a journey inside

it was quite a day yesterday.
i went miles inside myself.
and it all happened so unexpectedly.

i went to pinterest to say hey to someone.
and i saw on one of their boards my 'my kids' quote on
some other artist's work.

huh???

i went and looked her up and found six different businesses
selling that quote. and have since seen products all over pinterest
that aren't a bone sigh, yet they have my quote on them.

instead of being a rational human being, i went crazy and
wrote all six of them that they are illegally using my copyrighted quote.

now, i can tell you, i know this....approach is everything.
my approach wasn't the one where i was gonna get sweet helpful
responses.

i was setting it up for defensiveness.

i'm usually way better than that.
i can think my way thru stuff.

but not this time.

so why?

wondering a bit, but not stopping to think about it......
i ended up in one of the most amazing exchanges i've ever had.

it was with the first woman who responded. we'll call her sally.

sally wrote back oh so sorry and took it right down.
i thanked her and pointed out she might want to google things first.
apparently she had, and apparently she couldn't find the author.
and now she regoogled, rethought and wanted proof i was indeed the author.

okay. this made me crazy.

cause in my mind - and this is an important part -
all you had to do was google it and you'd find me.
that's it.

I JUST ASSUMED.
(big part)

so i got hot, wrote a letter that didn't feel like terri at all.
and then cried.

okay.
so i'm noticing more and more the strong reactions.
they're outta proportion with my norm.
what's up?

i got a little inkling, but still not the whole thing.
but enough to know i was reacting to other stuff in my life.

so i wrote her back, apologized, told her i was havin' a bad day,
i run a business of heart, want to remember that, and wrote her a letter
straight from the heart.

in my mind, THAT'S the note to respond to. cause THAT was my heart.

and then i sent her yet another with my copyright info.

and THAT was the note she responded to...(the copyright one)
she believed me and she was cool.

i wrote her and told her that i was glad it was settled yet sad it took the
copyright to believe me. i had wished she'd believed me without it.
and i also told her that i had been sitting there trying to figure out what was going
on inside of me - because now by this time i had stopped everything, sat back,
cried, and tried to figure out what exactly was going on with me.

i came up with some stuff i had been feeling all week.
complicated, lots of strings, for simplicity sake we'll say it all fell under the category
of 'not feeling seen.'

she and i ended up exchanging some emails, laughing, sharing the disappointments
of being burned in business, and the sadness of the mistrust that it all causes. she
was as sad as i was that it took the copyright to believe me. (i think that part is
really cool. she was sincerely sad about that.)

and then i posted the story as briefly as i could on the bone sigh arts fb page
and then i shared her links and spread her around. cause that's what bone sigh
arts is about.....COMMUNITY!

i felt the story mattered. it was of losing myself and finding myself.
it was of me seeing her as well as her seeing me. it was a lotta things.

and THAT'S who i want to be.
not the person i started out being.

so this whole thing kept going on all day.
i'd hear from the shop owners and they would be defensive.
but by this time, i had calmed down and become human again, and so i'd write terri notes.
and thru those notes i found one person who had a friend hand her this quote at a time
she was really worried about her son.

when i wrote her back and commented on the son part, she shared that he had been
bullied for 7 years and was at rock bottom, but now had risen again and was heading
off to college and doing really well.

we talked of that.

another shop owner's husband is out of work. so this has become their only means of
income. her sister is ill, they're worried about her and she's the caretaker of her mom.
'i'm a hardworker and would never steal anything.'

i remembered i was looking at people.

and the day kept going......
by the end of the day i realized enough websites have the quote up with no author that
even if you googled me, i'd just be yet another one of those sites. and yes, we are
remedying that right away.

so what i had assumed in the very beginning was incorrect.
and emotions i was having from that were strong.

in talking to bob that nite about our own issues as a couple, i saw similarities.
the assuming and the reacting to the assuming.

we talked of how we (everyone) just let that take over. we forget to stop and look
and listen and hear. and we forget who we want to be.

it was quite a journey i took yesterday.
i was really tired when i got into bed....but ever so grateful for the ride.