Greetings,

I write from the heart of winter, from a tender, vulnerable center of melancholy, that quiet, introverted place, where infrequent shards of sunlight, linger only a moment on a random patch of floor, on the sun-thirsty potted pine in the window, at my working table, where those fleeting beams elicit occasional smiles. Those of us in wintry corners know that more and more light is already asserting itself outside and inside, signaling to winged things to chirp their way back into our worlds. The pervasive grayness, the cyclical absence of flowers, inspires me to mine for color with the brush and the dye pot. What a gift to have the full compliment of rods and cones to perceive the nearly infinite range of tints and shades and to use them to say what no words can ever say.

The Shop Talk section of the Newsletter, together with its companion, From the Studio of, is looking for a new writer. This section is the heart of the newsletter and provides essential information about what we most want to learn more and more about.

After six years of keeping our membership rate stable, we have concluded that due to the rising costs of doing business we must ask you to endorse (or decline) a $60 yearly membership rate. SDA Treasurer, Suzanne Williams, details the whys and wherefores in a separate column in this issue. We have put this off for as long as we could, and hope you appreciate the board's efforts to keep our costs down as much as is feasible, while still sharing some of our proceeds in the form of grants and scholarships.

Wishing you all many moments of great inspiration. and the time to devote to the promptings of your bolts of white fabrics, eager for you to breathe your particular brand of visual magic into them

Fondly,
Jason