lifting the project to within 4" of my face. Good thing I could spend time learning the peyote stitch!

Surgery was interesting. It's done awake with some kind of anesthesia. I wanted to join the operating room conversation but was told not to talk so there was no chance of my eye moving. Shucks! All I could see was interesting blobs -- and no way to photograph or draw them! Suddenly, a clear view of the operating light. Goodness! I could see!!!!

I have to wait about 3-6 weeks for my final results and new glasses/contacts, however the initial result is just perfect for me (though it freaked out my doctor's assistant when I could barely read the top line of the eye chart). I have perfect 20/20 vision about 12" from my face ... ideal for handwork! My left eye takes over for distance. The blobs are gone and the world is so much brighter! From about 14" to 5' I have some fuzzing ... that's what will be corrected by the computer glasses. Overall, I am thrilled.

For the first time in my life I have something approaching normal vision .... what a joy!

-- Joanna

A Sunday Artist Date

Sunday I had the pleasure of going out with a new frined explore some of southeastern Arizona. My friend is a professional photographer and I've dabbled in photography throughout my life. First we went to the ghost town of Pearce. It's along a major highway and not totally abandoned, but it still meets the definition of a ghost town.

Then we headed to the Chiracahua Mountains and the famed Chochise Stronghold. While I've been by the mountains on a number of occasions, this was the first time I had gone into this section of the Coronado National Forest. It's definitely an area that is off the beaten patch and there were few people around. Perhaps becuase we were flirting with the triple digit temperatures common to our Arizona summer!

There's a wonderful ranch that is now an historic site. This photo captures some of the beauty of this wonderful area.

I was thrilled to get some wonderful photos of texture ... perhaps they will become photo fabric in future projects. What fun!

-- Joanna

The Agony of Learning

If you are accustomed to reading the newest blog posting first, that isn't going to work with this posting sequence. As you'll discover, there is a very specific sequence to these three posts. I'm posting the last first and the first last. So please continue reading!

After starting improvisional bead embroidery and joining the Bead Journal Project I decided it might be a good idea to really learn beading. You know, the kind where the beads are attached to each other without any fabric. That is a skill, incidentally, I've had absolutely no desire to learn my entire life.

I bought a couple books (I'm not going to mention names because I will not recommend them ... at least not for learning!) and pulled out two colors of beads. Then I spent about three hours of total agony to create the top item in the photo. I want to stress that this was total agony! Trying to do this brought me close to tears. If I didn't have a persistence gene that refuses to accept defeat you would have heard my screaming from here to whereever you live!

Despite the agony, I tried again. A couple of hours produced the next sample. Better. Then I tried smaller beads (not pictured). I don't like doing samples so I decided I would try a project.

And that is the next posting.

-- Joanna

My First Peyote Stitch Project

Where to start? What to do? I decided on a necklace purse or amulet. No pattern. No instructions. Just a folded up dollar for sizing. I looked through my slowly increasing bead stash and selected five tubes. I love texture created by color and I liked the 'bead soup' I made when I poured out the beads. I don't remember if I started with odd- or even-count peyote. I simply started and kept on beading. And beading. It was wonderful! I learned a lot about tension, burying threads, decreasing and making fringe.

I made many mistakes and here are some of them:

- I didn't make the flap long enough. It should have had about three more rows before I started the decreasing.
- I didn't know how to make fringe. I initially did a six bead drop fringe on the flap. My tension was all wrong so they didn't hang right. After creating the bottom fringe (and getting a clue about how to make the beads hang right!) I went back and ripped out (well, cut out would be more appropriate) the fringe. I added a focus bead drop.
- As a result of tearing out the flap fringe and reworking the edge, I bowed out the flap with my buried threads. No one will notice unless an experienced beader looks at it closely.
- My peyote base row for the chain was far too long. All things considered I'd rather have too long than too short!

Despite the flaws this meets the quilters' galloping horse test ... if you can't see any mistakes riding by on a galloping horse it looks fine! Being a perfectionist I generally go by the inspect under a magnifying glass for problems rule. With this first peyote project, I'm giving myself a break. I do like it and I will be making more of these in different colors. What fun!

Except ... I'll try different stitches. RAW ... isn't that supposed to be meat or a camera setting? Hm, I must be a glutton for the agony of learning.

-- Joanna

How (Not?) to Take Jewelry Photos

I like to take photos of my projects in natural light whenever possible. I have a wonderful chiminea in my garden where I can place projects. The result is nicely organic and different. Sometimes I photgraph on one of my cactus as well. And there are times I put down some gray felt and stand above it to take the photograph. That does, however, have hazards as this photograph shows. Miz Paws likes to get her paws into everything, including anything I try to photograph.

So I decided to show this photo of my "studio" ... feet, Miz Paws, rocks and all!

I hope you are enjoying this Independence Day as much as I am. I remember something my son's second grade teacher, an immigrant from a repressive society, told her students: "How wonderful your pencils have erasers. When you make a mistake you can erase and do it over correctly." That's what she had her students do: erase any mistake and do it over correctly.

How wonderful we can make mistakes and learn from them. Always keep those "corrected mistakes" ... they will remind you how far you have come.

-- Joanna