I saw a post on Columbia-born (now NY-based) artist Juanita Cardenas on the crazysexycool (or, inspiring, awesome and brave) ‘We Love You So’ blog. I was intrigued. There was fuchsia. I scrolled.

And then I saw this:

This is a page from Juanita’s sketchbook. It is joy personified. It is bold. It is bright. It makes me want to twirl in a perfect skirt that I do not own, but often dream of (when I am not dreaming of meatballs or Superchunk playing my wedding or Stephen Merritt writing a 70th love song about me or Jon Hamm dropping his trench coat over a puddle so I can cross the street).

I decided to email Juanita and ask her about her work and where she sells. And you know what? She wrote back. Within the day. Turns out, she didn’t even know about the ‘We Love You So’ blog post. She was really excited. She’s out of the country, but we’re going to try to meet up when she returns.

The moral of this story: Ask, even when you think things are impossible. You never know what might happen. Oh, and always think about what bands you’d want to play at your wedding. It’s a fun game to imagine your wedding as the new All Tomorrow’s Parties.