Rocky didn’t need too much coaxing to get into his stall today. He listens to locate Maria and then sniffs to figure out where the grain is. He is hesitant about the step up, which he can’t see. So he presses his hooves against the step to figure it out and then steps up into the stall. The entryway is concrete, but the stall is lined with hay. He gets to go in and out if and when he chooses.
The New Bedlam Farm – built in 1840 – has a beautiful cold storage room. I wanted to take it as my office, but Maria nixed it. The farm families stored vegetables and canned fruits in this room, which is cool all year round. I might to hide in there when I want to write.
Red and Rocky hang out sometimes in the pasture at the new place. So far, I have not found a place Red will not go. The donkeys are getting comfortable with. Red has many girlfriends, more than I ever had.
Maria is launching a big-deal one-week notecard sale starting today on her website. She is offering five-pack notecards for sale for $10 plus shipping.
We are thinking about the future of notecards. I have mixed feelings about them. I am enjoying selling my photographs as prints. Maria is offering a small number on her site and they are selling consistently.
We’ve sold a lot of notecards over the past few years, especially at art shows and during visits to the farm (a tradition we will expand and refine at the New Bedlam Farm), but I am not easy about making up too many notecards. I think there will be fewer, not more, and Maria will be selective about them. I don’t want to be in the novelty business and writing books, taking photos and videos, writing e-books and children’s books is more than enough to keep me busy.
Selling my photographs in small but steady quantities suits me fine and doesn’t put too much of a strain on Maria. Her business is advancing steadily. She now instantly sells everything she makes, quilts, streaming pieces, potholders, and has a back-list of orders. I don’t want her to be selling my stuff when she has her own. We both value the idea of our work being separate from the others. We work within a few yards of each other and those kinds of boundaries are important. Maria does not show me her quilts before she sells them, and I do not show her my books before my editor sees them. I see spouses all the time telling me they wouldn’t dream of making something without showing it to their partners. I would. So would Maria.
In the meantime, the notecard sale is a great deal, priced now well under the cost or producing them. And if you like these images, it might be a good idea to take her up on this offer. I think we are moving towards very few of them, if any. Maria will put them up on her site this afternoon. She has Paypal.
We went over to the new house this morning to drop off some things, and this is the first thing I brought, a photograph I took in Brooklyn while visiting my daughter. I loved this slogan on the wall and it is the first thing I hung in my new office at the New Bedlam Farm. I try and live by this. Live. Work. Create.
