Research Time

This morning I dusted upstairs, vacuumed downstairs (that's dividing and conquering, no?), changed the sheets, swept the deck, started the laundry, brushed the dog, cleaned the dog's ears, and brushed the dog's teeth. I'm sensing a theme here.

and that's just the ears...

But that's not the point. I also created a few more product in my Zazzle store. 
 

Swallowtail Redux Plates by artinphotography
Find other Abstract Plates at zazzle.com

 

Swallowtail Redux Blue Border Print by artinphotography
Browse Insects Posters online at Zazzle.com

I LOVE this Swallowtail Redux art! I made it from one of my original photos of a swallowtail butterfly's wing. Sometimes a design hits you just right - the colors, the lines, the motion - your eyes and heart suck it in and can't leave it alone, and you know that for whatever reason, it's just right. But that's not the point either.

The point is, I have rushed to get all these things done so that I could get to my research for my writing. Right now, I'm reading Indian Slavery in Colonial America, edited by Alan Gallay, and it's really enlightening. I never thought about (or was taught) the differences between societies that enslaved individuals as a by-product of war and slaving societies that initiated wars to obtain slaves. Or those in which slaving was a foundation of the economic base and those which it was not. 

I never thought about (or was taught) the colonial viewpoint of slaves, no matter what race. Or the different cultures from which slaves came as a contributor to enmities and alliances that may have prevented uniting against slavery. I never gave much thought to the erroneous assumption of equating the word "African" with "slave". 

I'm hoping more education on the topic will equal better writing about that time period.

Light reading? No. Enlightening? Very.