[caption id="" align="alignright" width="216" caption="Ilmarinen (courtesy of hugovk)"]
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Ilmarinen is an artificer-god worshipped in Finnish paganism. He's best known for forging the sampo, a magic mill that can create all kinds of goods. The easiest source to read about him is the Kalevala.
I'm not Finnish. He came to me anyway. I hear that's getting to be more common, and it's nothing new to me. I've worked with gods from a variety of pantheons before. But Ilmarinen swept in a few weeks ago and told me I needed to change things. I agreed with him; I knew I did.
He told me to make a few adjustments, get myself organized, and then he'd show me what I should be doing.
I did my best to fulfill his request, made some progress, and then all this came down on me like a ton of bricks. Good bricks, mind you. And while he hasn't told me in as many words, I can't help but feel like I see his hand in it.
I thought I would start slow with him, pick something safe like wire crochet or chainmail, maybe metal clay to start with. But no, I got firmly pushed in the direction of welding right out of the gate. Nope, this is not going to be easy.
I think it's be exactly what I need. I need someone who's going to keep me pointed in the right direction. I need to be dragged, kicking and screaming most of the time. (Odin had to do that to me in the first place. It's a pattern. Not one I'm proud of, but a pattern nonetheless.)
I ran into some setbacks today involving financing and paperwork. Usually red tape in particular is a huge mental block for me. It emotionally exhausts me far out of proportion to anything else, and usually when I'm depressed running up against something that simple will make me want to give up because obviously it's never going to happen. Instead, I printed out the forms I need, made arrangements to meet an advisor, and also looked into an alternative option or two.
I'm going to do this, or at the least I'm going to exhaust my options trying.