a sense of time

My beautiful landscape as seen from the second floor deck off the kitchen. I grab the little camera and step out into a surprisingly mild evening. On my long walk in the park today I heard songbirds somewhere in the trees. It will come. The thing called Spring. Meanwhile the tiger stripes on the snowy mountain mesmerize once again -- how many years have I seen this sight? How many photos have I taken -- and each one slightly different? Will I ever be able to leave this place?

Too many things to do these days. My husband dealing with a serious medical condition, decisions to be made, myriad details to pull together, places we have to go. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed. I've stopped pretending everything is fine to him or anyone else and just allow myself to be who I am at the moment. I met up with my friend Joan for lattes yesterday morning. Joan  is a serial knitter a hundred floors above me who is designing and teaching. She surprised me with a gorgeous skein of mink yarn. Mink! 100%! (Trendsetter). It was so thoughtful -- and the yarn is amazing. It's brushed from the undercoat of the minks twice a year -- apparently the minks are treated well ("with respect") because an unhealthy animal's hair won't make a beautiful yarn. So no animals were harmed in the making of this yarn. This particular skein is hand-dyed, making it even more delicious to work with.

As soon as I got home I immediately began knitting a Colonnade shawl/scarf (Stephen West Designs). There is just enough yardage for it (if not I'll finish the lace edging with some cashmere that I have in a similar color combo). What a pleasure it is to work with. I realized that I haven't done much knitting in the last couple of months. A pair of hand warmers for a friend, a pair of socks for another friend. A couple (or more) UFOs will, hopefully, be finished soon. But when I touched this yarn I put everything else aside and remembered, as I worked, that this kind of knitting is therapy for me. A meditation that takes up a piece of my overactive mind and forces me to let go as my hands do their thing and I have to count stitches or purl, or yarn over.... It's what got me through a couple of intense sessions recently. I've only been able to blog about once a week lately, and will continue to do so until some space opens up in my life. Soon, I hope. Meanwhile, I'll just enjoy the view, the yarn, a good book, and allow love to envelope me from many different angles.