Fighting Discouragement

New post, which threatens to be long since it’s been so long since I updated, except that who has time to write at all, let alone a long post. Still I will try.

First off – I am on the Rhinebeck Bingo

thing!!!! This should be fun and should make Rhinebeck more enjoyable since sometimes (true confession time) I go and just feel jealous seeing everyone’s booths and seemingly so successful fiber businesses.

On those lines, yesterday was a big huge discouragement. I had my second ever fair booth – this time at a “Harvest Festival” in a park in a nearby town. It was a total complete flop and waste of time. I will be blunt and say that I sold nothing zilch zero nada. And it was freezing getting there, I had to leave at 6:45 in an unheated camper-bus whose windshield was frosted and would not un-frost, seeing as there was no heat. And I had to pack the bus all by myself and unload at the fair all by myself and set up all by myself and then sit there for hours and hours at first in the freezing cold and then in the hot sun still all by myself. A wonderful friend showed up at the end and helped me haul everything back to the bus and load back up, so that was nice. I still have not unloaded the bus because it is just too discouraging. On a bright note (one must keep the bright side in mind) I did get in a good bit of spinning while there. Thank goodness I have that to keep myself happy at those kind of moments.

So it brings up all kinds of questions like: “why bother???” and “do I have nothing to offer that anyone wants???” It is very easy for me to sink into a morose depressed state and lose incentive. I will try not to do that. I will try (after I use this medium to vent – lucky non-existent readers) to rally and look on the bright side and not worry be happy. I will try to learn from the experience, to grow and become a better person. Maybe even a better “craft vendor,” if that is truly my goal.

What is truly my goal? Well, as I recall, my real goals are to: 1) find an outlet for my creative spinning/fiber endeavors, and 2) to feel somehow like my time on them is justified – and in our $$$$-driven society that seems to mean that I must be able to translate the endeavors into money as proof that they are valuable. Now I’m not sure that I truly believe in those values, but for now I still want to pursue the selling goal. After all, I have given away as many hats as I can give. As it is, many of the hats I’ve given do not ever seem to be actually worn. You see, if someone buys a hat, there’s more a chance that they truly wanted it because they were willing to part with precious money for it, so perhaps they will value it and wear it.

Now, as for the Bright Side… I did the Apple Harvest Fair in the center of town here a few weeks ago, and that was quite a decent success. So I shall not let one small set-back destroy me or my resolve.

Things I learned from yesterday’s experience:

1) I must research events. Obviously they are not created equal (there was hardly anyone at the fair yesterday, there were very few booths, and I don’t think much of anyone was selling much)

2) I must come up with better Wind Remediation Equipment. The wind yesterday was gusty and everything kept blowing around. The booth next to me was selling scented candles – they managed fine in the wind, but

wind + soft fluffy fiber stuff = not good.

3) I must come up with more saleable items, without destroying my integrity. Does that make sense? I want saleable things, but there’s no point making things that will sell, but that I don’t enjoy making or that don’t satisfy my creative urge. I am in the (presumably) lucky position that I don’t have to actually make a living on my creative efforts. So I need to find a way to sell yarn that I spin. That’s really the crux of it because that is what I wan to make. There’s no sense making some cute little doo-dad that the buying public might want, but that I personally think is stupid. On this topic, my thinking is to come up with knitting kits (something I had thought about long ago) because a lot of people are interested in knitting, perhaps knit a bit, but for them it is too big of a leap to just buy a skein of handspun yarn and figure out how to make something from it. So kits, or at a minimum instructions for how to make use of my skeins is a good idea.

Well that is enough for now. You see, it did turn our long. I’m off for a hike with my hubby and dog, then on to bookclub this evening, and knitting group tomorrow evening. See, there is good in the world!