"15 july 1995 - i dreamt there was a company - more than a company, it was an idea of self expression & the power of individuals as a circle of friends. I was in it, and we were all creating ourselves & this dreamlike clothing with symbols, shape and incredible colors - they told stories."

-- from the Blue Fish Fall 1995 catalog

�

DO YOU HEAR WHAT I HEAR?
Monday, December 25, 2000

In just about a month's time, Blue Fish Tales will be celebrating its first anniversary. The site was launched on January 26th on America Online by a novice who'd never done ANYTHING like it, let alone put up a website. I wrote the whole thing in Notepad, and FTP'd it over to AOL. (Yeah, I know, lose the technical jargon, Linda.) Between February and March, I added pages, refined the site, and finally moved it over to Geocities, where I added the now infamous message boards. Little did I know that the message boards would make this site explode (in more ways than one!)

Today I compose on MS FrontPage. I've hired a website developer to help me move this over to bluefishtales.com......and we're still working on that one. The site has two business supporters and a growing list of individual supporters. All that this site has achieved is due to this support....financial support of course, but also the support of Barb's Blue Fish Friends site, Tracy's Vintage BF Catalog site, Pat's BF Consignment Site, Deb's Art to Wear Consignment site, and Jan's forthcoming Where to Buy BF site. The enthusiasm I've seen is remarkable. Clearly, we all share a passion...and a desire to connect with each other.

Yet recent events have shaken me up a bit. Is it the stress of the season, or something else that rattled the cages and opened a Pandora's box of ugliness up on the message boards? I recently told a friend that after creating this website, I had a sense of what God must feel, looking down at the Earth...you create this thing with the very best intentions, and yet it goes spinning out of control and there's little you can do.

But that's not necessarily a bad thing....because adversity and even ugliness can provide lessons that we can learn from. Here's one lesson I've learned from running this website: it's okay to be disliked. It's good for the soul, perhaps, to be disliked....because it makes you really say to yourself, "Am I doing this because I believe in this and really want to do this, or am I doing this because I want to be popular and liked by everybody?" It's good to be challenged, to have provocative statements thrust upon you...and to defend your own statements or reexamine your beliefs....and maybe even change them.

I've changed my mind on a number of issues....eBay is one, and the wisdom of being the "policewoman" of discussions on this site is another. People have opinions, and though some won 't take ownership of them, they feel the need to express them, and should I delete them because I don't like them?

I raise this question because of a specific story I'll tell you about. It happened once upon a time and I'll keep the details vague so as not to incriminate anybody. After all, the people involved were simply expressing their own opinions and I wasn't present...yet I heard about what was said. Here goes:

Once upon a time I was shopping for Blue Fish. I am known to shop the stores in person and/or by phone, and the sales as well. (I leave it to you to imagine the circumstances.) I had just made a purchase, and had chatted pleasantly and warmly with all involved. The transaction completed, I hung up the phone/left the store/left the sale.

The next day, I got a phone call from someone who knows me very, very well. I trust her implicitly, and I know she has no hidden agenda. She was present shortly after my transaction was completed, and overheard several minutes of� what she described as "nasty, cutting comments" about me, the BF Tales website, the women who frequent it, and what goes on. No one present realized she is a good good friend of mine. She was so upset she couldn't buy anything, she said, and she left quickly. When she called me, she was sure I'd be outraged to hear the specifics of what was said.

Well, I wasn't...not at all, because of several reasons:
1) This was the opinion of one, two, three, four or more people...not necessarily the entire BF company. The people involved had been very friendly and courteous to my face. They did their jobs very well, and their jobs are to sell BF, not to be my best friends, so whatever they privately felt, at least they had not said it to my face!
2)They have the right to their opinions. They may feel that BFTales hurts BF (I don't think it does, I believe it promotes BF) and that people make money off of BF Consignment and eBay by selling BF (I believe most simply want to get rid of BF that they won't wear, but I know some make money, but that's not my business!) and so they feel angry with me and with the site and the people here. I wish they wouldn't feel that way, but they don't necessarily know the whole story and may never know it!� Yet their opinions, though in opposition to mine, are nonetheless valid.
3)It doesn't really matter to me what they think. Thank god I have gotten to the point in my life where I am happy with myself and feel that I am a good and authentic person. I am who I am and I'm comfortable with who I am, and if you don't like me, well, too bad for you.�

Does it matter what other people think, anyway? This has been at the root of the unpleasantness on the message board, IMHO. What I always say to my daughters is this...when you get all upset about what someone else thinks about you or how someone else treats you, you give away your power...you let the other person have power over you. It's hard, very hard, to just turn away and shrug it off, but in the end, worrying about how others feel about you will just make you feel worse, not better.

Every woman reading this is beautiful. Of course, that's just MY opinion, and if you care what I think then you're giving away YOUR power. What matters is what YOU feel about yourself. Who cares if Blue Fish says, "We love big women and embrace them!" or "We DON"T love big women and won't cater to them!" or "We only make clothes for women who can prove their ancestors were on the Mayflower!" or even "We're not interested in clothing that appeals to anybody over 40!" The only thing that matters is A) does the stuff fit you?� B) do you like what you're wearing? C) do you feel beautiful in it? D) if you don't (and haven't for a long time), can you NOT buy BF anymore and finally make the break and move on to other lines of clothing? Remember, YOU have the power....not Blue Fish! What YOU feel should be of concern to Blue Fish, not the other way around. Suppose you knew SOMEONE in BlueFishLand thought you were a total loser, a jerk, a complete fool? Would it matter enough for you to STOP buying their clothes? (I hope no husbands are reading this and getting crazy ideas...)

I don't want to confuse my love of Blue Fish Clothing the clothing with Blue Fish Clothing the company or Blue Fish Clothing the employees. I personally don't have to LOVE every single one of the people who make the clothes I wear. They are HUMAN, for goodness sakes, and they have their own pressures and emotions and lives and good points and bad points and likes and dislikes that have little or nothing to do with me! and I don't need a "relationship" with Blue Fish Clothing to wear Blue Fish.

I realize this is MY opinion, and many may feel they WON"T or CAN"T wear clothing that doesn't have good karma for them through and through. I respect that, and admire the fact that you have more personal integrity that I probably do. For me, I like the clothing, and I can tolerate being disliked. So I guess I'll continue to buy BLue Fish for the time being.

BUT....the next time anyone says to me, "do you want to hear what I heard so-and-so say about you?" I'll politely decline. I'm just not into wearing hair shirts, even if they're made by Blue Fish.

FIGHTING FOR HER LIFE (and the lives of her students)
Monday, December 11, 2000

This is not my story - it's the story of Susie, who many of you know on eBay as [email protected]. We first met in Reading, PA, when Susie picked me up at a local outlet mall and drove me to the now-closed Blue Fish Outlet Store at a nearby shopping area. I had come into Reading on one of those awful bus tours...this one for outlet shopping....and though Susie had never met me before, she took a risk and gave a stranger (who shared a love of BF) a lift to the BF outlet. The first time I saw Susie, I was struck by how she seemed to possess a glow.....she's really quite beautiful to begin with, and she is a happy, upbeat person...she shines with an inner light that just touches you somehow. I had the sense that she was a woman of extraordinary strength, but just how much, I was later to find out.

Some of you may know that in addition to being a talented jewelry artist and quilter, Susie's a school nurse....a loving woman who is loved in turn by her students.� In talking to her, I could see she clearly is devoted to her job, which makes the following stories all the more difficult to read. These are articles taken from the pages of newspapers that have been following Susie's story....a story she's been struggling with for the past year, and one that just recently garnered media attention. I'm reproducing them here because it's a story you should know about:�

�

December 03, 2000
School nurse sues Pottsgrove School District
By:Evan Brandt, Mercury Staff Writer�

LOWER POTTSGROVE - Claiming the bacteria- and mold-laden Lower Pottsgrove Elementary School made her sick and unable to work there, the school's nurse has sued the Pottsgrove School District and its superintendent in federal court for failing to transfer her to another school building.


The suit charges the district with violating Susan Burke's rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act and with violating the whistleblower protection law.

What the suit does not do is ask for millions of dollars in damages. Instead it merely seeks provisions for Burke to work in a school other than Lower Pottsgrove Elementary, back pay for missed work and for legal fees.

Superintendent Sharon Nalbone Richardson, who is specifically named in the suit, could not be reached for comment. Assistant Superintendent Joseph Bender said he was not aware if the district had received the lawsuit summons and so was unwilling to comment on it.

The lawsuit adds another chapter to the sad saga of contamination at the 1939-era school that began last spring with sick children and sick teachers, a condition with which Burke, as the school nurse, was well familiar.

George D. Sheehan, Burke's attorney, said it was Burke's constant alerts to the district about the health problems she was treating at the school that convinced him to consider the whistleblower aspect to the lawsuit.

"Susan was instrumental in getting the school district to do things which cost the district money. The law gives protection to people who do things their boss may not like, but which are certainly the right thing to do," said Sheehan.

"It was her job as school nurse to act in the best interests of the children and her actions ended up costing the school district money. The irony is that after spending all that money, the building is still not safe for Susan," Sheehan said.

Burke is not the only person who feels that way.

Last month, several parents addressed the school board about their environmental health concerns about the building.

Two days after the school was finally re-opened Nov. 1, one of Karen Elsier's daughters was taken out of the building by ambulance after suffering symptoms consistent with anaphylactic shock. Two more of Elsier's four children who attend the school have also suffered a variety of ailments, including skin rashes and bacteria contamination.

Like Burke, Elsier's request to have her four children transferred to another school was turned down by the school board. She has since moved them to the charter school in Phoenixville.

Burke first noticed the problem when she called a school nurse at West Pottsgrove Elementary School and asked if students there experienced a high number of severe headaches, sinus infections and asthma.

Burke was surprised to discover that while Lower Pottsgrove Elementary had eight to 10 children per week complaining of these symptoms, West Pottsgrove rarely had more than one per week.

As she dug further into the problem, discovering that at least two teachers had been stricken by extreme symptoms, she began to notice she was experiencing similar symptoms herself.

"But she put her health on the back-burner until summer of 2000," Sheehan said.

In August, while the school was in the midst of failing its first set of air quality tests, Burke was battling a pseudomonas infection that required treatment by intravenous anti-biotics.

Pseudomonas was one of the dangerous bacteria found in the carpet that was removed from the building.

Burke also received allergy tests in August and discovered she is highly allergic to molds. Her doctor advised her "that her health was at risk by returning to work at the building at Lower Pottsgrove Elementary School if molds continued to be present in the school," according to the lawsuit.

The school was re-opened Nov. 1 after more than $500,000 worth of clean-up efforts by the district and only after additional clean-up work was conducted there after tests of the school's air failed to show acceptable elimination of the contaminants.

Up until Nov. 1, Lower Pottsgrove students were scattered throughout the other district buildings and Burke was assigned to the brand new Pottsgrove Middle School, where she experienced no health problems.

An investigation of Lower Pottsgrove Elementary School was first conducted in December 1999 by the Montgomery County Health Department. In March 2000, the district hired Todd Environmental to conduct an environmental review.

The suit alleges the definitive study conducted by Indoor Air Solutions was undertaken by the district only after a grievance was filed by the Pottsgrove Federation of Teachers.

That study found dangerously high levels of bacteria in the school's aging carpet and a high concentration of toxic molds. The cost of following all IAS recommendations for cleaning the building would top $100,000, according to the lawsuit.

Sheehan said the sad thing about the lawsuit is he and Burke tried to avoid it. "We tried for months to find a solution outside the legal remedy," he said.

Particularly galling to them was the news that a nurse at Ringing Rocks Elementary School had requested an unpaid child rearing leave, which would have opened a slot for Burke to fill.

The school board denied the child-rearing leave request as well.

As for the larger question of whether the school is safe, Sheehan said Burke's lawsuit cannot answer that question.

"It's clearly not safe for Susan, but whether it's unsafe for everyone, well, that won't be decided in this case," he said.

�The Mercury 2000

Friday, December 1, 2000�
Nurse who cited mold sues over no transfer
She argues that Pottsgrove has kept her from leaving the school where she fell ill and was a whistle-blower.

By Kathryn Masterson
PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER SUBURBAN STAFF

The school nurse who first alerted the Pottsgrove School District to health problems among students and staff caused by mold and bacteria at Lower Pottsgrove Elementary filed suit in federal court yesterday, contending the school board and the superintendent had violated her rights by denying her a transfer to another school.

In the suit, Susan Burke charges her rights under the Americans With Disabilities Act were violated when the district turned down her request last month after her doctor told her she was highly allergic to mold and should not return to the building. Even after the clean-up of Lower Pottsgrove, testing showed some levels of mold in the school.

Last year, Burke suffered a pseudomonas infection that required intravenous antibiotics, the suit said. Pseudomonas bacteria were found in the school's carpeting, which was determined to be one of the major sources of bacteria contamination in the building.

Burke has stayed home since Nov. 1, when students who had been scattered in classes throughout the district during the cleanup returned to the building, while her two transfer requests were being considered. She has taken all of her sick, personal and emergency leave and is now on unpaid leave.

Her attorney, George Sheehan, said yesterday: "My client has been extremely patient, and she has done everything that the district could reasonably expect of her in trying to avoid this day. But the district has left her without a place to work, without income, and without any choice."

The suit also charges that the district violated Burke's constitutional right of equal protection by requiring her to do more than others requesting transfers, and that she was singled out for such treatment because of her continued efforts to have the problems at Lower Pottsgrove recognized and repaired.

Burke was the first person to publicly speak about about the high level of health problems, including skin rashes, conjunctivitis and other eye infections, headaches, coughs, stomachaches, allergies, and asthma, that she had observed in students and staff at the school. Since then, she had been a constant presence at school board meetings, continually requesting information about the condition of the building.

A third count charges that because Burke was a "whistleblower," the district discriminated against her by effectively denying her the opportunity to work.

The complaint asks for reinstatement at another school in the district, payment of back wages, and compensatory and punitive damages.

Superintendent Sharon Nalbone Richardson and School Board President John Allen could not be reached yesterday for comment.

The district has also denied transfer requests from several parents, including one woman whose daughter had an allergic reaction and was taken from the school in an ambulance Nov. 3.

At the Nov. 14 school board meeting, Richardson acknowledged that some children were still getting sick in the building but said there was no proof that the building was causing the health problems.

�The Philadelphia Inquirer 2000

December 7, 2000�
Parents: Health problems resurface at troubled school

By EVAN BRANDT
Mercury Staff writer

LOWER POTTSGROVE -- While the lawsuit filed last week against the school district by the school nurse at Lower Pottsgrove Elementary School may have put the brakes on most public discussion by the school board, it did little to quell commentary by the public at Tuesday night�s board meeting.
The subject came up in a variety of ways, initially in comments about the suit itself -- or rather, the person who filed it.

"On behalf of all the parents at Lower, I just want to say that we�re all missing Sue Burke desperately," said parent Maria Fox. "We feel the loss desperately."

Burke filed a suit in federal court last week, charging that working at Lower Pottsgrove Elementary School had made her ill and that the school district violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by refusing to transfer her to another school.

Because Burke was vocal about air quality concerns at the school throughout the health crisis, which has rocked the school since last spring, her suit also charges the district with violating the whistleblower law, which is designed to protect employees who point out public dangers from retaliation by their employers.

The school re-opened to students and staff on Nov. 1. Burke, who has an extreme allergy to molds and was advised by her doctor against returning, did not return with them and has been using sick days since.

Fox said since Nov. 1, a steady stream of students have been trooping through the nurse�s office complaining of nose bleeds and that the substitute nurses the district has been placing there don�t give any "sense of continuity, except of course in the steady stream of kids through there."

"I mean has anyone compared the sick records at Lower to those at West (Pottsgrove Elementary School) or Ringing Rocks (Elementary School) to see if we have more?" asked Fox.

"Bloody noses are not common and some teachers have told me they have three a day. I honestly believe there�s still something in the air there and someone should be watching the numbers in the nurse�s office before we find ourselves in the same boat as last spring," Fox said.

Parent Bess Lindburg told the board that she took her daughter out of Lower Pottsgrove and enrolled her at the charter school outside Phoenixville.

"When she was in that school, she was in the nurse�s office almost every day with complaints and now, after one week at the charter school, she is healthy and vibrant," said Lindburg.

"If you people don�t realize there�s something still wrong in that building, I feel sorry for you. I put my trust in you guys and you let me down," she said.

Another parent may also be concerned about the air quality in the school and has asked the school board for permission to have a carbon dioxide monitor placed in a classroom with a child.

The board considered the request warily, musing, as school director Gordon Whitlock put it, "if we allow one of these in a room, the next thing you know we�ll have 30 in that room and 500 in the school. We�d be opening a real Pandora�s box," Whitlock said.

School director William Wendel wondered aloud if the request was for medical reasons or "some other reason, like a set-up for legal action."

Solicitor Marc Davis said, "I�m sure you�d prefer that if there is going to be testing going on in that building, that you do it."

Parent Karen Cope, who heads up the Parents Acting for Safe Schools group which sprang up in response to the health concerns at the school, reminded the board that the air quality report done by the district�s consultant called for carbon dioxide testing once the children were back in school.

"We�re going to do something, we just have to get going on it," said School Board President Jack Allen.

"These things should be moving like clock work and they�re not," Cope snapped.

One thing the district is doing is sending Business Administrator Sylvia Lenz to air quality school. Tuesday night, the board voted unanimously to send Lenz to an air quality school workshop this month for a cost of $127.50.

Unknown at press time is the cost of replacing the Christmas tree at Lower Pottsgrove Elementary School.

Fox told the board that when the building was cleaned out over the summer, the school�s artificial Christmas tree was thrown out.

"I fail to see how a plastic and steel tree could get moldy, but the point is that tree was paid for by the P.T.O. and we can�t keep constantly funding things like that," said Fox.

With the holidays approaching, Fox bemoaned the fact that a school already laboring under a dearth of school spirit will have no Christmas tree in the lobby.

"I feel shafted ... again," said Fox.

�The Mercury 2000

Sunday 10 December, 2000
Editorial
Parents deserve answers to school health questions

People like to think that when we point out problems, someone in charge does something about it. And when the problem has to do with the health of our children, our desire for immediate action increases exponentially.
So it�s easy to understand how educators, who deal with the intensity of parents� concerns on a daily basis, may tend to temper their response.But sometimes the zealousness of parental calls for action can trigger an equally ardent resistance to it.

Such seems to be the case in the Pottsgrove School District where continued claims that something dangerous is still in the air at Lower Pottsgrove Elementary School appear to be falling on closed ears.

Sadly, the inevitable news last week that the district has been sued over actions directly related to the air quality complaints has unlikely spurred this sluggish school board into a high state of activity on the issue.

The school�s nurse, Sue Burke, has filed a federal lawsuit against the district, charging that working at Lower Pottsgrove Elementary School had made her ill and that the school district violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by refusing to transfer her to another school.

Because Burke was vocal about air quality concerns at the school throughout the health crisis that has rocked the school since last spring, her suit also charges the district with violating the whistleblower law, which is designed to protect employees who point out public dangers from retaliation by their employers. It�s hard to say which came first, the lawsuit or the caution.

From the beginning, this board and administration have seemed reluctant to grab the bull by the horns and wrestle the problem to a final resolution.

The half measures taken to mitigate the problem seemed designed not to make the building safe for the children and teachers who spend the majority of their day there, but to get the building to the point where it would pass air quality tests. That accomplished, the board now behaves as if it has met the problem and resolved it.

But children are still getting sick. One parent has had three of her four children fall ill. One had to be taken out by ambulance just two days after the school re-opened.

After being denied a transfer by the school board, she has moved her children to the charter school outside Phoenixville. And she is not alone.

We understand the need for the board to keep this issue in perspective and make sure it does not spin out of financial control based solely on the concerns of worried parents. But that�s why we were so disappointed to hear that since the building reopened, the district has done little to monitor the health the building�s occupants, even with something so simple as a comparison of illnesses experienced at the district�s two other elementary schools.

Superintendent Sharon Nalbone Richardson said that comparison is not as simple as it sounds because nurses in different buildings track illnesses in different ways. She said if the district had the proper computer program, the comparison could be made easily.

We�re no experts, but we�re pretty sure that comparisons of that kind were made during the long dark period of our civilization when computers had not yet been invented. And it does not seem beyond the power of the school board to implement a policy requiring all the nurses to keep their records the same way in order to make these comparisons possible without costly electronics or sophisticated software.

The bottom line is that while the school board may be trying to keep the issue in financial and now, thanks to the lawsuit, in legal perspective, from the perspective of parents, the board is putting their children at risk.

And from where we�re sitting, those parents are justified in being angry.

For even if a study or comparison showed Lower Pottsgrove Elementary School to be home to no more ailments than its counterparts, as long as the parents have a perception that the school is unsafe, the school board has a problem.

�The Mercury 2000

I'd like to provide a happy ending to this story. But there is none at this point. Susie's health is still compromised, and her lawsuit is pending. I imagine Susie would appreciate knowing she has your support. You can email her at [email protected]. As the tale develops, I'll keep you posted here on VIEW.

LETTING GO (or Catch and Release)
Monday, November 13, 2000

This is a story about karma, materialism, overspending, eBay, friendship, making dreams come true, and realizing what IS and isn't important. I wish I didn't sound so greedy and awful in this story, but that's how I was feeling and it's an honest emotion. Maybe this story will resonate with you, as it does with me.

Just a little over a year ago I sold my first Blue Fish item on eBay. Though I don't remember who bought the item (a long vest from 1995), I DO remember who bought my second auction item. Her name is Cathy, and after the obligatory exchange of emails concerning the transaction, I commented on her home address and shared some personal details about why I almost became a (relative) neighbor of hers...but didn't (I got married instead)...and thus an email correspondence was born.

I can't say what exactly turned this correspondence into a friendship, but that's what it evolved into. Though we don't email every day...or even every week sometimes....we do stay in pretty frequent contact with each other. I know her sons's names and she knows my daughters'. We laugh about our engineer husbands. We both agree that we find it hard to say "no" and that other people may view us as pushovers.�

Cathy took the big step of calling me, and I can still remember the first time I heard her voice...I was standing in the parlor of a bed & breakfast in Frenchtown (the Widow MacCrea) where I was staying for my first Friends and Family Blue Fish Sale in June of 2000...when the proprietress, Lynn, handed me the phone and told me I had a phone call. I was so nervous (I shouldn't have been....I'd already met a pile of new BF friends earlier that day and that week....Christa, Linda, and Joanne in fact were staying with me at the B&B, and none of us had ever met each other before). I was embarrassed to be so nervous. I think Cathy was nervous too....but once we got past the shyness, the phone call was further acknowledgment that we were possibly "split-aparts"....like twin soul sisters. She was happy to talk on the phone, but sad that a previously scheduled trip made her unable to join the fun at the Tinicum Friends and Family sale.

Though that was our first phone call, it was not our last....and we finally ended up meeting at the end of October, one week after the Fall Tinicum sale. I drove down to pick her up at her cousin's home outside Philadelphia, and within ten minutes of meeting, we were out the door and dashing off to Doylestown.....then Rosemont....Frenchtown, and Bethlehem, shopping (and spending) all the way. We met up in Bethlehem at Reetha's new store with a whole bunch of other Blue Fish buddies...and it was there that the ugly green-eyed monster (no, not jealousy, but greed) reared its ugly head.�

I had brought a jacket to pass along to one friend (who has gotten some amazing BF goodies for me over the months I've known her, so we loosely swap items when we find something we think the other would like) but she already had one like it....so then I offered it to another person who has given me great deals on BF and has passed along items she no longer wears....but it didn't fit her, so I was all set to take the jacket back home when a third friend expressed that she liked it A LOT.�

Now, keep in mind that I had never worn this jacket up until this whirlwind road trip....and that it was in mint condition, a linen jacket with clay buttons (the Meadow Jacket for those of you who keep track of such things....original retail price $325) that I had purchased at a sale for $85. I had intended to put it on ebay, but thought I should bring it for my friend who I swap with...a friend who had a piece of red velvet for me from winter 1996, which is my favorite collection.

Also keep in mind that within this particular month, between the two sales I'd been to (the Tinicum sale and the Syracuse sale) AND the road trips TWICE to frenchtown (two weekends in a row) and the visits to the stores AND the consignment shop in Rosemont that sells vintage BF...I had spent close to $2000 without really paying attention...and I was WAY over budget and was getting panicked about the bill coming due.

So when this friend expressed desire to have this jacket, I said, "Well, I was planning on eBaying it to pay for my expenses....I'll sell it to you for $150." She shook her head no, saying that she couldn't afford that. I hemmed and hawed, and said, "well, how about $125?" but it was still too steep...then I dropped it to $100 then $90 then $80 then finally $75. At $75 she stopped and said, "Let me think about it" and we agreed that she could take the jacket home and let me know the next day, as I was staying over in the area (she lives around there) and would be having brunch with her and the gang the next day.

Well, as Cathy can attest....all that night I fretted about that stupid jacket. I had a million anxieties about that jacket. I had never worn that jacket, I had hoped to sell it on eBay and possiblly earn $150 to pay for my mounting bills...and when Cathy pointed out that the last jacket like it had sold for over $300 on eBay, greed and materialism gripped me, and I knew I had to insist that the jacket come home with me!

I've told you a bunch of details pertinent to this story so far. But one BIG detail that I've left out is this...the friend who wanted the jacket was the VERY FIRST FRIEND I ever made through eBay and Blue Fish...she was the first person to email me after I listed my first auction, to chat about what I was selling and to compare observations about all things BF. She was the one to tell me that there was a BF outlet (sadly, not in existence as of this writing) in Reading, PA, where I was going with my mother on a bus tour of the Reading/Philadelphia outlet malls...and she arranged, with another BF friend, to meet me at the one outlet and drive me to ANOTHER outlet where the BF store was.

In addition, she's provided me with advice, handholding, moral support, and comfort in the year since I've known her. Though I don't think I've ever sold her anything via eBay, she's been a good good friend, and it would have been a slap in the face to deny her a jacket she so obviously appreciated. AND, she is perhaps the biggest fan of BF linen that I know....and she'd been going through some tough times in recent days, so I knew the jacket would be even more important to her as a special thing of joy.

Well, we met the next day for brunch...and I was all set to say "no" to the deal...when I finally woke up and realized what I was close to doing....really ruining a relationship all because of a piece of fabric with clay buttons and block priting. I finally explained that I really wanted...needed...the $85 which I had spent on the jacket originally, and she was fine about it. In addition, she explained that SHE had been under the impression that I'd just bought the jacket at the consignment shop nearby that carries vintage BF...and that I had been trying to "mark it up". So we cleared the air of misundertandings....and she bought the jacket, while I continued to needle her about it, until she finally said, half-joking/half-serious, "Hey, am I going to hear about this the rest of my life?"

Driving away with Cathy on the way to take her back to her cousin's house (after our wild, non-stop 24 hours together), Cathy then needled ME about something I'd picked up at that same consignment shop...a BF peplum jumper� SHE's wanted, but that I'm still unwilling to let go of. "C'mon," she said sweetly, "you know you have to pay those bills, and if you want to get rid of that item, I'll be happy to pay you even MORE than you bought it for" and she named her price...but I shook my head no....not yet.

Well, this has been sitting with me on the back burner for some time now...this idea of the cost of holding on, and what it takes to let go. I'm telling this story now, because about a week ago, an eBay/BFTales acquaintance emailed me about my recent round of auctions (auctions I'm happy to report have helped me pay for those bills I shouldn't have racked up in the first place...) and asked if I'd be putting up any sweaters anytime soon.�

I then emailed her back about what I was thinking of selling...and she inquired about one SPECIAL sweater she's wanted for a very long time....a MIRACLE VEST from Fall 95, back when she coveted BF and that particular piece, but did not have the budget to afford such stuff. Well, usually the stuff I put on eBay is stuff I really don't wear...but that particular vest is one I love, and I wear it regularly each fall and winter season. I have two, it's true....but I just COULDN"T give up this vest!�

But then I thought about the Meadow Jacket episode...and I emailed this person back, and asked how much she'd be willing to pay. Well, clearly from her offer, she really wanted this vest....but she was being very low key about it...I think she knew that pressure might cause me to say no...since she realized I do like the sweater vest very much.

So I went to my closet, tried it on, and thought very hard...and then I realized that maybe I have enough, that ONE vest is enough for me, and that I could share, I could let go...and that I should let go emotionally. And I did...and I emailed her back, saying I'd sell the vest and I knew that it would be okay....the karma felt right.

If you're a regular reader of the message boards, you know many of us make a big deal about karma...but there's something there...there's something to that idea of a piece of BF..or anything for that matter...coming to rest where it belongs. And even though we say "it's only clothing" it's much more...but it's good to let go of things we love, because it makes us grow. Holding on diminishes us if we let our possessions rule our souls.

The Miracle Vest is packed and ready for the post office. By the time the first readers of this page get to the end of this story, the vest will be on it's way to a woman who truly wants it...a woman who has said that having it will be like a dream come true. I'm glad I can make that a reality for her.

I'm glad that my friend is enjoying her Meadow Jacket, and the value of her appreciation and friendship far exceeds the monetary value of the jacket.

I'd be glad, too, if I could let go of that peplum jumper and make Cathy happy as well...but I'm not there just quite yet. As you can see, Cathy, I'm getting better at saying "no".....maybe....well.......? Keep asking, eh tita? You know I"m a pushover.