A quick late run to the store, we’re out of milk.

Got my cart, got the milk, that was it, but then I thought, you know, we *are* low on veggies…

Turned thataway. There–I hadn’t thought of that, but you know, an acorn squash seemed just the thing to celebrate a fine October dinner with and they’re small enough for two. (Even if the outside color still doesn’t make it a green veggie.) Eh, I’m done.

I got in the shortest line, wondering what all these people were doing shopping after 9 pm too.

And of course found out in slow motion why it had been the shortest line. I was standing there five, then ten minutes with the same small group being waited on, the manager coming and going, all of them increasingly trying not to be flustered.

The clerk was. I’d never seen her before and she certainly seemed new. She flicked her long hair out of her way in annoyance. Finally one of the people grabbed an item and walked back into the aisles with a huff to put it back away.

More waiting for him to come back. Maybe he was searching for the right aisle.

Meantime, a woman had come up from behind. I tried to figure out how to rescue her from being stuck there too without making the clerk’s evening any worse. We smiled at each other; as the minutes ticked on, we shrugged our shoulders ever so slightly and chuckled together. She chose not to look for another line, although others were opening up. Not to be in a hurry.  She came across as someone you’d want to get to know the moment you met her.

And then to my surprise she finally said something–but not at all about the line but rather, “What is that?”

That was so unexpected that it took me a second as I followed her glance. Oh wait–the acorn squash?

“Yes, what is that? What do you do with that?” And then, “Is it bitter?”

No, it’s not bitter, and I explained cutting it in half, scooping out the little bit of string and seeds and microwaving or baking it; that we liked ours with a little maple syrup on it.

She made an appreciative “Ooh” at the mention of maple syrup.

By her accent and features I would guess she was from India. The items she’d placed on the conveyor belt so far were foods of Mexican origin. I was charmed: here was someone with the courage to move to a very different new place and the curiosity to try, clearly, everything. And with the patience of Job.

Finally my milk and squash were being scanned, and in my delight at my fellow shopper I somehow relayed it in my face to the flustered clerk–who was startled to see herself being smiled at, that was the last thing she expected just then! She rang me up quickly and I thanked her.

And then the person coming up behind was more gracious still. I can only imagine what a relief it was to that person trying to get the hang of her new job.

It is amazing to me how the sudden impulse to go down the produce aisle, and then to pick something other than, say, carrots, made such a difference–and the change in tone in that line all came because the woman behind me assessed the situation and felt that she had all the time and the heart to give in this new world of hers. However long she’d been here.

There was a larger crowd than usual tonight. People turned out; I think we all had an extra need for that sense of community. I got to hold a two-week-old baby wearing the tiniest, finest little handknit socks, to see (among others) a friend who’s been away at grad school, another who’s almost done with her cancer therapy whose presence I have so keenly missed.

She was wearing a pretty handdyed hat knitted by Kelli. Kelli hasn’t been able to knit for I think a year due to severe inflammation in her hands. But. She wanted to do that for her anyway, and so there it was.

Richard explained a little more today about yesterday’s having been weird: there had been reverse-911 robocalls to the Cupertino/Sunnyvale area, so the daycares knew before the school officials had arrived to find out; thus there were a lot of them that simply shut down before the workday started. (Note: the man was found this morning, and he died in a shootout with the police without the loss of any more lives other than his own.)

And so, in the midst of the grief and scare and loss of the day, small children were at the office doing small-child type things: being cute, running around, playing, finding joy in each other’s company and charming everybody while keeping Important Things from getting done, no doubt. New things to explore! New faces to meet! Cool!

And then tonight at Purlescence, surrounded by my friends, I got to hold one of the newest of the new.

I had an obstetrician a goodly while ago who had a poster set prominently in his waiting room, so that it was the first thing you saw when you entered his office suite: “A baby is God’s opinion that the world should go on.”

The next vote on funding CIRM again is soon, the ten years are almost up. So much has been done, so much needs more time.

———

“Wait–so you drove right into that!?”

“Well, not in…”

“That’s in. Mathilda goes to that part of Cupertino. If I’d known that’s where it was, I’d have called you. If I’d known that’s where you were going to be…” He shuddered, blaming himself, which he totally didn’t deserve. With everything else going on, he’d forgotten today was the day and he’d had no idea where the place was.

“I didn’t know till I got home. There was a helicopter right above me, I’ve never seen one that looked like that before.”

“That was it. They were looking.” And not just with one helicopter.

——–

Today was the day the Parkinson’s Research Institute in Sunnyvale held an openhouse re its stem cell work; I got a personal invitation from Chris Stiehl (whom I met at a Lupus Research Institute day),  the man in charge of patient advocacy within the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, the taxpayer-funded initiative to entice top researchers to work in California to potentially find cures for many diseases.

And I have a childhood friend with young-onset Parkinson’s.

Many of the attendees were a large group of high school students on a field trip. There were tables, displays, passionate people ready to show and answer and inspire.

The director of the project answered any and all questions, including mine. She told me in an aside of her great hope to spark a desire in these kids to go into research, to foster a love for science so that they could go out and change the world. There was so much that was so close; we so badly needed more scientists. She said she herself had stayed here expressly because of CIRM.

I told her that one of my children had had a high school biology teacher who had inspired her to follow in her footsteps, and thus her doctoral thesis in viral crystallography was recently published in (and she recognized the prestigious journal.)

The woman was very pleased. We talked about how good it was that finally, finally, research is beginning to be made available not just to those who subscribe to the terribly expensive periodicals; she explained to another woman with us, while I nodded yes, that it could cost $30 just to read one article online.

I didn’t wait for the walk through the lab, though I’d have liked to have seen it; I’d been on my feet for awhile and decided I’d gotten what I’d come for and headed for home.

Where there was that large helicopter flying fairly low over the freeway and then off towards the foothills. Didn’t seem to be monitoring road traffic. I had no idea.

Richard, meantime, came to work to find people in the parking lot talking about the man not far from there who’d shot his co-workers early this morning and fled, shooting and carjacking others in his path, as it turned out. Their kids’ schools were on lockdown. What do you do, what do you do. (And no they haven’t caught the guy yet as I type this.)

Then he told me the other reason it was a very very hard and weird day at work, terribly hard for everybody.

That Steve Jobs had passed.

My heart goes out to all those families.

I remember when Steve cold-called my husband and tried to armwrestle him into coming to work for him at NeXT. Richard didn’t take him up on it; a good friend did accept an offer there, though. Silicon Valley is a small place. It is a measure of Steve’s quest for perfection that being asked to work for him was the highest compliment one could offer an engineer.

Rest in peace, Lehigh Plant workers. Rest in peace, Steve. Thank you for being passionate about making things that worked with utter clarity, simplicity, and grace. Every person who has ever touched a computer since the first time you did owes you: you changed the electronic world and demanded to the end that it be made better.

I can only imagine what your kids will accomplish. Maybe someday one of them will be the one to find a cure for pancreatic cancer.

If only there had been one already. Let’s get that research funded and let’s get it going.

Listened to Conference today again; it’s a two-day multi-session thing. (The Sea Silk project got finished.)

Quentin Cook, one of the last speakers, started to tell a story.

Okay, back up: he first made the point that bad things happen to good and bad people alike and those who would judge the ones that bad things happen to, just don’t get it.

But it is amazing how all the personal tributaries that flow into the Mississipi River of the lives of all of us eddy and tumble together. As soon as he started into his tale, I knew exactly who he was talking about: I’d read the biography by the man’s son about his father. Then he named the name. Yup.

There were six young Mormon missionaries nearly 100 years ago whose missions to Great Britain were ending at the same time and they were going to return to the US together. With much hype going on about the world’s greatest ship, the fellow named Alma booked passage for them all on that one.

And then one missionary simply could not make it that day and was going to have to ship out a day later alone. The chance at a trip of a lifetime, gone.

Alma said no way no how are we leaving you doing that long trip by yourself; you’re going with us. We’re just going to have to re-book our tickets and that’s that.

But, but!

No buts, we’re going together.

Which is why they weren’t on the Titanic.

Which is why, nearly 100 years later… I have the best daughter-in-law anybody could ever ask for and an adorable little grandson who has totally stolen our hearts.

Alma, Kim’s great-grandfather, was generous to the one who was disappointed.

Small choices matter.

“Go in a half hour?”

“At shove o’clock on a Saturday?” Eh. Sure.

Rather to my surprise I actually quite enjoyed today’s Costco trip: we ran into our friend Lisa, and then a mutual friend spotted us, one of Michelle’s friends growing up, and he asked after Michelle and Lisa and I asked after him and it was a grand old reunion over by the apples and pears.

And you know? I was feeling a sense of gratitude towards every single person who was trying to be careful not to block much less cream anybody nor put their cart where someone might back into it. People were looking out for people whom they didn’t know, constantly, even if on some level it was hidden. The intent to do good was there, visible all around for the seeing.

It was such a balm. I got one woman to look up and laugh by catching her eye as I oh oops! and moved my cart out of her way. She’d looked harried and distracted before that moment; I saw her smiling at the next person as she went on by.

I think that’s the thing I keep learning over and over: it’s the bad events that remind me how important the little good things are. As if I’d somehow forgotten. Or maybe, didn’t remember enough. Today, at least, I did.

With a random August picture of Parker thrown in.

There were maybe three times today all day when a small random flock–finches, towhees, titmice, juncos–flew in and grabbed a snack, quick, and scrambled out of sight.

It was very odd to have it so still out there. Even the squirrels barely showed, and when they did their behavior was very subdued: Don’t squirt me bro!

I didn’t see the hawks, but I have no doubt they were seeing me.

I had things to get done. Two packages to get off, one with the four hats going off to Vermont for flood relief, a card tucked inside each with a quick note of what yarns it was made of, who dyed the one from Vermont, and that Judy Sumner had given me it; I wanted to convey a sense of we’re all in this thing together. (I tucked in a few soft sweaters, too.) And this time I insured it.  Because…

I went home after talking to the postal clerk and found an actual place on the USPS website where I could send a message saying, this is the tracking number, this is the date sent, and a Kid Seta and cashmere Rabbit Tracks scarf in red disappeared after Aug 30 on its way to Germany to a recently-retired Army vet who served in Afghanistan. (I wanted them to feel a sense of responsibility to honor one who has given and served much; I certainly do.)

I went to Purlescence tonight, got to see Jasmin and Gigi and a whole bunch of people and talk and listen and soak in the yarny essence of everything and just in case, looked and found a pretty close match on the Kid Seta. I’ve got more of the laceweight cashmere. But the hesitance was in the thought, if I don’t buy it the original will show up, right? Just a little more hope a little longer.

At one point, Kay walked around the room handing out copies of Piecework Magazine’s new Knitting Traditions issue. We were all thumbing through it, reading it, admiring things in it, when Kay, who had by then sat down and was doing likewise, exclaimed suddenly, “Ohmygosh! That’s Ruth!” (She may have said “Ruth’s” with me missing the s.)

Wait, what? I didn’t see any pictures of…

Sandi (sitting on floor, left and front) came over and apologized for having forgotten to tell her it was in there:  Ava Coleman had an article in there on christening gowns, and as an example showed the beautiful lace gown she had knit for her granddaughter.

Ava happens to be Sandi’s mom (correction and thank you Kathy: her former mother-in-law–I knew that… It’s just that she’s the only mom to Sandi I’ve ever known, and they’re such a natural fit of caring, talented, knitterly people.)

Now I got it: that wasn’t someone’s following the same pattern as… That WAS Ruth’s!

It took me longer than it should have: for the little girl, I was saying a prayer pretty quickly. But her mother too needed serious help and they clearly needed intervention.

It took awhile last night for me to acknowledge the sense of being tapped on the shoulder: Ahem.

Yes. Yes, I do hear You, I’m sorry, I’m on it. And I added a prayer for the woman who pushed me yesterday, and then the older woman with them and then all three of them together, but to be honest, it was with a sense of reluctance and of giving up on the one.

I wrote that post, I said that prayer, I knitted, I did my treadmill time, and as I racewalked, I kept being drawn back to the mystery of them: how had they come to this point? Was there anything anyone could do to make a difference? Thank heavens it (presumably) wouldn’t have to be me again–but the one thing I could do is say another prayer and mean it a little more from the heart this time.  And so I did.

It became easier to.

The thought settled in, as I hoped that maybe that was her lowest point at a bad time in her life and that perhaps it might shock her into seeing what she had become: she had assaulted the one person around whom she couldn’t just brush it off later as Oh, I bumped into someone. Rather, she pushed hard the one person around whose sense of balance was via tactile feedback, so that there was a very large and very public display of danger to that person in direct consequence to her actions and that she had to have had to dodge, although at that point I was suddenly not paying any attention to her to be sure of that. (As Richard on the other side turned to see and grabbed to steady the suddenly projectile cart.)

Lots of people saw. She could walk away but she would not be able to get away from herself on this one. Nobody yelled at her, nobody stopped her, nothing else she could project the blame onto.  Just her. She has to live with it.

I see two potential paths from there: either she refuses to acknowledge to herself any fault for anything anytime.

Or if only. She wishes she’d done better and tries to make up for it by treating others better from here on out. Maybe not now, maybe later; I think of a story Rachel Remen tells of one of her older patients glad for her cancer, wishing for retribution for the many evils she wished now at last she hadn’t done in her life, finally acknowledging them out loud. Dr. Remen heard story after terrible story of this woman who’d been a child in a war zone trying to survive alone, carrying that anger into adulthood, and realized, “I am her first witness.”

What a horribly long wait to begin to heal emotionally.

One of the things I’ve learned is that when you pray for someone, the answers don’t always come fast, they don’t always come in the ways you expect or even understand at first, and they very often come through other people.

May that woman encounter the other people she needs in the way she needs at the times that she needs. Starting right now seems to me would be good.

As I continued to say those prayers last night and today, I found myself increasingly able to give the whole scene up to God and, as far as anything concerning myself, to let it go.

Not your usual Costco shopping trip. We had checked out and were heading towards the door and it was actually less crowded than many a Saturday, when a woman we’d seen earlier, her small daughter in her cart and her mother (I assume) with her, was haranguing them (still) in their language; our guess was it sounded like Chinese.

We had not at any time made eye contact nor interacted in any way except that I had, on the far side of the store a little earlier, smiled briefly at the little girl as we passed by.  She was being well behaved.  Her mother reeked of anger.

I guess I was not walking as fast as the woman wanted me to. I barely saw her coming up from behind just a moment before it happened. There was plenty of space to go around. She instead actively pushed me hard (and my cane, since she was on that side) out of her way. There is no question it was a deliberate act.

Richard was on the other side of the cart and didn’t see till I went flying, totally akimbo, balance blown, grabbing the cart with my other hand to keep from breaking a hip: *I* know what my bone scan looked like after that mega steroid treatment in the hospital, (200 mg/day) even though she could not have.

Everybody behind stopped in horror while those women marched determinedly on, ignoring the fuss.

It was an interesting discussion on the way home: Richard was telling me that co-workers of his had described to him how, in the open-air markets back home, the old women were the worst–they would simply snatch what they wanted out of your hands and didn’t care whose toes they stepped on.

I love that we live in a diverse, culturally rich area. But those people today live here now and you do not assault disabled strangers.

We were too stunned to react (and I was too busy trying not to fall), but for any next time should there be one, my husband and I now have an agreement: next time he will plant his 6’8″ not-small body in front of the woman, who made a point of acting as if she had nothing to do with that and no knowledge of it, and tell her that she is going to wait with us while he calls 911. Because next time I will probably break that hip. I was very fortunate.

Now pardon me, I have a back to go put an icepack on. Good knitting time, at least.

————-

(Added a few hours later, after I’ve had time to process the above and settle down.)

The report I got is that Judy Sumner‘s daughter put on her favorite music this morning, and at the third song, Judy quietly slipped away to be with her waiting husband Len. She would laugh out loud if she heard me say WIP in peace, dear Judy. Thank you for everything.

So I was talking to someone at Purlescence tonight who used to work for a major bank, and she told me that every time they did an upgrade, a few accounts somewhere got totally messed over.

That made me feel better because at least it made sense. Not that it happens at all, but that it had clearly happened to us.

Ours did a major upgrade just yesterday, as it turns out; I found that out when I tried to log in today, tried again, tried again, got a Contact Us message only, and finally gave up and called the number.

I got told the unbelievably-bad-PR line that I had to have my husband vouch for me, either on the phone or in person, that I had his permission to use our joint account.

Wait, *what!?*

I said we had had that account for 15 years, not to mention it was a community property state. Besides, all I wanted to do–but that I really really wanted to do for now–was to transfer my son his college tuition money.

The woman on the line took care of that for me but told me I needed to come in in person with proof of my social security number: the one I was giving her was not accepted.

They’d clearly assigned me a random string of numbers to replace mine and that’s all their computer would take. I still don’t even know what it was, since I couldn’t see it. They did the same thing to the login ID.

I went in, glad we had a local branch. Not what I’d planned to do with my day, but glad that I’m mobile, at least, so that I could do it. I told the woman who ushered me over the first thing I’d been told on the phone, and she exclaimed an indignant, “WHAT?!”

Got that one on my side!

She could not fix it. She tried again. She called over to her manager for help. She said I would get a confirmation email of my new password, and she called our son to get his okay, but apologized that it would have to be followed up with a signed form he would have to turn right around in the mail for me to be able to put money in his account.

Twist his arm.

Hours later.

There is still no confirmation email.

The email they said they sent Richard yesterday informing us of the changes never materialized.

Neither of us can get in.

They have all our money and we have zero access. I imagine that could cause some excitement at the state regulator level if it’s not fixed fast.

And the kicker?  I was going to get to the post office afterwards to mail in two hats and a few good warm sweaters for Vermont flood relief. I was at that bank so long the post office would have been closed before I could get there. I was afraid I would be spending a lot of time watching someone staring at their computer screen (and I did) at that bank, so, looking at my shawl project and going, no way, I grabbed yarn and needles and headed out the door. I needed something small, portable, and mindless.

I cast on while she stared at her screen. I continued at Purlescence, in between holding and playing with babies and knitters.

…And there will now be a third hat going out to Vermont, again knit from Judy Sumner’s giant merino/silk hank. And I am finally admitting to myself that I felt all along like there had to be at least three with the same yarn in all of them or I would feel quite disappointed later. Another person needed one like that, someone somewhere out there, known to God.

And that’s far more important than any silly computer nonsense. But it took the computer nonsense to get me to put aside what I thought I wanted to do and sit down and start it. It had felt compelling but I had ignored the feeling–it is such a relief to watch it coming to be after all!

I posted this on Facebook a few hours ago:

“Ten years ago, we all came together. Today, I have been knitting a second warm hat for the people in Vermont who lost–belongings, for the most part, but still, the comforts of home, gone. I will never be a firefighter, but I can at least try to be a flood fighter.”

This time it’s more of Judy Sumner’s yarn, knitted with a strand of navy merino/cashmere 50/50. I want it warm and I want it soft. It’s something I can do about it and in honor of Judy’s good name.

————–

Coopernicus. I do think that would make a great name for him. I saw my male Cooper’s hawk this evening! After lamenting to my daughter on the phone minutes before that it had been awhile. He was standing on the barbecue grill, watching the birdfeeders, watching me, twitching his tail side-to-side and shuffling foot to foot, perhaps unsettled by my having moved. A moulting flank feather was prominently askew–here, let me brush that cowlick for you.

There is a point on the back of the awning pole where the squirrels have recently learned to try to tear a seam in my taped-up parchment paper, just enough to get a toehold they can leap to the feeder from. Word got out fast; the flashmobs returned. I finally put a chair back under the Brome yesterday and that brought an abrupt stop to that behavior again.  Curious, that.

And so, considering the supersoaker briefly, I decided to ignore the black one gleaning on the ground; it’s Sunday, let him alone. It’ s just one and he’s behaving. Should he hop up on the chair and up to the feeder, he’d be coming from immediately below it: no swinging, no seed, no waiting crowd hoping for the pinata to spew, cage closed. Have a good meal, little guy.

His sudden scurrying later caught my eye and that’s what got me to turn to see. (And if I’d opened that glass door and used that soaker it never would have shown up.)

I held obediently still now for the hawk. He eyeballed me, then the feeders again, doing the head bob that helps a bird judge distance just before takeoff. I thought there was still an oblivious finch on my daughter-in-law’s feeder and chanced a glance behind me.

At long last he swooped–doing a sharp turn, to my surprise, not around a feeder but around the exact point on that pole to see if that squirrel was hiding on the tear-the-paper spot.

Nope. But it was a clear sign that he’d been studying their behaviors closely.

Blink and he was gone. Such a beautiful, beautiful bird, lit up in the lowering sun, blue- and near-white faced and chestnut brown, then bluegray wings wide to the wind, flying free.

We’re still in the dry summer season, this place that alternates rain/drought on the six month schedule every year, and the air across the valley was brown and hard to breathe this afternoon. Thick enough to muffle thunder.

We decided to beat the Saturday crowd and get some grocery shopping done this evening.

“Did you hear that?”

Coming home…

You know you live in the city when at first you’re looking for the source of the light beam going upwards: who’s advertising what?

And then it happens again and, as your husband drives, you can see the clouds that weren’t there earlier charcoal-doodled against the dark sky and that flash of light against them is brighter this time.

By the third time, one right after another, the two of you are talking about heat-lightning storms, but there’s not a drop from the sky.

Then you pull in the driveway and start to unload the groceries and it’s strike after strike, right there right above your heads. Breathtaking–but not something to dawdle in. A former in-law’s grandmother died of being hit by lightning.

The young teenage neighbor is standing in the middle of the street with his buddy, the two of them watching the sky, and I get that; it IS cool, it’s part of Nature and therefore inherently interesting and it’s very very very unusual to see around here. But–

–and having raised four teenagers, I walked over towards them and asked them about what they’d seen, maybe the parts we’d missed while we were in the car. “Sorry, I’m being too deaf, say that again?” and I walked closer.

Having a middle-aged woman join your conversation when you’re keenly aware of the need to be cool around your friend: we’re out of here! They answered once to be polite and then left, quickly back inside.

Cue the Kenny Rogers, Mom version: You gotta know when to scold’em, know when to embolden’em, know when they’ll walk away, know how it’s done…

A few years ago, I wrote a little bit of a book. (Purlescence still has new copies at the cover price, signed for you if you’d like if you wait for me to show up for Knit Night.) And it sold well.

My friend Judy Sumner, whom I had known via the Knitlist and KnitTalk yahoo groups for lo these many years, had had a sock book idea in her head for a long time. She had already been successful in getting a number of her designs published; her name was already out there in the world of designers and via the thousands on those lists; she wondered if she could do it too. Passing along the gift of Gracie Larsen‘s having believed in me and the great good it had done me, I thought a collection of Judy’s sock patterns would be a wonderful thing to have out in the world and I encouraged her to go for it, one voice among many others.

Twist her arm. She sent me regular updates on how things were coming along. I thought that was very cool. She loved her editor. I loved that.

Judy’s website is here, her book, which came out as beautiful as I knew it would, has been selling out the last copies fast of late here.

Then Judy not only surprised me with a pair of handknit socks, just because she’s a knitter like that, but she also gifted me with a hank of yarn.

And not just any hank of yarn. She had no way to know: I had seen Ellen of Half Pint Farm‘s offerings at Stitches West many times, (Judy I believe went to Stitches East), I had oohed and aahed especially over the huge hanks of merino/silk Ellen dyes and hangs in her booth. But I would look at the price, fair though it was for 13.5 oz, and leave them behind. Those were a lot of sportweight.

So now here coming out of that box that I had no reason to expect was a gorgeous hank of that very yarn. In one of the very colorways that I’d liked so much. Judy had no way to know that; she had just wanted to do that and could only hope I might like it. If only she could have seen my exclamations of gobsmacked WOW!!! in person!

(One of my tall daughters loves her socks and they fit her beautifully. And they helped me be subversive: if you want more that feel like that on your feet, you knooooow, I could help you learn howwww…)

But I didn’t know what to do with that hank. I wanted to repay the gift in the best possible way, but I was stumped on where to start. I have taken it out and petted it and admired it and pondered it many times over the last couple of years.

The time is right. It took me, with distractions, over two hours to wind it all up yesterday, but at least and at last I finally knew: when I asked here a few days ago if anyone wanted to knit for the people who had lost homes, jobs, everything they owned in the floods in Vermont? Who could no longer reach for a favorite hat or blanket when the cold sets in?

That yarn was handdyed in Vermont.  I’m using two strands of it right now, knitting it tight and warm and dense in a cabled honeycomb pattern to make pockets to hold the warmth on someone’s head out there. It’s a start.

Judy has moved into her daughter’s house and is under hospice care now with pancreatic cancer. Her mail is being forwarded; her daughter watches over her email as well as her. If you want to thank Judy for answering knitting questions or just plain for being a friend to everybody she ever heard of, now would be the time. Don’t hope for an answer; let your peace bless them and let it be enough.

It’s very much the least of their worries, and yet, I still hope she gets to see this post to know that someone out there facing so much loss is going to be hugely comforted that someone needed to repay, and took the time–because someone else gave the gift–because someone else had the artistry to dye the yarn–and it will all have come full circle and returned to its home state.

Saturday night, at about dusk when the UV wouldn’t be an issue, my husband and I wandered around downtown.

Meandered into the crowded Apple store. Inwardly chuckled at the (possibly Indian?) fellow who suddenly found himself at belly button level with my sweetie and jerked his head way up to see just how far to the ceiling this guy goes! Didn’t hear a friend trying to shout hi across to us as we were leaving, and he couldn’t run fast through all those people; he had to wait till today to tell us.

Applauded the apps and the Apple and walked away, for now, our wallets intact. I told our friend that and he laughed and said his, not so much.

Bought gelato from the cheerful (I have no idea what he was saying, but he was having a great time of it) older guy with “Croatia” embroidered on his polo shirt, with a fairly garish painted mural (was that supposed to be Venice?) on the wall behind him, a street musician at the front of his little shop asking for song suggestions from his foot-tapping audience.

Went into the still-breathing Borders bookstore. Everything must go. Including the Borders gift card my husband had long forgotten he had in that wallet he didn’t take out at Apple, well, will you look at that! Hey! Seeing the size and the weight of the bag he came out of there with, we decided it was a good thing we’d gone in there last.

But it wasn’t.  I nearly walked on by but Richard turned at the sound, beckoning/inviting me too, and it was like a baby boomer’s Narnia moment: we found ourselves coming down a beautiful new-ish walkway opening suddenly out to a courtyard where a band was totally rocking the most joyful rendition of Stevie Wonder’s “Don’t You Worry ‘Bout A Thing.”

And I came home thinking…

And then today. I’ve met her, but whether I’ve ever heard her name I’m not sure; I sure don’t see her often. I think she’s older than my parents. But I saw her today, and she motioned to me and pulled me aside and reached out her aged hand to hold mine: she just wanted to tell me she love love loved my hair! She said it again. She just loved it. She wanted me to know that.  I was very surprised. (I did not by any means have great hair before that moment, but I’m easily persuaded.)

And I came home knowing…

All those years of wishing to be able to get back to my old pre-lupus life and the way things were? Really? I’m there.

If one were to drop a painting in the washing machine, now that I can finally use mine again (yay!), I have a strong Impressionist would create a laundered Monet trail.

Ahem.

I got a gift in the mail today from Karin, owner of The Periwinkle Sheep, the friend who, three years ago, drove all the way from Albany NY to Burlington, VT when I was there visiting my daughter, so that we could finally get to meet in person. So. She dyed some deep turquoise fingering-weight merino and decided to mail a skein for me to play with, gorgeous, just because; she told me something was coming but I knew no more than that.

I’ll add a picture in the daylight. Sitting where I could hear the doorbell ring, wondering who the strangers were going to be who would come, it was a great comfort and a scrumptious yarn. I am listening to it to see what it wants to be.

We got up early this morning and drove to Oakland Airport across rush hour and hugged Michelle and let her go.

My dentist’s office called yesterday and asked if I could bump my 1:30 appointment up a half hour? The plumber then called me back and asked if he could come at 3:00 Thursday?

Wow. That perfect timing came in handy!

Lee Kratzer came, he tried, his snake was too short. He refused to charge me for the 45 minutes he was here. Instead, he handed me the phone number of the man who had trained him years ago and told me, He’s good, he’s honest, and he’s very reasonable, and he’s got a lot of guys working for him so one should be available.

Joshua, the new guy, got here within an hour.

First he listened to my brief summary. Then, he turned on the water in two places. Observed. Went out to the street. Heard it, saw it–it’s coming out. The first guy had dislodged the stuff enough, even if he hadn’t known it.

Well, but I didn’t want to have to call him right back in a week or a month… True! We discussed the tree, what I’d seen on the six-month-ago-plumber’s camera of that root and what that guy had said about it.

He went after it.  He had a long enough snake, but he could not get that root to give way past a certain width–just like all the previous attempts. We discussed options for a long-term cure of a longtime problem so that it doesn’t become a sudden severe emergency someday.

And then he handed me my bill.

I was stunned. “Are you sure?” I had never seen a plumber who broke it down to a quarter hour and didn’t round it up to a full extra one.  I had never seen one whose rate was that reasonable. He did the job quickly, he did it well, and he did it with a minimal amount of disruption or stress. He was a nice guy, on top of that. That made it the second time in one day that I let a plumber know he wasn’t charging me enough.  Wow.

And his grandmother and I think he said it was his mom are avid knitters and his wife an avid writer. I sent him home with encouragement for his wife and a copy of my book to share with the knitters he loves. He had earned it. He loved it! He flipped through the pages, looking at the patterns, saying all the right things, making my day right back at me.

And then I went hunting for my last ball-and-a-bit of soft, handdyed Malabrigo Rios merino and cast on a hat for Lee, the plumber who had helped me out but wouldn’t let me pay him at all.

You know those crazy last two days before a kid leaves for university when you have to run every last errand, she’s got to wash her laundry, we need to pick up the drycleaning, and your friend Catherine recommended the Vanilla Queen (a gallon of bourbon vanilla, fair trade! Bring on the hot cocoa!) but that was just too far but that Indian grocery in Sunnyvale, let’s try that, and it had every spice you ever heard of (Michelle loves to cook Indian style: so many flavors, so dairy free), and then a dash to Trader Joe’s and Safeway too and Dad my hard drive failed! and pack pack pack and hey, one last chance to see one of her best friends?

And yes. That would indeed be when the plumbing sputters and today finally fails again. Just like last time. Right on cue.

So. (Picking up the baby alpaca.) Tell me why Indian names of things always seem to need an h after the d and an i after the a. And ghee, what was that bright (and I mean bright!) green yam-shaped plant part that had more spikes than an ’80’s punkrocker’s head?

“Are you all together?”

“Yes.”

Michelle noted that she was buying spices and I was buying shelf-stable ready-t0-heats.

They had pretty pictures on the boxes. I figured that potential earthquake supplies might as well be tasty, but what I said out loud was, “The difference between your choices and mine is that you know what yours are.”

The clerk cracked up.