I'd Like to Say It Ain't So, But...

Sometimes I get weird intuitions. Mostly it's mother's intuition, which is generally dead-on, which makes it critical to listen do, but also more than a little creepy. Occasionally, though, it's about other things, and this weekend I had one of those "other" intuitive thoughts.

I've written a couple of times about Austin Art Glass, on SoCo in Austin as owned by artist Aaron Gross. Last October we picked up three new plates for our wall, including one to replace a broken piece, and I spent quite a bit of time talking to Aaron about whether or not he'd be able to stay in business given how slow it was for him last summer. He was less noncommittal than he'd been in September, giving me hope that because of his talent—and his prices— he was going to stick out the economic downturn.

Well, Saturday evening as we were driving home from dinner, I suddenly flashed on Austin Art Glass, pulled out my phone, and tried to access the website. I couldn't. When we came home, I went first thing to my desktop and went through all the Googled links I could find for both Aaron and his store. Lots of reviews and previous mentions of both...but nothing but a "Forbidden" message when going to austinartglass.com. I told my husband about it, and added that I felt like crying at the store's closing.

There's so much beauty in Aaron's art, and even with the economic downturn, people are spending all sorts of money on all sorts of things they don't need (iPads topping the list) and rarely consider the influence of beauty in their lives. I'm not immune to buying things I don't need, but when we drive down to Corpus Christi this summer to visit my m-i-l, I had every intention of stopping by Austin Art Glass to buy more lovely glass plates for our wall. I know there are other artists out there creating beautiful glass art, including James Hayes in Little Rock, but I'm taking the closing of his store very personally.

I'd Like to Say It Ain't So, But...