Ordinary Time

When children were younger, I would go through phases of having them memorize poetry. I know that I had several sets of children learn Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley and The New Colossus by Emma Lazarus. I think everyone should be familiar with these poems, one reminds us that human achievement and perceived greatness is fleeting, the other reminds us of how to really be great.  In case you don't know The New Colossus or haven't read it in a while, here it is: Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame, With conquering limbs astride from land to land; Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame. “Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse...

It's been a hard day for those of us who are still sane in the United States. We have been betrayed by those who had promised to keep us safe, and I fear we will look back upon this moment and wish we could go back to it and relish our ignorance at what is to come.  The words of Julian of Norwich have been echoing through my head all afternoon.  "All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well."  This isn't some trite positive thinking line, because she also wrote, "He said not 'Thou shalt not be tempested, thou shalt not be travailled, thou shalt not be dis-eased'; but he did say, 'Thou shalt not be overcome.'" This is the long view.  So take care of yourselves and do what you need to do in order to be ready to do the hard work when it comes. Do what you can right in front of you. Help the hurting right in front of you. Feed the hungry right in front of you. Speak the truth to those around you. Stand up for t...

I flew home this afternoon from the training I was doing for Athena this past week. It went really well. The learners were great and the facility we were at was pretty amazing. I admit to having more than a little barn and horse envy. There's something pretty amazing about working with a herd of 14 horses. When I win the lottery...  It was also really good to catch-up with my brother-in-law and his family and get to know the older versions of my nieces and nephews. They were so generous to give me a place to stay, and it really made the training that much more enjoyable. And can I just tell you how much I love the little Manchester, NH airport? It's so human sized, it almost makes travelling stress-free. I will never complain about a security line with no one in it where the guard checking your ID uses your first name and wishes you a good trip.  And now I am home and it's good to be back. Tomorrow I will start to dig out from being gone. I think I need a good night's ...

Tomorrow in the wee hours of the morning I'll be catching a flight to New Hampshire where I will be the trainer on behalf of Athena for a four-day Equine Assisted Services certification session. A bonus is getting to stay with my brother-in-law and his family. I have no idea if I will have the energy to blog while I'm gone. I wouldn't count on it.  The forecast for New Hampshire looks far better than Chicago's, which I'm not sad about. I'm just hoping my typical weather unluckiness won't follow me and they won't end up having an unexpected heat wave.  And for the curious, I'm packing four books for the five night trip. You can't be too careful.

So it seems having possibly identified the reason behind my creating desert was enough to move past it. Going with the assumption that I needed a project that required more concentration than I typically need for a fiber related project, I dug out something that I had put away for a while because I hadn't wanted to work so hard.  A long time ago I had seen a blanket by Arne and Carlos that was made solely by connecting crocheted flowers created out of yarn leftovers. I loved how it looked and I certainly have lots of bits of yarn. The crochet bit was the issue. I can crochet and have made crocheted objects. I just don't do it very often and a long time passes in between projects. So long in fact, that each time I start a project I have to essentially teach myself how to crochet all over again. That made this project seem like the perfect one for my current mental state. I will say that each time I do pickup a new crochet project, the relearning process goes a lot faster.  I al...

You may or may not have noticed (I certainly have), that the amount of things I have made this year so far is incredibly small. I just haven't had the mental energy to do very much. I haven't been concerned because my interests do have wild swings, but I have made note of it. I think I have figured out a small piece of what's going on. When I read the news today that the selling of public lands was removed from the Big Ugly Bill the amount of relief I felt was significant. I don't think I was quite aware of how much stress and anxiety I was carrying about this. While this issue is important, there are still so many others, not the least of which is ICE kidnapping people off the street, that are still ongoing. I think that there are many of us who are carrying weight the extent of which we don't fully realize.  What I have been doing is reading. Copiously even by my standards. I'm currently averaging over nine books a month. It's been a lot of reading. Its al...