Sarah Fishburn - September 2009

 
Image above by Sarah Fishburn
It was about 20 years ago ( really?.....no, wait....REALLY??!!!!) that I first saw Sarah at a huge corporate picnic. I saw her from afar and thought:
“...now THAT’S one girl that I’d like to meet.....”
Her beautiful red hair, her joyous way of dressing....she indeed stood out in the crowd - in the best possible way.
It was only a matter of weeks later that I had taken my son to dance lessons and during his class time, wandered into the Dancewear store where Sarah was working. “Hey! It’s YOU!!!”
I casually mentioned that I owned the local Rubber Stamp Store (which at the time was miniscule) and that was IT. We became FAST friends. Her daughter babysat for me and soon our families were interwoven in numerous ways. When I took over the retail store division, I hired Sarah, who turned out to be one of the original Visual Journalers, having created brilliant, poetic and stunning scrapbooks since the 70’s. When I say “Scrapbooks” I don’t mean scrapbooks in the conventional sense. These were TRULY works of art. Combine that with Mad organizational skills, perfect customer service, bottomless talent and you’ve got one of the reasons that the original Uptown was SO successful. 

Be sure to pursue Sarah’s links at the end of her story. She’s busier than ever and things are always interesting in her World!

Thank you Sarah!

The Rose-colored Velvet Love Seat

Play back the circumstances and events of my life; I harbor few regrets, and none daily. Not having stick-straight hair, nor a pinto pony or palomino, and the tragic loss of our rose-colored velvet love seat are the exceptions. Thank God for product and straightening irons, and yes, I MIGHT someday lasso a horse. As for the third, no remedy seems likely. We left it behind years ago; flying back to the desert, we gave it away to a friend. He was getting married and after all, a plane is not a boat. Unquestionably, through either miracles or hard work, heavier losses to other people have been overcome.

Details are what truly matter --- you know, it’s always the little things. Our lives hinge upon, and play out amid exquisitely, often achingly felt, then remembered, touches, sights, smells. Acts of living are accomplished in scenes set upon stages we each craft to our particular muse.

Picture a city --- Chicago comes to my mind, but pick another if it suits you. It’s early summer, a fair number of years ago --- not too many, say 33, more or less. The neighborhood is mostly Puerto Rican, a little Creole. Radios through open windows inform us, sweetly --- and we can dance to it --- that we are the sunshine of Stevie Wonder’s life. Edgier unknowns are heard, too. Their fingers and lips interpret Hancock and Corea and mimic Muddy Waters, from within shadowed (though wide open) doorways. Platform shoes create a back-up rhythm and say “Hey, babe, take a walk on the wild side.”

Think of a girl --- a pale young woman, a girl really, appears on the sidewalk, heading for a cross street further up Halsted from Cornelia. A bit bedraggled, generosity compels us to fashion her Bohemian. Filigreed opal earrings, camisole, sandals, and a long handmade skirt comprise her everyday costume. With a black gypsy scarf covered in enormous vintage roses holding back long, ever unruly hair, she’s like a kid from some Wild West version of Hester Street. Truth be told, the girl stopped here, in this midwestern town, where Marshal Fields meets the lake shore, and took an available third floor walk-up. Coming from the clear blue heat of earlier years spent in New Mexico, she hadn’t the heart to continue further east where (at least the semblance of) prairie gave way to Indiana.

Imagine the hour --- earlier that day, on an especially roundabout way home from work, she notices it, past the window box flowers and street reflection, just inside the junk shop door. Stepping inside, she smiles and happily approaches the owner. It’s a good sign, she thinks, that no one bought it “in the meantime”. Two other pieces catch her eye. A little piano bench and botanical print (“Gurka vit.”) aren’t quite so dear; she schleps them home on the bus that afternoon.

A week or two later, she returns for the rose-colored velvet love seat, pays a second or third installment, pulls it out through the shop door and continues down the several blocks to her old brick apartment building. She stops occasionally to catch her breath, sits down on the love seat right there on the sidewalk. The wood trim of the arms and the feet have a nice, just-polished sheen. It’s in perfect condition. People passing her admire it. That velvet is such a lovely shade of dusty rose --- just like the sky over the west mesa late in the afternoon, when the green chile smells of everyone’s kitchens begin to mingle and entice. And really, it was SUCH a bargain, though of course she had had to scrimp some, and save.

At the foot of the steps inside the front door of her building, the girl is momentarily distracted by the row of mailboxes. She can tell at a glance if there’s mail; she can see it through a slot. There’s something anyway; an eagerly awaited note from home, a plea, a prayer, a promise. She’ll come back downstairs for it later. On the 2nd floor, someone comes out to help her the rest of the way. His door closes on a room crowded with people, guitars, old women, music, glasses clinking, and babies crying. Once the 3rd floor landing is attained, he heads back down and she pushes her treasure into the apartment. A couple of panes in the bay window are open and there’s a light breeze off the lake. The apartment is nearly empty of household goods, except for a borrowed radio, two enameled cereal bowls, a handful of silverware and small paring knife, a Baby Ben that keeps falling out a window onto the alley below, a few postcards (reproductions of Symbolist art) and a vintage photo postcard of a dancer. There’s really nothing of any value.

The radio plays something new. At least, the girl thinks, I haven’t heard it before. Dancing in the Moonlight. Centered in the living room, the rose-colored velvet love seat looks perfect. The pretty botanical print of the fresh from a turn-of-the-century garden, Swedish cucumbers hangs just to its left, and the little piano bench completes the tableau. She keeps walking back into the room to admire it as she runs a bath.....

[email protected]
http://www.sarahfishburn.com
http://www.ragtagsf.blogspot.com
http://www.sarahfishburn.etsy.com
http://www.lulu.com/cartwrightandfishburn
You can find Sarah on FaceBook (you can become a "fan) and twitter, too

Oh, and by the way...

Coming to Designs & Ragtags (etsy shop) in mid-September:
chic and stylish: sterling silver pictorial eardrops, and a brand new batch of elegantly funky pictorial silver rings.

Comments

[michelle ward]

sarah - thank you for sharing your story with lisa and those of us cozied up by the bonfire.

i love the story of the velvet LOVE seat but i want to hear more! i want to know the secrets she has, the happiness she embraced, the tears she comforted. who sat on her. who fainted on her. who smooched on her. what became of her. more more more!

[sarah]

Me too, Michelle!

[Marylinn Kelly]

Is it fantastically human or deeply magic, the way our dreams vector down to one material object? What a grand Bonfire offering...imagine us all talking at once, asking Michelle's questions, picturing each step of the day she became yours, only to be released to another. I always think of the pioneers and see the harpsicord (sp?) left, out of necessity, at the side of the trail. Bravo.

[Seth]

The best of the Bonfire. Sarah is an artist with her words as with her images. And much like Sarah...this story draws you in and makes you want even more! Perfect September story Lisa. Thanks!! Love it so much, I added a link to it on the Inspiration Station on the sidebar of my blog!!

[Jill]

Yes, wonderful story with words that just flow and move you to follow the stream of thought. Coming here from seeing you spotlighted in Seth's Inspiration Station. Super Pick!!

[Chris]

Don't you love when just enough is said to pique your curiosity? Mystery is life!

Thanks, Sarah.

[caterina giglio]

yes, I agree! I want the second chapter please!

[JeriAnn]

Me, too -- please, M'am, may I have some MORE?

[Kathleen Sigg]

I can just see her dancing red hair!

[Carmen]

oh oh! I love her, too!

this is a lovely site too, thank you, Lisa!