Forward

Life is being lived around here these days. News and blogs bring lots of other horrible shit happening all around us, and I think there's no escaping it. When I rule the world, babies will be born healthy and on time, people will settle their differences by talking about it, or maybe with a good healthy arm-wrestling session followed by beers at the local pub, and no one will avoid going to the doctor because it will cost too much. In the meantime, though, all I can do is try to counteract the shit by being the best person I know how to, for my sons, for myself, and for all of you who have been so wonderful, supportive, and caring. I'd been wallowing in a lovely bout of self pity for a while, and then the IBOL guy linked to this site, and I started to realize that people came out of the woodworks to shower me and my little guys with love, help, prayers and hugs, and I was finally able to see that, while I miss Rick and my life will always have that scar on it, I am well and truly blessed by beautiful friends and family, both in person and on-web. It was humbling to sit back and think about the grace that appeared in my life when I needed it most. So anyway, thanks.

(Also, thanks for the birthday wishes for my little man. He's so big, I can hardly stand it.)

In other news, I can has a job! I interviewed for this position back in July and thought for sure they'd filled it already, but Tuesday I got a call from the HR Guy asking for my references. I sent them off, and last thing Friday afternoon, the hiring manager called and offered me the job. It's local, it pays the bills, it gets me out of the house and allows me to talk to new people, and I'm thrilled. I don't start for a few weeks, which gives me some time to get my house in order and get a few new work outfits and a haircut and such. To say I am relieved is the understatement of the century.

In addition, I am going to Taos! I'd planned to go months ago, when Rick was still in decent health, but thought that plan was gone because of all that happened. Since I still have a bit saved, and I know that I won't be homeless anytime in the immediate future, I decided I'd take my boys, meet my stepdaughter there, and we'd have a little vacation. Squish, Angie? Get ready, I can't wait!

In knitting knews, there has been some. B-side grows slowly, mostly because 280+ stitches per row + sport weight yarn + slow knitter = glacial growth. It is growing, though, and I love the fabric it's making. I'm ready to start the increases and hope to be ready to divide for fronts and back by the time I leave for Taos later in the week. This is relatively close to the color of the actual yarn, or as close as I could get it with my limited color-balancing abilities.



Now, if you'll excuse me, it's shaping up to be a beautiful day (the Sonoran desert has the inverse of everyone else's weather - we're just coming into the "outside" season, opening our houses to soft breezes and tweeting birds after the crushing heat of the summer) and I think I'll take my boys to the zoo. And maybe, if they're really lucky, to the carwash where the bunny lives.

Mommy math

+ 4 years =




Happy birthday, Bubba.

Yeah, well.

This blogging thing is kinda hard work sometimes. I used to think in status updates and blog posts, and now I mostly don't think in any technological form at all. I still waste time on the web, and have been enjoying my first audio book (after all, why not? I loved being read to as a kid), but mostly my life is pretty devoid of its public presence. I think it's natural. I know that friends and family don't want to dwell on Rick's absence, and talking about him is much of what I want to do, so instead I talk TO him, and spare them (and you). I never realized just how much of my social outlet he was - work was much of the rest of it, and now that they're both gone, I don't really talk to people much. I always knew I was a hermit at heart. ;-)
The thing I figured out recently, why I can’t wrap my head around the fact that Rick is gone for good, is that it was so ordinary. I felt like the earth should have shaken, or tornados and hurricanes should have raged, or something. I think we go through lives with this "it won't happen to me or my family" attitude, but OF COURSE it will. It makes me wonder if, in places that are not the US, where we’ve insulated ourselves from death, if death really is ordinary. I mean, it’s part of life, we all have to do it, but it was such a spectacularly awful thing that it really feels to me like there can’t be nice days without Rick, and the whole world should have stopped and mourned with me. The fact that everything just went on, except for our little lives, is so strange and unreal, you know? I wonder if everyone feels a loved one’s death like this, or if in places where people aren't so insulated, where they are more attuned to the whole life cycle of things, they say, “Well, that’s that. I’ll miss him, but I have to weed the garden.”

Anyway. Enough now. I have come to the conclusion that I couldn't bear to work on any of the knitting from "before", so I started some new things. (Oooh, lookit me, I'll use any excuse for startitis.) For a few weeks, I couldn't even knit at all, but my hands needed to do something, so I appliqued. You know, because nothing goes with a long, 100+ for-days-heat-spell like appliqued snowmen. This is as far as I got, because the siren song of new knitting called, and I answered.



Here is the knitting. This is a seriously long term project, since it is done on smallish needles with sport weight yarn and is knit back and forth in one piece. Lawdy I have got to get skinnier if I want more handknit sweaters. Anyway, it's B-Side, by Laura Chau, in the Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool that Joan sent me.


(Colors are so far off in this photo as to be almost completely unrelated.)

Finally, this is not a project, but a cool thing. I have a DARTH VADER TIN. Yes, it's true, I am the coolest space nerd out there. There is no one cooler/nerdier than I. My supercool nerdiosity is the greatest.

Back to the business of living

It's slow going, for sure. First, let me thank you again for all the wonderful comments. He was a great man, and he was loved by many.
Several people commented about how everyone should be loved like that, and I think that most people are. You just might not know it. So if you have someone special - a husband, wife, mother, father, aunt, uncle, child, friend, teacher, whatever - I'd like to humbly suggest you create such a list for that person and SHARE IT. I know Rick knew I loved him with my whole heart, but I also know he didn't know half of the whys, and I'll never be able to share it with him. Please, if you are inclined, don't wait any longer.

I also wanted to bring your attention to Iraqi Bundles of Love. Read the site for details, but the gist is that you make a bundle of sewing or knitting supplies, send it to the IBOL Guy whose unit is stationed in northern Iraq, and the local authorities will distribute the supplies to women in the area. Time is short - you have to have these things in the mail by Sept 7, but truly, we all have stashes we can dig into, I'm sure. Mailing instructions are there, and you just leave a comment to get the address emailed to you. I'll be sorting through my quilting stash this afternoon.