I almost didn’t go. I want/needed to make money, but the constant sucking sound emanating from our bank account all summer had me standing at the edge of my cave, waiting to pushed into the void.
But I need/wanted the money, so I went, knowing that was the worst possible reason to set up a booth at the art fair. Thinking about the money and not the art scrunches your face and you end up making no money and having even less fun. But I’d made the cards and magnets (which suddenly looked horrible to my jaded eyes), and I forced myself to turn into the field-turned-parking-lot.
My neighbors cheerfulness was stronger than my internal gloom, and I felt a little burst of energy as I started setting up my tables. As people wandered by and giggled at the cartoons, I remembered what had inspired them and started to giggle too, and I started noticing the art surrounding me.
There was no cell phone signal which forced artists and shoppers to completely disconnect from the overwhelmingly negative digital zeitgeist and reconnect with humanity. For me, wandering barefoot through a field populated by artists of all kinds made the world’s problems seem smaller and mine even smaller – or at least distant enough to start seeing beauty, and finally the funny in life again.
And at the end of the day, I wasn’t much richer, but that wasn’t the point on Saturday. Saturday was about taking a flying leap with fate and instead of waiting for fate to push me into the abyss.