Vickie Daggett:  

Life 38 years is a long time to spend disconnected from old friends. Each year I tell myself next year I will see about the reunion and reconnect. Each year I get busy with the life in front of me and forget to look behind. 4 children 8 grandchildren and work and home well it has happen to all of us. I have come to call it Life in Progress. I have done everything I thought I wanted to do and alot of things I hoped I would never have to do and alot of things I couldn't have dreamed of doing. I won't bore you with the details. It's all been Life. I always wanted to be a artist when I grew up. My family and friends thought that was a not so bright idea. As it turns out, they were wrong. I like to go to the ocean find a quiet beach and scream at the top of my lungs at the surf. The tops of mountains are good for the same kind of venting in a pinch driving down the road with the radio up as high as it will go and screaming works too. The wildest thing I did in school was take my Olds 88 1959 fins and all drag racing out at Hinkle against David Moon and I don't know who all. I punched it and had lift off front end sailing and back end screaming it would top out at 140 8 miles to the gallon though a trunk as big as my pickup and a trip to Portland 1 hour 47 minutes. Not as much fun as my 59 Ford Angelia though I don't know how many times I was called out of class to go get it off the back steps of the school after it had been put there by a gang of hoodlums. I remember one time they found my stash of torn pantyhose and left it on the steps decorated with about 15 old pair, not a pretty sight. Example is the best precept. While driving through our community the other day a voice came from the back seat saying, "That's not a good sign Gram! I glanced back at my three year old granddaughters pointing finger and took notice of the sign she was critiquing and had to agree. I also reflected back 18 years prior when her mother sitting in a car seat age five made almost the very same statement. I was amazed back then that a 5 year old would recognize the difference between a readable sign and poor design. Until that day I hadn't realized how much time I had spent discussing signage with my children or how much they had absorbed. When I started painting signs in 1988 it was on my kitchen table, bigger projects in the front lawn under a tree. I was baby sitting 4 other children and trying to paint signs, it wasn't pretty. Within two months I had a shop and had a baby sitter for my own 3 children. I was a single mother on welfare. 2 of my single mother friends bemoaned if only they could go to College while I bemoaned if only I could get a computer and a sign making program. I knew nothing of computers or sign cutters. They followed their dreams with the college loans and subsidized housing and assistance. I found a used Mac black and white screen with typestyler and a small plotter and taught myself how to use it. At the time it was a $2000.00 loan that got me going. Looking back it was like using a wringer washer in comparision to what I have now. I thought I had accomplished the unattainable dream. The first time I weeded vinyl my kids came by the shop "Thank God" after school and found me wrapped in vinyl to my knees and cut me loose from my entanglement. I had totally lost myself in my work and had dropped all the weeded vinyl on the floor ...Expand for more