Crafty Beggar Creations

Propelling me to the next roller-disco, motorbike and brass band is the possibility that I might find the answer. The question is more difficult to figure out but it is something like, why am I unhappy? Maybe it’s just the scourge of the middle classes: to be spoilt to the point of rendering everything meaningless. So I fret from this to that in search of a remedy, something to fill the void.

Being sat at a desk 8 hours a day staring at little letters appearing on a screen in front of me is contributing to my slow, dull mummification so, I have hatched reckless escape plans in the dead of night which have, so far, come to nothing.

One of these plans was to start my own business called 'Crafty Beggar Creations'. I wanted to make my own paper from which I could make greetings cards, diaries and scrapbooks. Everything I produced would be found or recycled and made into something new and beautiful. 

As with most ideas that go nowhere, I spent most of my time agonising over the name. I was quite set on it being something to do with the Wombles to start with, but they’re a protected name-species. Then the name ‘Crafty Beggar’ came to me in a ‘eureka’ moment. I was delighted with my punning genius until I found my thought-twin on the internet. It was too late. I had already named my child so I settled for adding the word ‘Creations’ on the end so I could secure my own domain name for a website.

The hours I spent consumed in this naming process seem a little wasted now given that I’ve done precisely nothing with it. The idea went up like a firework with a burst of light and sound cutting through the daily mediocrity of life and then faded to nothing in the night sky.

The stumbling block came when I tried to run before I could walk. What any 'normal' person would do is build up a stock of cards and other items to sell and start by flogging small numbers to local retailers, whilst beginning to sell items online with the view to developing a website. Not me. I hate waiting. I prefer to skip to the end. I wanted to give up my job and my flat and rent a unit at a local print-works which was being renovated to become a centre of artisan businesses. These units were advertised as combined working and living spaces so I thought I could cut down on my outgoings by living and running my new business in the same place. This all seemed quite feasible to me with my budget calculations and forecasts until I went to see the space. It was absolutely freezing….and dark….and damp. The units which were supposed to be suitable to live in had stairs leading up to a wooden platform which was almost big enough to put a single mattress on….welcome to the living quarters.

That was the end. The bubble popped. Paper production slowed down after that and has since ground to a halt. I still do handmade cards for friends and family but the website lies dormant.

Did Crafty Beggar Creations change my life?
Although my actual situation has not changed as a result of 'Crafty Beggar Creations', I think it did help me with a mental shift into conceiving of more possibilities for myself. I never even thought about setting up a business before so I think the whole process, although mostly hypothetical, did widen my horizons.

Rating: 3/10
Comments: I’m mostly just disappointed in myself when I think about 'Crafty Beggar' because it really shows up my lack of commitment to anything that doesn’t come easy to me. I think of myself as being quite a determined person and that whole ‘episode’ is like a blot on my self-perception, forcing me to face the truth – I’m a bit lazy really. 
Development Opportunities: I still have the website and all the equipment to make paper so I could continue to make cards as a hobby and even get a stall at a Christmas market and try and flog a few. I just need a few more hours in the day.

Brass Band

Being a brilliant musician would be like reaching the pinnacle of my personality-mountain. I would exist freely in my boundless artistic expression and live a bohemian, fast-paced, free-love existence. I started playing the trumpet a couple of years ago and I haven’t even got past the foothills yet. This is mostly down to my total lack of dedication.  I decided to join a brass band. Like a Sherpa taking me further up the mountain, I thought it would force me to play at least once a week and maybe even shame me in to practising. I went to try out for the City of Birmingham Brass Band.

The rehearsal was due to start at 7.30. I arrived at 7.32 and they had already started. A conductor who begins a rehearsal bang on time values punctuality. Not a good start. I decided to wait and just have a listen to the kind of music they were playing until the half-time break when I could make my entrance. After about ten minutes sat on a chair outside, a man with a trombone rushed past me: another latecomer. He looked at me a little confused and asked what I was doing. He explained that there was no break and ushered me in to the hall announcing, “This is Amelia. I found her outside”, before leaving me hanging in the awkward silence as he went to take his seat.

Three members of the band had to get up to go and get my cornet, an extra chair and a music stand. Then everyone else had to move to make room. The conductor looked at me with a bemused expression and asked, “So, where do we put you then?” In a panic of self-deprecation I said, “Just put me with the worst one.” Everyone laughed and he replied, “That’s not how we tend to put it. I’ll sit you with Elly tonight – no offence Elly.” Great! Not only had I fully disrupted the whole rehearsal but I managed to insult a band member and humiliate myself in the process. It’s amazing what you can achieve in ten seconds.

I’ve had my ups and downs in band. Downs would include spending a day in the pissing rain playing to a handful of patriotic toffs for some half-drowned jubilee celebrations and being humiliated at rehearsals when the conductor asks me to play by myself (just in case the others were in any doubt that I’m incompetent). Ups would include playing in an area contest (serious business in the brass band world), playing at Stratford-upon-Avon bandstand for another bunch of patriotic fruit-loops (in the sunshine this time) and making a new friend in 3^rd cornets.

Did a brass band change my life?

Two rehearsals a week certainly has changed my life. A significant portion of my leisure time is now spent perpetually under-achieving at the same thing.  If I abandonned everything else and just concentrated on playing in the band and practising my trumpet outside of rehearsals, I could actually be quite good (I can tell because I’m surviving without putting any effort in at all right now). I am, sadly, unable to focus on one thing – all part of my desperate and flailing attempts to find meaning and fulfilment.
I get glimmers from it though. When I manage to play something well or we give a good performance, I get a real buzz from it.

Rating: 6/10

Comments: There is no short cut to musical genius. Being in a brass band is fun (sometimes) and hard work (most of the time) but can’t pull me up the mountain without me putting more time and effort in (more than 2 nights a week?!?). Unbelievable!

Development Opportunities: Apply myself? Not likely.

Become an experimental jazz trumpeter…you can play whatever you like and say it’s ‘art’.