UNRAVELED

ps- there are no photos here because between flickr and yahoo asshattery i am locked out of my photos.  if you know how to permanently fix or prank them, i'd appreciate knowing... now, on to the blog...

So this year, I came undone.

Now, a sock------

Yes, a sock. It is a beautiful knitted thing.  A mastery of magic and engineering.   Toe, foot, heel, leg, cuff.  Heels being my favorite, the juncture at which horizontal becomes vertical by sheer trickery.  There are as many recipes for socks as for spaghetti, but in the end, it is the making and the wearing that spark joy in my soul.  Imagine the betrayal as the little fucker fell right the hell apart.

(photo of one of my socks with a stupid hole in it here)

I tried to mend it by taking up the broken end and securing the live stitches, but the little tail kept coming loose and unraveling even more, making it three times worse every time I thought I had it sewn up.

It started in March.  My doctor and I decided to change my medication.  The old one was terrible for blood sugar, weight gain and liver function. Feeling that the last year or two had been quite fine, we moved ahead with a new medication in a calm and orderly fashion. Everything seemed to be okay, the stitches were holding, the pattern lookin' dandy. Hearts and Flowers.

(clever photo of heart-and-flower sock here)

In April I gave notice at my job for May, as the commute was frightful and I thought I'd move on to a home-based business. Everything made sense, I still felt in control, relatively happy and confident.  I started that business, got off to a roaring start....

Snap

Just a couple of strands at first, but I was still rolling, keeping busy.

Snapsnapsnap

I woke up one morning from the middle of the hole.

The depression is unbearable and seemingly unbreakable.  It's a uniquely isolated feeling, like being a little wooden doll suspended in deep black space. Nothing about me has felt natural in sixth months, I have absolutley no emotional connection to what is going on around me-- Parties, hangouts, birthdays, doing laundry are all the same gig. There are parts of me I am nearly certain will never connect with the outer world again.  

Hyperbole and a Half wrote about her struggle with depression recently and the part that made me laugh and sob uncontrollably was the way she described what I call Giving Face.  Unless you've just been surprised by a party girl poppin' out of a cake at a funeral, you have natural facial expressions related to your everyday speech.  I feel like I literally need to reach up and mold my face into a look appropriate to any given experience. I often stand among people feeling stretched and awkward. I hear conversation around me, the attendant phrasing and pauses, then the alarm sounds that I'm supposed to react!  Formulate, execute, et Voilà, A Face!  Needs some work? Sorry.

whipwhip

So here's me in therapy, and at the meds doctor, on time and ready to go...I pick up stitches and whip the yarn round and we pull the hole shut a bit...

fwoopfwoopfwoop

And there's another loose end, coming undone, the hole three times worse again.  I can't think much of the time, I don't actually care or have opinions about a lot of things and I have all the energy four cups of coffee and two naps a day can afford me.

I feel obligated to say that with some tinkering, yes, I am a bit....Lifted? Brighter, I think. But I’m still floating in the hole, wooden and sometimes completely emotionless.  It’s odd, but some of this, including intermittent feelings of ennui and total uselessness are actual side effects of the medication.  

I’ve never experienced this before.  Many, many sufferers of mental health problems maintain that the medication makes them unbearably gray.  Fellow Bipolars and others suffering with more severe conditions feel it takes away our Super Powers. When I find a way to explain those to you, I will, but suffice to say, the more severe the change, the more likely some people drop their ball of meds to find their way out of the wool. My meds mostly made me feel more “me”, more in control, able to live among friends and family without causing damage. Lately, though, I have nearly ached for that razor’s edge of unmanaged ZING, just those few beautiful moments before everything will go, inevitably,  to crazy hell, just to get the feeling of life back, to see the extra rainbow color, to cinch that hole tight and sew in the tail in a fit of mad possession. 

Looking back, I could just rip the entire year out, no matter how much I had loved the pattern, as that tiny, ungraspable end eludes me and I can't stop the unraveling.  It feels like a slow, perpetual, unrelenting state now, which leaves me at moments panicky, frightened, embarrassed, heartbroken and, ultimately, resigned.  

Every day is a step in this sock, every day the hole may rip and leave me exposed or the heel may hold and I’ll just keep walking.

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MOM'S DAY: A STORY OF SALVAGE AND SANDWICHES

A Mothers Day Card:

Dear Mom,

You were the mid-season replacement and parenting was tough.  I was a tough kid.  But we’re all grown up now and so much we’ve done I cannot imagine having done without you.

You were my Mom when I was 20 and freaking out and joined the Navy. You were my Mom when I came home tired, bedraggled and dumped by an idiot. You picked me up when I felt humiliated and said hey, it can happen to anyone kiddo, you’re life’s not over and dinner’s waiting when you get home from work.

You were my Mom when L had her final breakdown and disappeared.  You never stopped hugging me.  You never let me go and this was the most gargantuan feat of grace and understanding any woman could possibly muster, to help her kid deal with the crazy of her spiritually dying mother.  And you never let go, especially when I called you from work and said it was my birthday and I didn’t know where my mom was.  Yes I did.  She was on the other end of the line, saying honey, I love you and it’s gonna be OK.

You were my Mom when GingerMan came to pick me up for our first date. I was ready and waiting, on time, upstairs, and let him sweat it out down there talking to you for nearly ten minutes, because I wanted your appraisal of his character.  You waited up past your bedtime to tell me he was charming and seemed just good enough for me (you later raised his rating to “Buy”). 

You were my Mom when we picked out my wedding dress.  And five years later when my sister chose hers.  Your mother was our beloved Grandmother, the only real one we had.  We were married in her back yard and you were our Mom when you walked us down the aisle and sat in the front row with your corsage and tissues.

There to capture the Important Things

La Belle de Notre Dame

You’re our Mom when you call three or four times a week just to say Hi or ask if we want lemons or limes or avocados off the backyard trees.  When you ask if I just want to come for lunch and hang out.  You make the best sandwiches, and I can’t replicate them at home.  Mom Sandwiches, as Dad says.

Belly Dancer and Baklava for Grandma's Birthday

For all the sandwiches, and avocados, and love and listening, thank you from the bottom of my screw-ball heart.  I love you, Mom

Happy Mothers Day

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MOTHERS DAY BLUE. AND PINK. AND PURPLE.

Hi LA,

Funny, how no-one knows that’s why I hate my name.  We share our initials and people call me ‘La’ all the damn time.  I loathe it.  I turn 40 this year and intend to change it, to what I am not yet sure, but I am sick to death of LaLaLa.  

You named me after someone you knew.  When I was little you said she was an aunt, but my oldest sister said she was just a friend, someone who was kind to you in a life where people were duplicitous and lecherous at best.  But it’s nothing to me, and I’m sorry, but I’ve never liked even the sound or look of Laura Ann.  I have no connection to it and it’s got to go.  I used to think I could do that with you, to, but now I think differently, so let me hold your hand and say “Hi”.

It’s been a while.

You’re my mother.

At the moment, I work in downtown Menlo Park, and while it is a lovely place, we have a few “fixtures”, one, by pseudonym, Blue Lady.  Because she wears a blue parka.  She is You.  I knew You the minute you walked into the shop the first time.  You look the same. Your troubles are deep, you live in a home or shelter and are, by turns, disconnected, sometimes cheerful and talkative, or maudlin, or inconsolable.  Sometimes the voices come and you are frightened and angry and I have to call the police and I hate it. I hate that you are frightened, that your sanity is lost. I hate more that you frighten me and make me uncomfortable.  That I have to fight inside to console you or hate you for coming into the shop and talking to my customers and leaving me unsure of what to do.  I can’t take care of you now any more than I could when I was small.  So I bottle it up for the day, after you’ve used the bathroom and left. I get in my car and tighten up, drive all the way home, then fall apart.

The other day, Facebook ran a Suggested (advert) Post (advert) for a Mother’s Day card that featured a mommy and daughter outside in the rain with an umbrella and galoshes, and they were rainbow colored. The caption read:

“What moments have you noticed that you’ve started to act like your mother?”

My response was: “Dunno, but love her as I do, it's never looked like this...”, and it took me a while to realize I didn’t write that about my mom, I wrote it about you.

There are a lot of moments, many of which torment me; are painful and regretful and retarded my life just as the same poison ruined yours.  And yet, so, so many moments I wish I could. 

You see, you passed on the crazy.  Big ol’ buckets of it, in many forms, to just about all of us, but a few of us especially in a few special ways.  The nephews have their challenges which they have overcome with a lot of resource help in school and my sister’s never-ending sainthood.  She deserves a Nobel.  Or something.  But I got the PayDay-BabyRuth-Nutbar, and it has tormented me my entire life.  Which is where this whole agonizing ying-yen begins.

I was a difficult, probably terrifying, child.  And dad worked a lot. And sometimes, for all his good points, he was not very forgiving, and he had expectations, and I cannot imagine what it’s like dealing with a mentally ill child plus two other kids on your own.  But I remember the Pink and Purple Planet stories.  With the little girl and her archeologist/paleontologist father on a world of weird stuff and dinosaurs, which you made up out of your head every morning on the way to daycare because you had to do something with me for a few hours a day.  But I had wretched anxiety, sick to my stomach, so you made up stories for 15 minutes every morning.

When we moved, the new house had orchard trees.  So we made apricot pineapple jam.  To this day, when I open a jar of really, really good apricot jam I nearly cry with happiness.  But I don’t know how to make jam.  I was too small.  I remember what the jars looked like, and pouring in the molten-hot, golden-orange goo, and the tangy, late-day, sunset-y flavor of beautiful homemade jam, but I don’t know how it was done.

I remember cheeseburgers and Kraft Dinner, which I can make, with èlan.  I remember spaghetti, and sausage with butter beans, which my husband likes a LOT.  I remember meatloaf but it was only in the last few years I ventured into this territory because I failed it once.  I remember distinctly it was made in the loaf pan, and had ketchup, american cheese and bacon criss-crossed on top.  I made it once when GingerMan and I were first together, and I didn’t know what order everything went in and it was not to the Standard of Memory. I got the grown-up By-God-Betty-Crocker ring-binder cookbook, and began learning the shortcomings of cookbooks, as the recipe didn’t work either.  Years later I found, on a visit to my sister in Kansas, a Betty Crocker Cookbook for Boys and Girls. You know I bought it.  It was YOUR cookbook.  Spaghetti made with ground beef, salt and pepper and tomato sauce, where *I* got to open the can and pour it in!!! Everything except the meatloaf was there, so I just started to think I wasn’t remembering it correctly.  Turns out I was, but there are better methods, and now I eat it all the time and secretly think of you and me squishing meat in the metal bowl with the hanging ring on the side (which I have).

It was also you, plus crazy plus circumstance plus three kids versus the world, and I remember the times you tried to do things together, or get the two of us active and healthy.  But I couldn’t do things that weren’t perfect. I didn’t know how to compute it, how to deal.  There were little Crayola transfers for making pictures (age 5?), but the rubby thingie wasn’t in the box and I freaked out but you grabbed the wood spatula because really, anything will rub a transfer, but I distinctly remember thinking desperately why is everything in my life incomplete?  Like the green bike you bought, with the leg elastic for your pants leg, but we couldn’t, for the life of us, figure out why there was only one, and I panicked because I was sposed to know the answer.  Not really, but you felt the same way, and you were sposed to be the adult and now I know how that feels.

Except you had no-one on your side.  And a world with very little understanding of Crazy.  

I. Do. NOT. Know.  How you kept it together so long.

I mean, you were really wretched later, when you were still pretty much together.  You were awful to my younger sister.  And I had to pick up those pieces, when I was going through my own real Crazy Adolescence.  But then you fell right the fuck apart and I am so, so, so sorry.

Because I know what it’s like.  To go all the way to edge.  But someone pulled me back.  Lots of people. Real, qualified doctors, an awesome (in the true definition, awe-inspiring,) husband, my parents.  People loved and supported me.  All the things you never had.  You had people tell you to pull your shit together.  To be a better mother.  To straighten up.  Did any doctor in the 70‘s listen to you when you said you were falling apart? Your last doctor was a creep. My sisters and I should have reported him. He was the same kind of lech you grew up with. If he had done more, if he had been, well, normal, in any way, you probably would have had a chance, but your darkness was so black and inky I may be fantasizing of a world never meant to be.

I never forget.  When You come in to see me, You call me your Angel, your Light.  You walk up within a millimetre of a customer and point to me or my workmate, the rock-solid K, and tell them we’re your friends.  Then I sell spices and talk to people about cooking all day and think of You.  I miss you, but I don’t think we can be together, because as close as you are, I’ll never really find you in there again.  But the small me loves jam and meatloaf and Pink and Purple and dinosaurs. 

and you.

happy mothers day.

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PAPRIKA AND SPICE AND EVERYTHING NICE

A Tale of Two Weeks

OR 

How Smoked Paprika, Onion and Garlic Powders Save the World:

Scene 1: A recovering GingerMan wanted something approximating real food, so I hopped to the store after work and picked up chicken, as requested.  Into a pan, salt and pepper only, brown rice on the side.  Yay.  A few days later, he’s moved on, and there’s still plain chicken in the fridge.  A million things to do, and not much effort to expend, as I have no energy at the moment.

Scene 2: A family Holiday Breakfast, what can I do in batches large enough to feed the Pacific Fleet, full of complex flavor which such endeavors sometimes lack, especially when dietary needs must be met?

My Go-To Team: Smoked Paprika, Toasted Onion Powder and Garlic Powder.  They’re like having Cinnamon, Ginger and Nutmeg for baking.  A few things which play well alone, together, then team with others to save your bacon.  And eggs.  And stir-fry, risotto, meatloaf or squash soup.

Reasons to go with Smoked and Toasted: Developed flavors.  The work is done for you, naturally.  The peppers and onions are dried and smoked/ toasted, then ground so they are deep and easy to incorporate into anything.  BONUS POINTS: Ground Chipotle Pepper.  Adds a small to moderate amount of heat depending on the amount used with a huge amount of naturally smokey pepper flavor added to your dish.

The following are two new spins:

SOLUTION ONE: CHICKEN SALAD!

2-Large Broiled chicken breasts, cubed

1/4 mayonaise

1/4 greek yogurt

3 Large radishes, diced

3 TB Red Onion, finely diced

2 TB Toasted Sunflower Seeds

2 TB Roasted Peanuts, chopped

1/4 tsp Smoked Paprika

1/4 tsp Toasted Onion Powder

1/8 tsp Garlic Powder

1/4 tsp Penzeys Bavarian Seasoning (Crushed Brown Mustard Seed, Rosemary, etc.)

Kosher Salt and Pepper to Taste--The Chicken was already seasoned, and the Seeds, Peanuts, and Paprika all add savoriness so I didn’t add any extra.

1) Cube or Shred the Chicken, your preference, place in medium bowl.  Dice radishes, onion and add to bowl.  

2) In a separate bowl, mix mayo and yogurt.  This is my favored mix, both for this and tuna, BUT you must feel free to fiddle with the mayo/yogurt ratio to achieve your own private Nirvana.  

3) NOW, add the really good stuff--Smoked Paprika, Toasted Onion Powder (yes, from Penzeys, regular White Onion Powder is great too,) and the Bavarian Seasoning.  In lieu of Bavarian, I should think some Poultry Seasoning, a little extra crushed Rosemary (ooo-yum if fresh!), and maybe some dried or prepared mustard should do the trick, but I do love me some Bavarian blend, Bubb.  

4) Add half the dressing and mix lightly, then add half the remaining and the seeds and nuts, mixing lightly again.  

5) Stand back, admiring your creation.  Taste it.  Is it fresh and savory? Can you taste the chicken, but also the fresh crispness of the radish and the toastiness of the spices and peanuts?  Add the rest of the dressing to desired level of creaminess, plate, grab some crackers and try to control yourself.  

6) It is wonderful on it’s own.  It is fabulous on: Wheat bread or Toasted Sourdough, as a sandwich; on toasted rye or pumpernickel points, or a good, crispy cracker such as Triscuits.

SOLUTION 2: BISCUITS AND GRAVY!

So by adding The Three to the Bavarian we come to a piquant, herby flair.  But sometimes you want rich.  Down-home.  Family food. Say, Biscuits and Gravy? The regular recipe is traditionally....light on seasoning, so to achieve ultimate savoriness, I take the Spice Road:

I start, (as we did in Sept 2011 “Good Gavy! And Biscuits!”), with the traditional Sausage Gravy for Biscuits from the Joy of Cooking, pg. 547, calling for 8oz sausage then the standard 2-2-2 Fat-Flour-Dairy ratio to build a classic White Sauce.  

EXTRA RESTYLING:

A) This was for Easter Brunch, where a few people couldn’t/ shouldn’t eat pork, so I now regularly sub Turkey Italian Sausage, with Fennel.  

HMMM...ENOUGH SAUSAGE?

B) You will need the full amount of the fat as Butter, as there will be effectively no fat from the sausage. 

C) You will want to split the types of dairy 80%/20% to achieve creaminess and viscosity.  I’m OCD, your mileage my vary. Other effective Combinations include Half&1/2 + Whole Milk or Whole Milk + 2%, but I really wouldn't reduce fat content below that if your aim is the time-honored super-creamy, thick sauce.  (Weight Watchers, bless their healthy hearts, claim you can make sauce with just flour and skim milk, and as a physics experiment this is true.  The result cannot be described in words.)

Also note, this is triple the published recipe, for family servings:
  

24oz Turkey Italian Sausage, browned and crumbled

6 TB Butter

6 TB Wondra Superfine Flour

32oz (1qt / 4 cups) Heavy Cream

16oz (1 pint / 2 cups) Whole Milk

2 TB Smoked Paprika (Regular Sweet will, technically, work, but will NOT render the delicious, unctuous smokey flavor)

2 TB Toasted Onion Powder

1-2 TB (3-6 tsp) Garlic Powder--Your preference.  I live 30 miles away from the Garlic Capital of the World, so you can imagine how I roll.

1.5 tsp Kosher Salt-- To start.  I add more at the finish to taste

Follow all directions to construct Sauce, then,

YES, I RAN TWO SIX-CUP PANS AT A TIME, YO.

TO FINISH:

-Salt to taste

-1.5 tsp Ground Black Pepper, see Salt

-Dashes of Hot Pepper Sauce--I say Crystal Hot Sauce, possibly Tabasco Chipotle; and the stated 2 Dashes per 2 cups gravy are, to me, laughably uninspiring.  The Sauce is to add flavor more than heat, but until you're an experienced splasher, dash with wisdom and constraint to be sure Hotness has not overcome the desired Flavor. 

Add Sausage back in, ladle over Biscuits et VOIL`A!  

So put a little Spice in your Nice (enough), or, if you are Jedi Jasmin, Super Jenius, (courtesy of http://melomeals.blogspot.com/2011/09/how-to-build-raw-kale-salad.html) you can add a little Hale 'n' Hearty to your Kale Salad--Have a Party!  

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BARRED

“...So I am improving...and now GingerMan is turning his attention to his annual Spring Migration to Ireland...”

OR not.  Bags were about to be packed, Days out from Departure numbered T-3 and counting.

It seems no matter what I did to scrub my hands raw or disinfect switches and faucets as I went, GingerMan caught the plague.  The Sunday before his trip.  It started in the morning, so I bundled him into the guest room, donned apron and gloves and scrubbed the house top to bottom with bleach.  Called the doctor, told them what the ER Angels had given me, they called in a scrip Monday morning and he was well on his way that evening.  Pissed off, but way better off than I had been.  My hands, on the other--um, hand--- were puffy, red, raw, scratched and stinging.

Enter Lavishea Lotion Bars.  In the interests of Equality, I will also mention the gorgeous Bar Maids Lo-Lo Bars.  What the Whaaa? You ask?

A lotion bar.  Comes in a little round tin, made of various oils, waxes, natural stuff and it was not until this utter catastrophe struck and my Yarn Posse texted en masses that I realized I had run out of these about a year ago and never stocked up again. They are ingredients formed into a small cake, which you pop out of the tin, rub on the affected area and pop back in the tin.  No Muss, No Fuss.

 I am a dedicated follower of Bar Maids lip balms, they are now the only ones allowed in the house.  When GM and I first met, he had, possibly, the Worst Lips in the World.  The US, even in the humid regions, is a drastically dryer place than Ireland.  By a LOT.  In the Old Country, you leave bread out, here, that's Death.  When we go home for holidays, we never use lotion and my hands look 10 years younger, here my skin falls off if I don’t moisturize every 6 hours religiously and after every hand washing.  

So we are on a strict balm regimen, with happy smoochers to show for it. Lately, I have had specific skin allergies which have reduced me to one specific type of body lotion recommended by my doctor, but before that, I knocked my bad self out with the panoply of scented wonders from these companies, even when I couldn’t use any other scented products on the market.

Their ingredients are pure, and great for all skin types.  Lavishea bars are a little dryer than the Bar Maids to the touch.  Bar Maids has an entire line of cool stuff including several facial products, a natural baby line (tested by my niece, the Intrepid Danger Mouse), and the O For Feet’s Sake bar.  I am a makeup and body-care ‘Ho, and love them all, so I can’t honestly give you a preference for one over the other.  

DID I MENTION-LO-LO Has Luscious Flavors???? OOOO YUMMO!

OH!! And this is the NUGGET OF KNOWLEDGE, hidden like those stupid morals tacked on to the end of a He-Man- Masters of the Universe episode: 

FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY IN THE UNIVERSE, WASH YOUR HANDS.  DOCTOR STYLE.  PAY ATTENTION TO YOUR FINGER TIPS AND WASH ALL THE WAY UP THE WRISTS.  

IF SOMEONE CLOSE TO YOU HAS NORO OR A RELATED VIRUS, USE A BLEACH CLEANER TO CLEAN YOUR KITCHEN, THE BATHROOMS AND ALL LIGHT SWITCHES, REMOTE CONTROLS AND FAUCETS.

ESTABLISH, IF POSSIBLE, A “CLEAN” BATHROOM AND A “SICK” BATHROOM AND KEEP THEM SACRED AND SEPARATE.

IF YOU HAVE A REFRIGERATOR WATER/ICE SPIGOT, BE SURE YOU ARE CLEANING THAT WITH BLEACH BETWEEN EACH USE.  ALL PARTS OF IT.

IF POSSIBLE, DO NOT ALLOW THE SICK PERSON TO USE THE KITCHEN!!!!

So, otherwise, yes, this is nothing but a shill, but only because it’s been a grossbuckets two weeks round here, and these literally saved the skin on my hands and made me a bit happier. They are available at many local yarn shops and online at http://www.lavishea.com/ and https://bar-maids.com/.  Also, if you are attending any local fiber festivals, knitting conventions and whatnots, check to see if the Bar Maids are in attendance--you’ll hear the whooping and laughter a mile away!  They are more fun than a barrel of monkeys and you will love supporting a great company by treating yourself.

Herein ends the sermon, I am knackered.  I’m even skipping knitting today.  I’ve cleaned and tidied and worked all week and I am just gonna droooool today.  Except I keep coming up with things to do.  So Still Not Bored.  Then there’s Treadmill Time.  OH!  Okay, next time I’ll tell you about all the movies I’ve watched in the last week and a half!  

As Calvin said to Hobbes, the days are just packed!  

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"WOULD YOU LIKE A LITTLE ICE CREAM?"

So I’m going to tell you my little story, and give you a link to one of my favorite stories.  I want to you watch it, with lots of tissues.  Don’t be afraid.  Just do it.  You know, cuz your allergies might act up--happens to GingerMan, like when we watch ST II Wrath of Khan.

THIS week, I got Noro virus. Tuesday, Hoooorah.  Which officially makes GingerMan the best partner ever, as Wednesday night was spent in the ER, after which I was deposited at home, still nauseous and disgusting and by then wanting to cry, at midnight.  Midnight.  At which time GingerMan goes right back out to the 24-hour Understaffed, Overworked, Manned by Angels Walgreens Pharmacy.  Mid. Night.  Goeth the man who still has not eaten, after a full day at work, after working from home the day before to make sure I didn’t die falling over or something.  (BTW-While we were gone, MaryKay Carol dropped off Clorox Cleaner with Bleach-proven to kill the virus, and Jedi Jasmin made Chicken Ginger Broth, proven to kill everything evil and fill your world with rainbows.)

He turns in the prescription for what the ER nurse described as the anti-nausea “Miracle Drug.”  He waits, with a bag of Doritos and some trail mix in the car for another hour or so.  Then he comes home, pills me, eats and then asks if I’m good so he can go to bed.

I was lying at the precise angle that prevented me from yakking, and garnering all my reserves to not cry and said yes go to bed.  The meds took hold in the night and I actually slept for 4 hours. Still on the sofa, but with my shirt on.  Oh, patented system--and you don’t want the explanation.  But still...

So I am improving.  By Thursday night I ate some yogurt and GM could turn the TV on without turning me green.  Friday, Day 4, was TOAST DAY!  One whole plain piece!  Life is improving from there, and now GingerMan is turning his attention to his annual Spring Migration to Ireland.

I like me some time alone. I watch movies and cook Dinner for One with impunity.  I knit, I read, I go out with friends, and I can say what is usually applicable to my life--I am never really bored. I do it well. Better than he does, but I’m not bragging, because honestly--very, very honestly, I have a paranoid inner anxiety that maybe it means he loves me more and I can just get right along.

Except for my even deeper inner anxiety that he will die on a trip.  It grinds into me, burrows further down the farther in advance he plans.  Something will happen and the very one person in the world I have loved more than things, more than places, more than any other person, more than breathing, will be gone.  In 2002, when we were going to try on my wedding gown, my mom asked if I had been in love with my first (insert any ol’ words you like here) spouse and I said no, without having to consider.  Because I didn’t have a clue what the concept even was.  After GingerMan and I met, I forgot what life had been before, at Warp Factor 9.  Twelve years later it is possible to remember times and events, but no sense of living without him.  I have an ice-cold fear in my heart and soul that I could never get along without him.

I’d stick it somehow.  It occurred to me recently that I have finally accrued a bit of mileage, a bit of experience and some small portion of confidence.  I’ll fall right the fuck apart, but, well, what the hell do you want?

I’ve watched this particular short film many times.  It was featured on PBS as part of a nationwide story-telling project, shown at the end of features, and Danny and Annie remind me of us (link here JIK:  http://youtu.be/WNfvuJr9164). A schlub (me) and a catch (GM), and how a rag-tag duo found happiness until the end.  And then dealt with the end.  I know all of this sounds maudlin and macabre, but I’m an atheist and a realist and like to just deal with the scary shit.  I have lifelong severe anxiety about loss and loneliness and this film has really served as a training video, of sorts.  Whenever GM heads for the airport, the cold, black fear grips me, and then I think of Danny and Annie.  

Our affairs are in order.  We say “I Love You” so many times in one day you’d think we wouldn’t hear it but we do.  One night I wrote “I Love You” on little sticky-notes and stuck them in a heart shape on the counter around his morning cereal bowl and juice glass.  I was sick on Valentine's Day so he drove 40 miles round trip to get the flowers he’d sent to my job, even though I’d get them the next day.  Sometimes he picks up some Pretzel M&M’s (TM) at the grocery store just to see me giggle. 

“...She lights up my life when she says at night would you like a little ice cream...”

We each think JEEEEZUZ I was never good enough to catch you!  But that can only possibly be true one way and we’re each sure it’s the other way so we’ve reached détente and just swap pandas and “discuss” what to watch on TV during dinner.

Well, come to think of it, you don’t really have to watch it, but please do anyway, Danny and Annie are lovely people, with a lot to say about love and living.  Doesn’t apply solely to partners, there’s a lot of us in Friend Webs out here, and you know we’d be there with you in the ER at midnight when you need us, and definitely, definitely tell you to eat more ice cream--

--it’s medicine.  And Love.

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OF BUST DARTS AND BOOBAGE

Diddly dum, it's January, diddly doot, Here's February! Oh dear, I've caught The Flu. No, not THAT flu, the one I was vaccinated for, the OTHER one, as I presented myself to the doctor, stuffy, snurffly, completely exhausted.  "Weeeeellll-- itmayhavestartedasviralbut it'sdefinitelybacterialnow.  Here's your antibiotic."  Which worked very nicely, but for being so knackered I learned the intricate weave pattern of our high-thread-count sheets over the next two and a half weeks. That's most of February done by the time I crawl back to work, but then ZOMG,  it's 

STITCHES WEST 2013!!!!

A total yarn-gasm, five days of fiber-y awesome. This was my fifth Stitches since I started knitting in 2009, and it was a blow-out-- Helen Devine came from Pittsburg, Knit Cafe Abby camped out with me, CogKnitive Podcast's Dr. Gemma bunked with the Knitmores and Bèbè Knitmore made several extremely cheerful and well-behaved public appearences, with her handler the Most Excellent Daddy, Andrew.              

A whole mad bunch of us filled out Lily Chin's Bust Darts class thursday, then Mary Kay Carol and I carried on to Marly Bird's fantastic Curvy Knits class friday. Both of which collectively count as The Best Class I've Ever Taken.  We explored the nature of being fuller-figured.  Busty.  Plump.  Of following patterns faithfully, having taken the requisite few standard measurements, namely bust and maybe waist and upper arm or shoulders, but not often, then just zooming along.  Then ending up with: A jumper which is puzzlingly shorter in front after absailing sometimes prodigious boobage. One which fits like a sack due to poor shaping when the designer can't be bothered; or has a neckline ample enough for a two-headed baby calf because the pattern writer took their lovely size-6 pattern, plugged it into a computer program which extrapolated from bust measurements and made no appropriate decreases over the shoulders to the neck as per standard human anatomy.

We graphed.  We did Geometry.  We did Maths.  Just before the break in Lily's class I nearly had a nervous breakdown, but Carol talked me off the ledge.  A 'Dart', if you will examine, perhaps, your favorite fitted dress or skirt, properly distributes fabric around curvy areas of your anatomy.  It seems easy with sewing--pinch the extra material from the inside, secure and sew. The trick with knitting is, you're working with negative space.  You literally chart out a triangle of negative space, stitches you will never knit, then knit a Curve in the Fabric of Space and Time. Stephen Hawking's got nuthin' on me now.

Next day in Marly's class we were given a magnificent packet full of segments containing a woman's form, diagrams of a specific area of measurements and the maths for that area. As with Lily's class, we learned that measurements are everywhere--lengths of everything, distances between, well, ya know...everything. Shoulder to shoulder, Shoulder to hip, nip to...yup, everything.  Unless you want 1963's On-Trend Bullet Boobs, you better measure those "Bust Points".  Meaning that I now hold the Keys to the Jumper Designing Universe.  I can take Lily's Short Row Bust Darts, insert them into Marly's Chart 5, Do a Little Dance, Eat a Little Pie, et VOILÀ! Have a sweater design, including properly designed set-in arms, which will fit who I really am.

So who am I?  I'm the girl who was insecure and pointless four years ago, and laid off from a law firm, so I walked into a yarn shop and said Howdy.  I'm the girl who is weird and wonderful and crazy-ass and colorful and strange, but never knows who she is from the inside.  A dreamer, yes, but tidy and practical and reassuring.  I am a Virgo and an Earth Ox.  I love to cook and party and knit and party and hang out and party because four years ago I entered a weird and wonderful and crazy-ass family of colorful and strange people, and Stitches is our Woodstock.  I'm the girl who yells out in Lily Chin's Short Row Bust Darts class:  "SO--BUST DARTS ARE HEEL FLAPS FOR TITS!!!!!" 

 Eureka.

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