Three Paragraphs

Since coming face-to-face with the monumental task of clearing out Mama and Daddy's house, I've been on a bit of a crusade around here.  I'm trying to get rid of my clutter/things that I can't imagine either Briton or Hannah wanting once I'm gone.  This morning, I came across a box filled with photos, cards, etc. that were being saved for decoupage.  It was fun going through the box, winnowing out the ones that didn't strike me as it seemed they once did.  But now, I want to decoupage!  And Hannah said something last night about wanting to go to Michaels. . .  Must use all my self-control not to buy anything.  After all, this is still the year of my not having a job.

And I have discovered some ugly, ugly truths about someone close to me.  I'm at a loss as to what to do, but know I shouldn't do anything until I've calmed down.  What this person doesn't seem to realize is that, yes, lying = not telling the truth, but, also choosing not to tell the whole story = not telling the truth.  And while my temperament might appear easy-going a lot of the time, one thing that I cannot, will not, abide is being lied to.   I'm not stupid, you know --- I can put things together pretty quickly, and I know when they don't add up.

My knitting is coming along apace.  I've got about half of one sleeve to go on a sweater for myself, and, now that the Christmas deadline is gone, I've started --- again --- on a sweater for Briton.  Ongoing are wash/dish/cloths out of leftover cotton and a rippled blanket from leftover worsted.  Too, though I'd avoided spinning until now (I didn't need another hobby, with more boxes of supplies laying about), Roxanne has sent me a drop spindle and a shopping bag of roving, so I'm going to have to figure the process out.  I want to enjoy it, but not too much, you know?

Christmas Wrap

Nice day here yesterday --- how was yours?

Among the presents I received:

Could those be ANY cuter????*  You should all know how I feel about Yoda by now.  And Maleficent is my favorite Disney villain.

Also got some lovely smiles and hi-jinks from these two:

Oh, yeah, and Thor.  What a guy.

 I must admit to having some very sad moments.  After we had opened all the gifts and sort of settled into the day, I realized that it was the time that I always called home to wish Mama and Daddy Merry Christmas.  And now I have no one to call.  And we have no "second Christmas" to go to. . .  For me, at least, things were very glum on and off all day.

But, I did do some Christmas Day knitting.  Not on either of these things, mind you.  These were finished some time ago:

 One of the other socks made of Norville Serenity yarn, and

a Noro shawl.

I certainly plan to do a great deal more knitting today.  Once I clear all the dirty dishes out of the sink, that is!  ;]

Enjoy the rest of your holidays!

*The answer, of course, would be "No."

Random Thoughts

Going to leave this tab open all day, and just record some of what crosses my mind.  Would that be okay with everybody?

Why, thank you.

It is my Favorite Day of The Year.  Christmas Eve is all about baking cookies (at least in our house) and excitement and being finished with all the rushing about and that marvelous anticipatory quiet and stillness that descend after the sun goes down.  Christmas Day can sometimes disappoint.  Christmas Eve never does.

Proof of the use of an Amazon gift card*:

 (Below "Bringing Up Baby is Saramago's memoir.  When I finish with his novel, All the Names, either that, or the letters to the President book, will be my next read.)

One of our Christmas Eve rituals is cookie-baking.  I'm also baking a breakfast casserole and a coffee cake for tomorrow, so there'll be more kitchen activity than usual.  We also always visit a live Nativity scene one of the local churches has, then come back to open one gift each, then watch "The Muppet Christmas Carol."  

Mama, Daddy and I didn't really have any Christmas traditions, unless you call me having to pull these off Daddy's feet after a tough Christmas Eve at the store one:

 Each year, when we go to the Nativity scene, I wear these in honor:

Inside the boots will be a pair of handknit socks --- made from Deborah Norville's "Serenity" sock yarn.  Now, I'm no Deborah Norville fan, but Jo-Ann had the yarn on sale for a ridiculously low price, so I got some.  I bought 2 skeins each of 3 different colorways, and it turns out that I got a full pair out of just 1 skein.  How often does that happen?  This is the color I'm wearing:

It's beautiful worked up, and is nice and soft.  Maybe an early holiday miracle?

Have a Magnificent Christmas.  You've been a great support in a year that I needed constant boosting.  Thank you.



*This mostly for the benefit of Twinnie.

The Christmas Sock

For me, at least, this week has gone by the way adults like/need the few days before Christmas to go, and that children despise the few days before Christmas to go --- slowly.  Not at a snail's pace, mind you, but at a nice, manageable pace that let me breathe normally.  I was able to do what had to be done without being frantic.  I was able to check and double-check "What Must Needs Be Done" lists, deprived of that it-will-never-happen-now pit-of-the-stomach feeling.

Except for stockings.  Stockings are my annual fifth column.  They were a tad easier when the children were small, and little toys fit snug down in the heels and toes.  Now, though, they are pretty tough.

Stockings, to me, have always been the secret weapons of Christmas.  In all the hurry and flurry of getting to and unwrapping what's under the tree, they're sort of forgotten.  When someone does remember to get to them, what an opportunity there is for a final hurrah --- a primo elfin gift or two to finish off the day.  So, I tend to focus on stockings beyond candy and fruit --- hoping to find small treasures that will top the day off in a special way.  

 

(I'm sure a good deal of that comes from having a father who was a jeweler --- lots of fantastic, sparkly things can fit very nicely into a stocking.)

 

Another reason I'm such a fan of stockings is that they can come shaped as cowboy boots:

I have a boot-shaped stocking which hangs on my bedroom door each Christmas.  It's for decoration, as we each have cross-stitched stockings hanging from the mantle.  But, if someone felt compelled to slip something into it, there wouldn't be a fuss made.

Day, Day, Day. . .

Tough day Sunday, as I was weepy and guilt-ridden and sad.  I should know by now that grief truly does hit in waves;  it would be nice, though, if there were some sort of lifeguard to warn you when the tides begin to rise.

Maybe someone sorta like this:

Yesterday was full of errands, today was pretty much the same --- looking forward to tomorrow, when there's nothing going on during the day.  Tomorrow night, Hannah and I get to go see Briton in a reading of "The Seagull". And then, I think, we are all free for Christmas.

How's things in your neck of the woods?

Ten Essential Songs

1. "To Love Somebody" --- Bee Gees
2. "Words"--- Bee Gees
3. "Gold" --- Emmylou Harris
4. "American Trilogy" --- Elvis Presley
5. "Darkness, Darkness" --- Iain Matthews
6. "Take It Easy" --- Delbert McClinton
7. "Seven Spanish Angels" --- Ray Charles and Willie Nelson
8. "Amazing Grace"
9. "Tennessee Waltz"
10. "When A Man Loves A Woman" --- Percy Sledge

You?

If You Were Me Today

1.  You would have awakened after dreaming about your First Grade Boyfriend.

2.  You would have a Cat Stevens song stuck in your head.

3.  You would not be, nor would you have ever been, a Cat Stevens fan.

4.  You would be puzzled by the shape of the garment you are knitting, even though you are following the pattern to the letter.

5.  (You would think the garment is either upside down or backward --- either one not good.)

6.  You would have e-mailed your therapist 3 times over a raging argument with your daughter.

7.  You would have received an Amazon gift card from your amazing twin sister.
8.  You would have already spent the card.
9.  You would have been sent this awesome link by an awesome friend.

Guardian Angel Roxanne sent me (through facebook) to a page with some nice advice.  The best of the bunch for me just now:

Stop putting your own needs on the back burner.
 Stop trying to be someone you're not.
Stop being scared to make a mistake.
Stop trying to compete against everyone else.
Stop wasting time explaining yourself to others.
Stop trying to make things perfect.*
Stop trying to be everything to everybody.^
Stop worrying so much.#


*A common mom problem, I suspect.  Definitely a Me problem, having been raised by a woman who did seem to do every single thing perfectly.
^I know this is a mom deal --- trying to meet every child's needs.  It also dovetails into the making things perfect issue.  And I'm still trying to be everything to a person who isn't here any more.
# How easily typed, how near-impossibly done.

I Promise

One day, these posts won't be "Oh, Pitiful Me"-themed.  But that's pretty much where I am right now.

 

Briton is in his new apartment.  Yesterday was fairly exhausting, yet I had trouble getting to sleep last night.  I'm interested to see how he did his first night in the new place.  We're meeting up in just a little while to go get Hannah.  I don't think she had a very pleasant end to her semester, and I don't think she's going to want to talk about it, though we surely need to.  We simply can't keep spending what little money we have on sending her to school if she isn't going to be a student.

And need-to-do-s from Nashville are still rolling around in my head.  Basically, I'm in a constant state of near-panic.  Or, more accurately, near-panic-attack.  I just cannot get my mind to be still.  And trying to distract myself fails utterly.  Losing Mama --- hell, this whole year --- has made me realize how easily time can be wasted.  It can slip out from under you before you know it, and you never get it back.  What have I done this year?  A nervous breakdown.  And a half.  Couldn't find a job.  Now, trying to pull together a Christmas, funds are even scarcer than they were last year, my heart and mind and dealing with grief and loss and children's problems. . .  "Let this Christmas go," I've heard in my head more than once lately.  "There will be others."  Maybe.  But what if this one is our last one all really together?  What if, for everyone's sake, this needs to be a really fun holiday?  Who puts that together?  It's supposed to be me, I guess.  And I'm not up to the challenge.

Back in Athens, getting ready to move Briton into his apartment tomorrow, then go to Atlanta to bring Hannah home for the holidays Tuesday.  Thoroughly unsettled, body and mind.

Time

I am in Middle Tennessee.  Have been since Sunday night, actually.  I had wi-fi installed in Mama and Daddy's house today, so that when we come here in the future, we don't have to live computerless.

It has been an agonizing week.  I brought Finn with me, and discovered on the trip up --- discovered twice, to be exact --- that he gets carsick.  And he's been very (understandably) whiney when I've had to leave to undertake all this paperwork, then very (understandably) clingy when I return.  I've tried to keep my outings to a minimum, but what you find when you try to wrap up a deceased parent's affairs is that one necessary form always leads to at least two others.  And appointments must be made.  And it is cold and raining and then snowing, and you are on such an edge that you are eating your anti-anxiety medication like candy.  And when you finish a day's traversing, you start downing melatonin and ibuprofen PM so you can just go to sleep and not have to feel the panic anymore.

I've had people offer to come by, to talk to me on the phone, but I simply haven't been able to face that.  I've been so frantic, so distressed that I knew having to talk with anyone would undoubtedly send me right over the edge.  So I've lain here with my feet elevated and my heart pounding, and poor little Finn skooching up as close to me as he can get, begging not to pass out.  Or crack up.

And I have to come back and do this time and time and who knows how many more times again before everything is really done.

I just can't look at any of that right now.  It's too, too, too much.

Next Steps

The death certificates are supposedly on their way.  When they arrive, Finn and I will leave for Nashville.  I'm taking him for the company, and for the fact that he is the most high-maintenance of the pets, and Briton has a busy enough week ahead of him without having to "put up" with all of Finn's shenanigans.

 

We have Riley, Mama's cat, here with us now.  She, in her own house, was the most skittish cat I've ever been around, so you can imagine how timid she's being here with all the noise and paws and barking and general carrying on.  She has come to live under Hannah's bed --- Hannah made really good progress with her before she (Hannah) went back to school.  Again, since Finn is the most energetic soul in the house, his absence might prompt her to come out and explore a little.  Poor thing --- she's been through a lot.  I know she was right there with Mama when and after she died.

I don't know how long all the "getting things in order" will take me.  Briton moves into his own apartment the 12th, and I know he wants me here to help him.  But I can only go as quickly as the Williamson County, Tennessee bureaucracy will allow.  One of the very first things I'm going to do is make an appointment to have wi-fi installed in the house.  Whenever any of us is up there, I want us to be able to compute.  We used to just go to Borders, but. . .

I've got two bags of knitting packed, along with one I left up there.  I seem to be expecting an awful lot of downtime.  We shall see.

Does Anyone Else Have This Problem?

Each year, when the holidays are over, it seems to take forever to take down and pack away the decorations.  And some are always missed.  (There's a Nativity in an upstairs bookshelf that hasn't moved in three years.)  Yet, before all that, when the decorations are first being brought out and placed around the house, there never seem to be enough.  Only a couple of little areas in the house have very much Christmas going on.  

 

It's kind of sad.  And not in the heartwarming Charlie Brown kind of way.

 

No, our house just seems sort of bare.  Granted, there isn't much of a holiday budget this year, but aren't there nice, inexpensive ways to make each room feel Christmas-y?

 

 

Ah-Cheer

For someone who didn't actually see her daughter all that much in the last week, I have somehow managed to come down with the most aggravating symptoms of the head/chest cold that was wracking Hannah's health while we were in Tennessee.  Sore throat (actually, it feels like someone is rasping my throat with a saw), cough (which makes the throat even worse), fever, headache. . .  I feel miserable.  Thankfully, I guess, the death certificates have not arrived yet, so I don't have an imminent trip to Nashville.

 

 

(This is precisely how I feel.)

 

We brought Riley, Mama's cat, home with us, and have been trying to ease her into live at The Chez.  Hannah made some real breakthroughs in the last couple of days, with Riley volunteering to spend time with her --- even purring.  I've never, ever heard that cat purr.  It will be interesting to see if any of the progress is lost, now that Hannah is back in Atlanta, and won't be back until mid-December.  

The rather spindly little artificial tree that I bought after Christmas last year is up.  This is the first time in Briton and Hannah's lives that we haven't had a live tree.  But they understand.  The tree isn't decorated yet, but we'll get there.  The stockings are up, and a few Nativities are out. . .  It is beginning to maybe start to feel like Christmas.

How about at your house?

 

 

Either I'm handling Mama's death very well, or I am in complete denial, and the ton of bricks has yet to fall.

I sort of have to keep reminding myself that she's gone, you know?  I look at the first sentence of that last entry, and it's like that isn't happening to me.  I've cried, it isn't that.  But there's a composure that seems out of place.  I'm parentless now.  It's just me.

If I begin to think too far ahead, my head spins.  One little chore, one little step at a time, I keep telling myself.  Nothing can be done at all until I receive the death certificates, so staying still seems to be all I can do right now.

People keep telling me to get a lawyer, or an accountant.  I don't know anyone up there.  It makes my head hurt trying to pull it all together.  Since I'm the only child, shouldn't it be fairly straightforward and easy?  Haven't people with less intelligence than me managed estates successfully before?

I am giving myself the early Christmas present of calling off any more gift knitting.  What's done for the etsy shop is done, unless I'm truly in the mood to make something for there.  The sweater I was trying to get done for Briton was going painfully (in the literal sense;  tough yarn), so it got ripped out this afternoon.  And I could feel the load lighten.  Yes, I'm upset that I won't have it to give him, but I'm more relieved that there are no more deadlines looming over me.

The Work of Grief

My mother died last Wednesday.  At least we think it was Wednesday.  I had been trying to call her that afternoon and getting no answer, so I got in touch with my cousin, who got in touch with the police, and they got into her house to find her lying on the floor between the kitchen and den.  One of the officers said it looked to him she'd been dead between 8 and 18 hours.

I packed quickly (and poorly, it turned out) and got up there that night.  Since we have only one working car right now, Briton and Hannah had to cobble a trip up;  they arrived Saturday night.  Visitation was Sunday night, burial was yesterday (in a dismal rain.)

Mama had asked for a graveside service only, and had chosen the person from her church to say a prayer.  I read from Proverbs 31 (A Virtuous Woman), and it was done.

I'm thinking now of all the paperwork I will have to do when I go back up next week.  And I am overwhelmed.  And, I imagine, only now feeling all the sadness and loss that adrenaline and arrangements-making covered over until now.

'Tis the Season

Made this this weekend, and still can't get over how cute it is.  The snowflakes and "pearls" are cut from miniature garland, and just tacked on.

Made lots of little things this weekend: several seed stitch buttoned bracelets that are my "Goosebumps" series, a couple of wide buttoned cuffs, pet things.  Just a few sales is all I ask.  If you had told me last year that Christmas this year would be even grimmer, I wouldn't/couldn't have believed you.  But it is.  A year without a job does that to a holiday.

Because Alan is a Two-Time Knitters' Hunk, and Sam is Our Reigning KH

Sam Neill is crazy, wicked clever and funny.  He is also a winemaker who periodically asks his friends to contribute their Essential Listening music lists.  This is today's:

Alan Rickman

Special Guest  DJ Thespian LEGEND, Alan RICKMAN Star of Bottleshock (Just to show this is in some small way connected to wine.)
Ladies aanndd Gentlemen! Tonight only, direct from Broadway, the utterly unique and completely brilliant Alan Rickman, right here in the Dayglo Disco spinning his discs just for you. And you. And you two in the corner. Yes it's Alan Rickman ... NOW I have your attention. Yes, it's the man who brought you Snape in Harry Potter (if you're under 20), Valmont in the RSC's Dangerous Liaisons (if you are grown up), the bad guy in Die Hard, he IS Colonel Brandon, Truly Madly ... oh alright you’ve got the picture ... and masses of other luminous performances on stage and screen. He is, like his namesake Chicken Rickman, sexy, charismatic and very scary. And here he is ... RESPECT ... sashaying up to the turntables with a stack o’ wax under his immaculately cut  armpit -- give it up, if you please, for one of the greatest actors of his and any other generation -- the simply great, the inimitable the fantastic ...Alan RICKMAN!!

---

These are songs to have grown up with:
I Won’t Dance - Fred Astaire                                        
My hero. Completely disciplined, completely free.
I’m Easy - Keith Carradine                                 
From Robert Altman’s great film, Nashville.  The scene has an acting lesson from Lily Tomlin.
Lily, Rosemary, and the Jack of Hearts - Bob Dylan                                             
10am. Monday morning. RADA student. Our brilliant teacher, June Kemp, gets us moving.
The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face - Roberta Flack                                      
Just listen.
Desperado - Langley Schools Music Project
Recorded in a school gym in 1976. The singer is 9 years old.
Dancing in the Street - Martha and The Vandellas            
Just dance.
Real Good For Free - Joni Mitchell                                        
She says it all, really. No comment required.
Coney Island - Van Morrison                                      
Nostalgia about everything. Everywhere.
You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling - The Righteous Brothers                  
Last dance at the party. A red light bulb. The dregs of cheap wine.
Imagination - Little Jimmy Scott                                         
A great jazz singer rediscovered just in time.

---

Thanks to Alan from taking a few minutes from learning his lines and rehearsing Seminar for Broadway. Fascinating list, and illuminating too. Go see it if you can.
Oh, and when we said inimitable, we were exaggerating. In the Proprietor’s experience, AR has one of those voices that actors all over the world absolutely love to imitate. Like Michael Caine and Sean Connery. And Christopher Walken. It’s a compliment.
Anyway, we always love any Rickman performance.  What’s your favourite?
He is the Bee’s Knees. Practice your Rickman with that phrase ... mutter through your teeth with eyes half closed and a kind of hypnotic drone “...heeez the beeez neeez." Good.

Today

At my psychiatrist's office, I saw a woman who looks on the outside the way I feel on the inside.  It's the second time I've seen her, but it really hit me today.

 

She came into the waiting room with her head down, and sat in a chair in the farthest corner.  Her posture made her back curve and her torso cave in.  She had a little purse which she held (both hands) in her lap.  Her clothes were ill-fitting, her shoes were old.  She never moved.  Not a muscle.  Her mouth was slightly open, her hair mousy.  She looked so all alone and so pained.  There was nothing about her that hinted at happiness or satisfaction or friends or hope.

I saw myself today, turned inside out.

Good Company Makes A Good Meal

November 10, 2011

And I Read, Too

Just the other day, I told a friend of mine that Jose Saramago is my favorite author.  This weekend, I finished his Seeing, the sort-of companion to Blindness (one of my favorite books of all.)  It was, as all his work is, remarkable.  And though Saramago is my favorite author, my favorite writer is:

Heck, maybe he's my favorite reader, too!

Once I got finished with Seeing, I sped through two more books.  Both were fairly short, but so compelling it was hard for me not to read them.  One was Thunder Dog, about a blind man and his guide dog surviving the 9/11 attacks.  (ANYthing about service dogs --- I'm there.)  The other book was Scattershot, about a family with bipolar disorder.  And "family" here is literal --- both parents, and two of the three children suffer with it.  After all my mental health issues this year, it was both a comfort and a fright to read their struggle.

Knitting does continue.  I restarted Briton's Christmas sweater with a different color yarn --- just wasn't satisfied with my first choice.  I've got just a couple of facecloths to knit for Hannah, and all my knitting for her (so far as I know) will be done.  I'm doing little things for the etsy shop --- tree ornaments, brooches, that sort of thing.  I hope, I hope, I hope I get some traffic this year, because if I thought last year's Christmas was tough. . .  Twelve more months of unemployment have broken the back of this one.

Photo Essay: Finn Falls Asleep

It doesn't take him long.

Lately

I'm in a black mood.  Feel like I'm getting sick.  Feel like I'm flailing and thrashing about with no direction or anchor.  I'm mad.  I'm frustrated.  I can't sleep.  I want to be left utterly alone.

 

Dear God, please don't let this mean another medication has stopped working.

So, Yeah. I Went to Nashville.

And here are notes and pictures that were taken while there.

•  My inability to fall asleep at night has gone beyond nuisance.  It has moved into "crisis."
• Drivers in Middle Tennessee seem to forget that there are other people on the same roads as they are.
• I've finished 2 Christmas presents, and learned that my mother does not like the phrase "freakin' ________."  Got a classic Mom Look when I uttered it.
• My hot flashes are still on Eastern Time.  And on schedule.
• There really isn't anything quite like a fresh, hot Krystal.

•  The people across the street from my mother have two dogs.  One is a big Rottweiler mix, the other a little Chihuahua-y thing.  Guess who's the chatterer of the two. . .

• I am knitting a striped scarf out of Noro.  My mother's den is so dark, I have no idea what colors I'm working through.
• Fox News is bad enough, but my mother also watches "Dancing With the Stars."  I've seldom missed our blank, turned off TV screen more.
• Both children call me on the same night.  One call lasted a shade over an hour.  The second, 2 1/2 +.

• Chick-fil-A for breakfast.
• For the first time, on this trip, I am seeing my mother as an old, old woman.  Sad.
• Suddenly very weepy.  I don't feel like I belong anywhere.  Don't want to stay here (too sad), don't want to go back to Athens (too many responsibilities and issues).  Nowhere, except a nice hotel, is where I want to be.
• Guilt.

Esmerelda

Our darling, gimpy little cat, the light of Hannah's life, had to be euthanized last night.  It came completely out of nowhere;  the doctor thinks it was the FIP virus.  Finn alerted me to her;  it's unlikely we could have done anything even if we had gotten her to the clinic any earlier.

Calling Hannah to tell her what was going on was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do.  There's no soft, gentle way to break that kind of news.  And she lost all control.  She adored Esme.

A miserable, heartbreaking night.  We love you, Esme, and will miss you so very much.

Priorities

Before I give you the Tennessee slide show, and the bullet points of my trip to Nashville, let me say these things:

My darling Roxanne is blogging again!  The girl is HISSterical.  Give her a read.

The just-as-darling Jo reminds us that now's the time to knit scarves for the 2012 Special Olympics. I did this last time, and felt so involved.  Everything you need to know is here.

Go check out Knitter Bunny's fantastic double knitting rabbit scarf. It's her own design, and she did a great job.

Me?  I got some Christmas knitting done while I was gone.  Other details of my trip tomorrow!

News

My son, Briton, turned 23 today.  How can that be?

 

I'm heading to Nashville tomorrow.  No computer there.  So my silence isn't surliness --- it's an actual inability to communicate.  See you late next week.

 

 

The Story of My Life

The whole world is knitting hexagons

 and I'm makin' triangles.

Who Could Ask For More

(I am assuming, of course, that there is storage for knitting supplies in the other corner.)

Fall Comes to Athens

A fairly representative sample of the lack of color around here.  Too many pine trees, not enough leafed.

Still knitting like a fiend.  This project was to be for the etsy shop, but I am so in love with the feel and color of the yarn, I'm going to have to keep it for myself.  (It will be a cowl.)

The color is "Sweet Potato" from KnitPicks, and, I swear, I can smell and practically taste sweet potatoes when I just look at it.  I was skimming around the KnitPicks site the other day, and was devastated to see that this color is being discontinued.  Would that there were enough money in my bank account to buy all that they have.
Finished my first Who's Feet scarf:

 Thirteen feet and three inches altogether.  It will be given to the first Whovian I ever knew, my best friend Lisa.  (Who probably doesn't read this, so no worries.)

For Myself

In all the manic knitting I'm doing for selling, I had to stop and make myself a pair of socks.  Remember I told you about the "Good 'n' Plenty yarn?

 This was my first use of elasticized sock yarn.  I like it.

Just Cool Photos

This is my crazy cute daughter at one of her favorite places, an anime convention:

These two men are Strauss and Brahms:

This is a bit of philosophy I'm finding helpful these days:

This is one of my heroes, and the inspiration for this blog's title:

This is a glorious picture.  Even the bear is in awe:

This is the first model hand eye crafts has ever had:

This has pretty much been my year so far:

How you doin'?

Entitled

“Harpo played the right instrument. He was an angel.There was nobody like him, there never will be anybody like him. He was just simply wonderful. He never had a bad word for anybody… not like me.I at least occasionally say something. But Harpo… they don’t make that kind anymore.”
-Gummo Marx

Currently

I'm making myself a pair of socks out of yarn with these colors:

It's like I'm knitting in a movie theater lobby.

Question

How is it that I suddenly have a subscription to Knit Simple magazine?  Has someone out there anonymously gifted me?

Thank you.

Saturday Night

Daughter came home from school Thursday, but she and Son are both in Atlanta tonight.  He and his girlfriend are at a concert --- they gave Daughter a ride here . So I'm facing an empty nest in the literal and the figurative sense.

With all the things that have gone on with me this year, Empty Nest syndrome never made it on my radar.  I don't know why --- maybe because Daughter came home every other weekend last year.  This year, the weekends she has been here, fights have broken out between all possible combinations of the three of us.  In fact, the last time she was here, it got so bad that she asked to be taken back to Atlanta immediately.  Broke my heart.  And maybe I've been over-checking, trying to make sure that she and her brother are alright, that things are okay between them and me --- I'm completely at a loss as to how to handle either one of them right now.

Haven't seen my psychiatrist since I had to cancel my post-surgery appointment.  And I am out of my main anti-depressant.  Went to therapy on Thursday, but all I could do was sit and cry.  Nothing got accomplished.  Crying is my default mode lately.  My children don't like me to cry, so they sort of tune out when I start.  And today, when I called my mother, and began to choke up, she told me not to cry.  I can't help it.  I'm just incredibly teary lately.  But no one will allow me the room and the freedom to just let go.

Until this afternoon.  Almost as soon as they were out the door, the floodgates opened.  And I'm about to let go again right now.  What is wrong with me? 

Other than living with the majority of major life stressors on just about any list you can find.

Of a Wednesday

Still cannot get over the knitted Bee Gees.  Maurice is especially spot-on.  I did a needlepoint pillow top of the "Main Course" album (the one right behind the dolls), and had a yoked shirt with that "Bee Gees" logo embroidered on the back.  I had/have the Gibb fever bad.  Ask anyone I went to high school with.  Or anyone who spends more than a half hour with me.

 

Back to the chiropractor with me today.  My right shoulder was out of joint.  Go figure.  There is just so much going on with my body right now, I can't keep up.  And it's hard to know what is influencing what, what is standing alone.  The worry over that is leading to panic attacks.  Which, I found out this afternoon, my mother is afraid will lead to a heart attack.

 

Yep --- I needed another dire circumstance idea planted in my head.

 

 

I'm Just Sayin'

So Let's See

A week ago, I have my gall bladder taken out very suddenly. I'm bruised from stem to stern, with all the internal pain that goes along with that.

So I've been sleeping a bit awkwardly, first in the hospital with the IV, then at home to avoid the discomfort.

A few weeks ago, I took that horrid fall that resulted in what I'm convinced was a concussion.

For how many months, I've been stressed by my life. And I've found out I carry my tension on my left side.  Lots of stress, lots of pressure for my left side to be carrying.

The last two nights, I had such a pain in my left neck that I was on the verge of tears.  I could tell one of my vertebrae was out of line, that I needed my chiropractor, but I figured I could white-knuckle it.  Maybe it would get better.

Last night, I was in an agony I don't believe I've ever experienced before.  Pain and fear and pain.  I hung on until about 9 PM so I could take some Percocet (I'm running out), but had to gave in and called my chiropractor.  At home.  After not seeing him for a couple of years.

He saw me this morning and declared me "A wreck.  A physical mess."

But he popped my neck back into place.  And worked on my back, which caused me the first pain I've every felt during an adjustment. A good pain, I suppose, but still a hurt. Told me to take double doses of Aleve today and tomorrow, go back and see him Monday.  He proclaimed my neck problem "solved."

That eased my mind some.  And I've had to say it to myself several times since I've been home.  I am uncomfortable and nearly out of pain medication and by myself.  (Briton has been with his girlfriend this whole time.  Hannah's working the haunted house in Atlanta every weekend.)  Not embarrassed to say I've been scared to the point of having to melt Ativans under my tongue and get my feet up higher than my head so I won't faint.

Don't go back to the surgeon for another couple of weeks, but will definitely be calling the office and begging for an extension on pain meds come Monday.  Some calmer tonight, thanks to the chiropractor.  But sapped of the crazy knitting urge.  Which is bad on two levels: not getting things made for the etsy shop, and not giving me something to think about other than what's happening inside my body.

Catch-Up

Pretty sure my hospitalization for depression is now out the window;  the pending gall bladder bills will eat up all that trust fund money.

Since I got home, the need to knit has been impossible to tamp down.  Don't know why, exactly --- I've gone a couple of days without knitting before.  But this is crazy, almost primal.  Same (little less concentrated) goes for reading.

I have a place (I hesitate to call it a "blog") on tumblr, and the number of people, especially young people, who knit and are excited about knitting there is so delightful.  Some of them are fearless, which inspires me.

And it's cowls this year, isn't it?  The thing to knit.  Oh, and the beekeeper quilt.  I'm not seeing any hexipuffs in my future, but I do like the cowls.  This is my favorite so far:

The Lemon Twist Cowl.  Very simple, and a nice fit.

I bruise sickeningly easily.  You can imagine what color my tummy is, with 4 laproscopic sites there.  And my left arm, where there were 2 separate IV lines.  But look at my right arm:

 To the left is where they tried (just tried, now) to put an IV in.  The big bruises are from --- my right hand on this --- the blood pressure cuff.  Granted, they took my blood pressure every two hours, but, still. . .
 I'm feeling alright.  Still very sore, but I'm trying to ration out my pain meds.  Have only needed the anti-nausea pills once, which is good.  I go see the doctor in about 3 weeks.  This has all been a disconcerting blur;  I scarcely remember any of it, even when I try to put it all together. 
And I woke up today with a crick in my neck.  Very painful.  The crick has caused me to hold my head at all sorts of weird angles all day, which has only added to the pain.  Think I'm going to have to break into my ration plan to get any sleep tonight.

My Dear Twinnie

Just made these:

 Without a pattern.

I'm so proud.

Ten on Tuesday --- Headlines From the Year I Was Born

I love this kind of thing.

1. John F. Kennedy elected President.
2. The first star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame is presented --- to Joanne Woodward.
3. Adolph Eichmann captured/kidnapped.
4. Nikita Krushchev pounds his shoe in anger on UN table.
5. Gary Powers and his U2 spy plane shot down over Soviet Russia.
6. "Psycho" the top-grossing movie of the year.
7. Harper Lee wins the Pulitzer for To Kill A Mockingbird.
8. New words that soon become commonplace: "anchorman," "sit-in,"
   "cosmonaut," "laser."
9. Astroturf, rayon and the felt-tip pen make their first appearances.
10. Chubby Checker introduces "The Twist."

What A Long, Strange Weekend It's Been

I made myself get up early Saturday morning (to beat gameday/tailgating shoppers) and get to the grocery for a few necessities: cat litter, cat food, cases of soda, etc.  All sort of heavy.  By late Saturday afternoon, a pain had developed right under my ribcage --- I figured it was a pulled muscle or something, but it just wouldn't go away.  Or ease up at all.

Finally, around 8 or so Saturday night, I got Briton to take me to the hospital.  It's my gall bladder.  And it needs to come out.  This is SO totally out of left field. . .  But the next thing I know, I'm scheduled for Sunday morning surgery.

Which goes well, except I apparently thrashed around while coming out from the anesthesia --- I woke up shackled to the bed in Recovery.  They're willing to let me go home, but my blood pressure is a tad low, so they keep me until today.

And now I'm home, with no less than six prescription drugs to take.  (My 3 anti-depressant/anxiety ones plus an antibiotic, an anti-nausea and an anti-pain.)  And no gall bladder.

It's a sort of a whirlish blur.  I'm going to have to read all the orders they sent home with me to try to make sense of it.  Right now I'm sore, and the Percocet is taking hold, and I just really want to knit.

How was your weekend?