restingmotion

Safe Haven

Things are coming together, one small island of tranquility at a time.

 

One book (among many waiting to be read)

Reading this week was lighthearted.  I got started on a book, misplaced it, picked up another, and as I sorted through the piles of book on the living room floor, kept coming across book after book that I had meant to read by never gotten to.  It was time to stop and read something now rather than just continuing to pile things up for the future.

 

I stared with The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver and found it surprisingly enjoyable.  It was surprising because the only other novel by the author I have read was The Poisonwood Bible, and although that book has stayed with me and had a great affect on me, I did not find it particularly enjoyable.  Maddening yes.  Enlightening yes.  Poignant yes.  Enjoyable, most definitely not.

 

But back to The Bean Trees.  Kingsolver has a remarkably astute way of capturing an image or dialog or a moment of drama, making it poignantly real, and even though there are many events and many characters in this book, and even though some of them are not developed beyond being symbolic "types", she manages to weave all the threads and all the bits and pieces into a harmonious whole where every detail fits.  She writes a novel with a poet's sensitivity to language and to structure and that is not an easy task for either a poet or a novelist.

 

That said, I thought the beginning was stronger than the ending.  The narrator, Taylor Greer, is a dynamic and vividly drawn character who draws the reader in.  But then as the plot becomes more complex and more things happen to Taylor, she seems to become more vague, too much of a symbol of what the author wants to portray and less of a person in her own right.  Despite this, I remained vested in the plot, probably because the plot became stronger even as Taylor's individuality seemed to fade.  I worried about Turtle, the little girl who eventually became Taylor's own, and I followed Taylor as she grew up and accepted the one thing she never wanted (a child) and went from being a smart, engaging young adult, to a resourceful, caring woman.  But I no longer cared as deeply as I might have and although the book remained enjoyable, it fell short of being enlightening or moving.

 

To reiterate, we start the novel with a strong engaging female lead, and we lose her somewhere along the path, even though the novel is very much about her growth into adulthood.  Taylor Greer seems to become just another symbol who reacts to situations as needed to fit the author's goals, but there is no longer any sense of Taylor as a person making these choices, something that is mourned simply because Taylor started out so very very real. This is one of the problems I had with The Poisonwood Bible as well, that too many of the characters were unrealized shadows that were drawn with large brush-strokes dipped far too heavily in the ink of stereotype.  In that later novel, however, Kingsolver does manage to maintain the richness of her portrayal of the characters that seem dearest to her heart.  In this early novel, she seems to lose the person in the pursuit of the idea.

 

The ideas set forth in this book are good ideas. Even as Taylor fades, the plot seems to become stronger and clearer although perhaps a little too certain.  In this world, terrible realities do surface, but then they fade back below the surface if they cannot be handily resolved, a kind of selective awareness that all humans actually must practice in order to survive, but in this book, perhaps the answers seem to pat, too simple, achieved to easily to be quite real.

 

Still it was a good novel and better than most with excellent writing and several interesting subplots revolving around language: how language defines identity and the various ways it affects political and sociological reality, and most importantly how the child, Turtle, picks up the mantle of language, beginning with the naming of things, particularly vegetables, and yes, beans, and how these words paint a portrait of Turtle's past and future.  Very interesting.

 

Mulberries in the Snow

My senior year in college, probably like most colleges, I had to have submit a photograph for the yearbook.  I asked a friend, who was a very good photographer, to take the pictures for me.  She told me to wear my favorite garment as long as it wasn't purple.  She told me it was very hard to photograph purple well.  There was something about the way purples absorbed and reflected light, although I don't really remember the details. (photographers may please chime in here).  

 

Unfortunately my favorite colors seem to all be shades of purple and this conversation keeps echoing through my mind as I keep trying to photograph purple garments and rarely capturing the color in its true glory.  Of course, I am also a very unskilled photographer so perhaps this too will improve with practice.

 

Project: Mulberries in the Snow

 

Pattern: Drops sleeveless dress 108-7, a free download from the Drops website.

 

Yarn:  Misti Alpaca Chunky knitted tighter than its recommended gauge at 15 stitches and 19 rows per 4 inches.

 

Changes made to the pattern:  I added a bust dart to accommodate my DD chest and I lengthened the torso by 1 inch.  The length was added in the ribbed section at the waist, which is supposed to extend down onto the hips, as it clearly does here.

 

Things I would do differently were I to make this dress again: I am basically very happy with this dress.  However, the pattern illustration shows the area above the ribbing ending just below the bustline.  I knitted this to exactly the length specified in the pattern above the ribbing but before beginning the armhole shaping (6 inches) and although it looks okay, I think it would look much better if I had shortened this area to 4 inches, or perhaps even less, so that the ribbing came up higher on the ribcage as shown here in this photo from Drops.

 

More photos are available over at my flickr page or on Ravelry.  They were not, however, taken before I managed to weave in those few annoying yarn ends that seem to have shown up in all my photos.

 

 

 

Statement Rings

I've been looking at Wendy Brandes' Swear Rings for some time but never really managed to actually buy them.  I figured they were too trendy,  too young, and I was counting my pennies for some more serious jewelry.

 

But I am not really a serious jewelry person, or at least I am not really a person who wears jewelry seriously.  Really, life is too short not to have some fun.  So this week I finally broke down and ordered them.

 

When I picked up the mail yesterday I was excited to see the box from Wendy and I practically ripped it open as I walked to my car.  I did wait until I got in the car to actually open it as there was enough slush and piles of snow and ice to negotiate without crawling around looking for lost jewelry, but as soon as the box was open, these rings were on my hand.  

Sometimes I gal's just gotta make a statement.  What surprised me is how happy the rings make me, just wearing them brings a bit of a smile to face.  

Since you can't really see them well in the first photo, G managed to snap another picture as I was heading out the door to knitting.  I think they go particularly well with pearls.  

Spring skirts

Duchesse posted this skirt yesterday.  I really like the look and was surprised that I had missed it.  But when I pulled out my Talbots catalog I realized why.  I like the front with the pleats, but the back is gathered and I don't believe it would do anything for the rear-view given that I don't think it flatters the models on the catalog cover either.  I'd like this skirt if it had pleats in front and back.  

 

It immediately reminded me of another skirt I'd just seen in an e-mail from Donna Karan.  I love the look of this skirt and the fabric, but am managing to convince myself that it will probably be too snug through the waist.  Sad but true.  Besides, the way the gathers are ruched or smocked at the top (I'm not quite sure which and it doesn't matter because I'm not going to copy this detail) would not flatter me.  I'd be much better off with stitched pleats.

 

But it does seem apparent that I need to make a pleated skirt for summer.  I've had favorite pleated skirts in the past, here, and here, and it seems time for another.

 

photo 1 courtesy Talbots

photo 2 courtesy Donna Karan

February Made Me Shiver

I seem to be having a little motivational crisis.   All I really want is to go back to bed and stay there until spring with perhaps a few forays into the kitchen for coffee and brownies and a stack of books.  

 

It is easy to say I am tired of winter, and it is true, I am tired of winter.  But so is everyone at this time of year and this has been a winter particularly trying to human patience.  But blaming it on winter is such a cliché, even if it does hold a kernel of the truth.   Winter is not over yet, there is still February, and February somehow seems to be both the longest and the shortest month, long because there is usually at least one brutal snowstorm waiting in the wings, long because we are all tired of winter, long because spring doesn't really start to come until April. In February, April seems like a long long way away.

 

I was cold all day yesterday.  I was wearing a warm sweater, the thermostat was set to 70 degrees.  But still I was cold.  Truthfully, the house wasn't really 70 degrees except in a few warm protected spaces and the smaller rooms, which are all bedrooms and therefore all the more appealing as a place to curl up and hibernate.  This is the downside of having a big contemporary house where the rooms are all large open spaces and the entire west wall is glass. Glass facing the Hudson River is beautiful, but it also exposes us to the bitter force of icy winds blown across the country to our house, battering our glass walls, sending shivers of cold through the house so powerfully that no oil furnace can keep up.  A few nights below zero, a day or two with no sun, a bit of wind and a chill begins to set in.  No wonder I love to knit big thick comfy sweaters this time of year. I live in a scaled down contemporary version of a drafty old castle.  At least it warms up more quickly when the sun finally reemerges.

 

The whiteness of snowfall that I loved so much in the early part of the winter seems oppressive now.  Yesterday the whiteness seemed to glare at me, to taunt me, and it was not accompanied by the soft enveloping silence of many snowfalls.  Instead we had wind, the roar of wind against the glass, the cold fingers of icy winds through the windowpanes. We do have insulating blinds, but they are not enough, and the wind seeps around the corners and curls down to the floor, creeping into one's toes and up into one's bones. This was a cold brittle whiteness, the whiteness of emptiness and despair.

 

Or at least that is how it seemed to me.  But then I know this really isn't just about winter.  It is about fear. It took me all day to write yesterday's post, not that it was all that much, but I just couldn't do it.  The idea that things were going well just wouldn't make the leap from my brain to my fingers to the keyboard.  My hands would freeze up.  My brain would burp.  I would think "I need a cup of coffee", or "I should run some laundry" or whatever it could throw at me to keep me from admitting that things are going well.  Am I afraid of happiness, of good things?  No I don't really think so.  I am happy to be happy.  But I am also fearful.  I am afraid to get to wrapped up in this happiness, to count on things too much, to be vulnerable.  Instead of saying things are going well, I fret about all the things I haven't yet done and think how much better they will be when I finish.  

 

I am thinking about how much safer I will feel when I finish things.  I am afraid that this happiness, this improvement in G is only temporary.  Oh hell, I know it is only temporary, I know the facts of dementia and the statistics.  Of course no person is a statistic and the reversal might not be so bad.  But my experience is that the reversal will occur, and I will not be prepared and so I am afraid to get too comfortable with this happiness because I am afraid it will get jerked out from under me.  This has been my experience.  But what am I actually afraid of?  What is safety?  Why do I think that doing things will make me safe?  They will not.  They merely distract me.  Winter is cold and brittle.  I don't want my heart to become cold and brittle but I am afraid to bring it too far out in the open as well lest it be caught unawares by a fierce cold wind.  But if I hide behind doing I will miss the warmth of just being in this moment.  The fall will be no less harsh because I was afraid to feel the joy of the heights but the loss may, in fact be greater.  And yet I am afraid.  

 

I am thinking that today, faced with whiteness, freed from the obligation of need, of work, of responsibility to the world outside, is a time to celebrate the world inside.  Today may be a day to snuggle.  Perhaps I should give it a try.

 

* Title taken from American Pie by Don McLean

One Thing Leads to Another

And another.....

And so on.

 

At least that is how it all seems right now.  I get started on X, and I get a certain amount done before I realize that I am stuck and can't go any further until I do Y and Z, which of course lead to A, B, and C, and before you know it I am back to X.

 

January seemed to be an endless loop of projects and adjustments to a new life.  Just as we seemed to reach a new understanding, a comfortable place, we would find some other adjustment that needed to be accommodated.  In the same way I would start a project, then find that something else had to be done before the project at hand could be finished, and the projects would pile up without ever being fully completed.

I would like to think that February will be an improvement.  There are two things I know:   

1.    The floors will finally be installed.

2.    The new bookcases will go up in the family room.  

 

And a few things were accomplished in January, but not enough things.

• I established an effective morning routine which seems to work for me and everyone else in the household.
• I am knitting every day and am therefore making progress on at least one creative front.
• I got one nightstand set up in my bedroom so that I no longer have to crawl across the room in the dark, but the second nightstand requires that I move a cabinet which requires that I dismantle a shelving system in one closet, which requires that I have a place to put the contents of the shelves, etc. 
• I managed to sort, purge and store shoes, sweaters and boots and they are properly stored in their new locations.

Most of importantly, G is doing fabulously well, and although his memory is still terrible and he has days of greater confusion, he is also able to carry out conversations and form conclusions based on the facts at hand in ways that he has not be able to for a long long time.  We are able to spend companionable time together, talking, reading, watching television.  This I treasure.