May I Have Your Name?

… sure, but can I have it back when you’re done with it?

I figure since this blog is … *checks the math* … holy fuck … 27 years old, it’s okay to put some distance between updates. And I have other sites with more specific purpose that I also maintain. (More on that later, maybe.)

(Okay, maybe now.)

Alchemias was supposed to be a festival-based shop starting in 2019, and then… well, we all remember how 2020 went. It’s been sitting around, inspiring me to make stuff, but whenever I thought about going and doing events again, Life Happened.

Well, I decided that I had quite enough of that, so this year, and through the magic of friendship, caffeine, and sheer frustration with the world at large, I finally have the inventory, the setup, and the backing to start doing public events. The first one (so far) is on May 9th in Austin, Texas, at FaeFest. There’s another larger one later this year at the Viking Festival at Runestone Park in Heavener, Oklahoma, too.

But Why Now?

There comes a time in every woman’s life when they have to make Serious Changes. Sometimes it’s a matter of choice, sometimes biology or circumstance force the issue, but we all have the option to decide if we’re going to get dragged into our next chapter kicking and screaming or take it with grace.

I don’t have the energy for the kicking and screaming part – I’m saving that up for something else – so, grace it is.

This is my Croning Era.

I mean, I’m not getting old per se, but… I’m getting older. Wyrd things that have eluded me in the past are suddenly clear, impulses that I’ve had that somehow got interrupted are manifesting out of thin air, and now it’s time to make it all happen.

I started getting into handiwork again. (I blame my incredible mother-in-law.) I helped out with the Ruby Star Society’s Sampler sample quilt by doing all the applique blocks. I started hand-piecing little pillow panels together. Hand-quilting has become almost as meditative for me as knitting.

I’m making tarot tiles and runes, and I’m working with Mysterious developing their Dreadfuland Tarot Deck, with the incredible artist Jean Walter. I’m still making horns, and I have chapbooks of my individual stories from Thiside of Anywhere that will soon be in its second edition.

But, most exciting is…

Ink Me Baby, One More Time

The tattoos are happening, too. There’s a whole backstory to that, but the important bits are that I found an artist (Nic at Renaissance Tattoo Collective) who has a light touch, does awesome work, and respects the process. Part of that, though, is that I’m using myself as a guinea pig to answer a seemingly unexplored question: how does comfrey ointment affect tattoo healing?

I’m going to document the process and post the results here in about a month. My left forearm is getting an armband, and there are currently three pieces of around seven done. I got the second solid band and the dot band done yesterday, and I had Nic also do a little gradient rectangle on my right wrist.

The armband will get treated the same as the last one with Harry’s Tattoo Frost, and the rectangle will be treated with Traumaplant Comfrey Ointment. It’s the closest I could find to a pure comfrey ointment, though it does have rosemary in it as well, and I’m okay with that because that’s a pretty good antiseptic. I had considered other options such as Ora’s Tattoo Aftercare Ointment, but it has a ton of other things in it like calendula, thyme, tea tree oil, and St. John’s wort (?), so it would be difficult to determine if the comfrey was making a difference.

Here’s my hypothesis (and I’ll cover it again in the final report): Comfrey accelerates healing – it’s good for bones (one of its names is boneknit), bruises, cuts, etc. – but it works so quickly and completely that anything inside the wound is trapped there. That’s bad when it’s a splinter or a bit of grit, because there’s a massive increased risk of infection, and since the skin is closed, that infection has nowhere to go but inside, and then you’ve got a recipe for sepsis.

But, what if we want to trap something under the skin?

My research indicated a ton of conflicting opinions, but I couldn’t find hard data. This experiment will hopefully provide some solid answers, though a sample population of one is hardly significant scientific rigor. Maybe it will inspire more research, depending on the outcome.

I mean, it could be that the comfrey over-heals the tattoo and erases it. It could be that the comfrey seals the ink and heals the skin so quickly that the dreaded peeling-and-itching phases is minimized or even skipped altogether. It could be that there will be virtually no difference at all between the two.

I’ll report back in a month and let you know how it goes.

Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Nonsense

The other other thing that I’m working on more writing. As I mentioned, there’s is the second edition of Thiside of Anywhere, yes, but also the sequel collection, and also some other short story collections. I’ve found that I really like writing in vignettes and daisy-chains (stories that take place in the same world but connect only at the beginning and end), and I’m enjoying writing cozier work instead of big epic things.

But I’m also working on a big epic thing.

And I’m weighing out different methods of distribution that don’t rely on massive, exploitative, unethical structures.

That’s a struggle, but one that has only been created recently. The chapbooks are a good way to start this (they’ll all be available for purchase on Alchemias very soon), but I’m open to other suggestions for ethical sourcing.

I miss you guys. I haven’t forgotten about a single one of you. I’m just really, really busy most days, but in a good way.