I’ve been hesitating for the last several hours to write this because it’s not about me and I don’t want to make it sound like it is.

This morning as I was deciding what to wear to church today, the thought came, wear a scarf. Not a shawl today.

And a few minutes later I found myself thinking, I need to knit me a pink scarf, while  envisioning some baby alpaca in my stash I might use for it. It would go with so many things.

Wait–say what? But I *have* a pink scarf. In that shade.  I kind of shook my head at the silliness of the thought.  I had knit it, not only out of baby alpaca, but out of a splurge of royal baby alpaca, Blue Sky Alpacas’ brand, the finest micron-count grade one can buy as far as I know and that my hands have ever felt. I’d knitted it up for my next book project and it was safely tucked away in wait.

But on impulse I pulled it out anyway. Wait–I never ran the second end in? (I always do the first going all the way across as I purl the first row; then it is not only done, there is matching spare yarn in the thing itself should the project ever need mending later.)

Well then. And I ran that remaining end through the cast-off row and put the scarf on. The shade of pink didn’t actually quite match what I had on but I persuaded myself that it was okay and wondered…? as we headed out the door to church. Curious. I promised myself to stay open to whatever might arise.

It was Fast Sunday (details here.)

And one of the people who got up was a man we’d never seen before. He said he and his wife were there on their way to LA. He talked about finding out he was quite possibly going blind, and as a graphic artist, this was a really really hard place to find himself in. (I thought, and for your wife. Very much so.) But after much prayer and working through all the emotions that come with such a situation, he had come to a place (and I imagine from my own experiences he was probably constantly having to work to stay in that place) where he could say, Thy will be done.

He knew God loved him and that was all that mattered.  Between them all, the details would work out somehow some way.

And as he spoke, I remembered a story from a book I had read long ago, written by a woman who raised angora rabbits for the handspinning and knitting communities, the title long forgotten to memory. (ed. to add: I *think* it was “Angora” by Erica Lynne.) She told of a young man who had come to her, hoping that she would make him a soft angora scarf for his grandmother: she was mostly deaf now and mostly blind and very old, but, he told her, and I will never forget the words, “She can still feel.”

Moved, the woman spun and knitted and made him that scarf, taking his love, adding her own, and making it tangible for a lovely old lady she had never met.

I sought out the man after the meeting was over. I told him about my grandmother being a concert pianist and having taught music at the University of Utah 90 years ago, and how she’d picked out my piano teacher–but that I had started going noticeably deaf by my teens.

“Aspirin,” I added. “I was allergic to aspirin.  It took them 17 years to figure it out.” (Actually, thinking later, more than that, I was 31 when a very astute ENT put all the clues together.)

“Aspirin!” he exclaimed.

I told him how much I appreciated his willingness to learn to trust that God knew what He was doing.

And then (trying not to blather) I tried to describe, in as few words as possible, what royal baby alpaca was. The softest of the softest of my favorite fiber to knit.

And then I got to see the love and warmth for her that came across his face as I told him it was for his wife.

That said it all. The impulse was true.

———

p.s. A note to that couple: if the color’s not quite what you want, let me know and I will gladly overdye it for you.

This was a test. This was only a test of the emergent-see-baby! Momcasting system. If this had been a true emergent-see-baby!… Hopefully, the little one will wait another two months before making an appearance.

I was off to San Diego this morning for a baby shower for my daughter-in-law, and home again tonight, and I can hardly believe it’s still the same day without a tessaract or two thrown in there.

There was a fellow knitter there who had knitted a couple of hats for the baby and wanted to know how I did the top of mine without the stitches getting too tight to work? Since mine had no seam.  So I tried to give her a good visualization of how to use two circular needles, curving away from each other and intersecting at the center, and how you are always working from one tip of needle A to the other tip of needle A, then switch to needle B at the intersection. I think she got it.

I had a really, really good time. My daughter describes Kim’s mom as one of the most gracious women she’s ever met, and I absolutely agree.  We are very fortunate to have all of them in our family circle.

My son picked me up at the airport and took me back again later, so I got a little one-on-one time with him–and he had to show me where he and Kim had bought me my Christmas yarn, so I actually even got in some local yarn store time: Needleworks, with a very gracious owner.

And a fabulous time was had by all. (I did it! And even though some of the set-up was outside, they quietly held it all inside with the sliding doors closed so it was completely safe for me re the lupus. Noticed and much appreciated.)

Do not forget my camera card do not forget my camera card do not forget my… As it sits in my computer for this post.

Peachy-pink Shepherd’s Choice, a skein I bought pre-Rios to try out; the folks at Purlescence told me it was their softest wool worsted.  Our niece and nephew are about to move to Boston from southern California, and I wanted to keep their newborn twin girls warm.

The grandson baby blanket is done. The sweater is done. The first hat is done. The unassembled bootie in the photo is now done. All the ends on everything are run in at long long last, the items are all wrapped, the cards are written and signed.

There. The camera card is in the camera is in the carry-on. And tomorrow I get to go deliver everything in person.

And darned if I can decide which knitting project in the queue to start on the flight. I know–it’s nice to have that level of problem.

My first pair of baby booties ever is done. They may fit the kid when he’s about two, the ends aren’t run in nor the buttons decided on, but there’s this tremendous sense of breaking past my inner barriers on knitting footwear: I did it! (If you need inspiration, look here at all these other Saartje’s. Talk about cute!)

Something caught my eye and I looked up.

Ah.  Playing field hawk-y today.  That’s why the yard’s been so empty. I thought of Smokey; nice touch, boss! It’s beautiful!

One small finch, maybe hungry enough to finally risk it for a late lunch, flitted alone onto the stained glass birdfeeder tucked far under the awning  into the porch where it’s a ten-foot-wide alcove, surrounded tightly by floor-to-ceiling glass on three sides. I was standing just inside, looking out.

That hawk watched it.

And I watched the hawk. I had never seen it go from perch to pursuit.

It spent about five minutes sizing me up, whether I would move, whether I was a threat; I was inside, yes, but visually between it and its prey.

I held still.

I kept waiting.

I finally cautiously reached for the camera. It was okay with that. I took the first shot. Okay. I opened the sliding door and hit the zoom button. Okay.

I closed the door quietly and waited.

The little house finch was on the far side from it, dipping deep into its sunflowers and could not see the hawk. The Cooper’s waited to see if it had been tipped off. No.

And then all at once, it spread its wings wide and I got to watch it do its own zooming in, a tight horseshoe manuever in that alcove, clearly aware of the walls of glass while focused on its prey. The finch, startled as this massive bird suddenly careened at it around the feeder, made a break for it and dashed for the treetops, the hawk gaining on it by sheer size of wingbeat as they were lost to view.

The birdfeeder swung wildly in their wake.

Coopers average a 31″ wingspan and their tails are long.  Watching that hawk do that maneuver in that small space at that speed right in front of me at eye level as I stood there a few feet away was something to remember forever. Wow.

So many memories. He changed our lives. He changed our children’s lives, and for the better for all of us.

Our oldest was going to be in kindergarten in the fall, and the school system there was terrible at the time. The snow was–well, when your husband is traveling a lot on business, what do you do with your babies? Leave them inside unattended? Take them outside where the only place to go in subfreezing temperatures was wherever you’d shoveled so far? If you’re lifting each laden shovelful of snow and having to toss it higher than the top of the garage, only to see it half the time slide right back down into the driveway because you hadn’t thrown it hard enough–and you had the whole depth and width and length of the driveway to do, and then you had to have the energy still to take care of your three little ones, alone, and one was often ill and often cried all night, and there would be no groceries if that driveway didn’t get done. And done again. And again. And again. And you had already learned the hard way that if you drove over just a few inches’ worth, just once, you were going to have impenetrable lines of ice maybe till spring that would spin your tires and flip your feet out from under you when you went back out later to try to scrape it out.

Seventy-five inches. Seventeen days.

So many things about ice and snow I learned during our four years in New Hampshire. New Englanders and Canadians are tough stuff. I am in awe.

Meantime, Smokey, the boss of the group in California that Richard’s was collaborating with, told him, Any time you want to change jobs, you have one with me. Absolutely.

But there’s no income tax and no sales tax in New Hampshire, we’d have to take a de facto 17% pay cut to move to your insane Bay Area housing market.

The boss at home, meantime, told Richard he wanted to send him across the country on a one-year assignment. By himself. No family.  No need for the expenses for the company nor the distractions for him.

It is safe to say we do not remember that idea fondly.

Smokey’s faith in Richard’s skills was our lifeline to a different life altogether. He fought the bureaucracy back East, he pulled the strings, he pointed out the obvious on the cost of living differences, he made it happen.

And his offer letter promised, in writing, “No home delivery of snow.”

Twenty-three years ago, almost twenty-four now, we moved 3333 miles to get a good boss, and Smokey proved to indeed be the best you could possibly ask for. The company didn’t last longterm; the many friendships that flourished under the long-haired man playing the 12-string guitar kept in his office for when things got too uptight, did.

Smokey himself sent out the heads-up recently to let us know. So it was not a surprise.  Still.

To quote his love’s note today:

 If you thought you heard bagpipges yesterday, stopped to admire a
late-blooming rose, or succumbed to an adolescent urge to do something
positively outrageous, you can blame it on Smokey. He would approve…

And if it snows anytime in this coming winter, we know who the practical joker up there throwing the confetti at us in celebration will be.

And now I’m glued (again) to watching the results come in.

We went over to Johnna and Glenn’s for an election party, Jon Stewart style: everyone kind and courteous and just plain enjoying hanging out with friends, regardless of any party affiliation. Pass the snacks.  Glenn supplied fine chocolate, I brought almond raspberry sponge cake.  (Mom: that would be your hot milk sponge cake recipe from Betty Crocker circa 1952, made with almond extract, 4 tbl butter instead of 2, and with two boxes of raspberries rinsed, very carefully patted dry, and arranged across to sink down to the bottom evenly.  Crunchy organic/Demerara type sugar sprinkled on top of the cake.)

And a good time was had by all.

(Ed. to add, and one political party=one baby hat, knittingwise.)

My hometown paper posted pictures of signs at the Stewart/Colbert rally. My favorite so far, having grown up in DC during the Vietnam War, was number 42, with the picture of a pepperoni pie: Give pizza chants.

Amen, brother.

And pizzan quiet at last when the phone stops ringing every five minutes come Wednesday.

Meg. We’ve heard all about your maid, endlessly; it’s not so much the is she legal/is she not, it’s, once you knew, how did you respond? Were you kind to the person who loved your children and you, too, enough to stay there for half of their growing-up years by then?

Or did you respond with vindictiveness?

Then how will you treat the rest of us whom you don’t personally know when you are in power over us?

It was not the taxpayers’ pockets that settled the suit when you lost your temper at Ebay and threw a dissenting underling towards the wall; I don’t want to be on the hook for your behavior when you find yourself thwarted in politics over and over and endlessly over again.  But see, there’s something you would already have learned a little of had you ever voted before deciding to run:

You don’t always get your way in politics. It’s worth trying, and then you just have to go and be gracious with the results.

And Carly? I remember friends who worked for HP singing in great glee, Ding dong the witch is dead! It was the unofficial company theme song across the headlines and in person–I bear personal witness–when you got fired by the board. You had no use for the egalitarian culture of a good company, one where by common consent when there was a downturn, everybody across the board from the top on down would take temporary salary cuts in order that there be no layoffs until the next business upswing. The focus was on taking care of each other for the good of the company that was creating new ideas and new products for the good of society.  It was a very idealistic place to work.

You killed all that. You bought yourself the corporate jet that Hewlett and Packard would totally never have done. (Bill Hewlett swam at my therapy pool. He was a sweet old guy.) You bought into the whole overprivileged CEO thing, spending millions and millions on yourself while firing competent workers and shipping their jobs away–HP nearly died of you. The HP Way, you thought, was archaic and quaint.

John McCain fired you too.

And tomorrow is my chance.

“What’s this?” the little boy asked me.

I told him, “Oh–thank you!” as I took down my forgotten No Solicitors sign. Oops–maybe that’s why the early kids didn’t show.

Out of one trio, two happily took some more when I offered more but one little boy did not. I offered him again and then simply grabbed a few mini bars and put them in his bag.

He looked at me, wounded: “I already had some!”

Two more little girls. The candy bowl with the ugly green Hand of Doom which in true zombie spirit refuses to die of old age after all these years, croaks Happy Halloweeeeeeeen and AAAHHHHHAHHAHAAAHHAH! when small hands reach for their candy. One of the girls thought it was funny; the other one was scared, so I quickly held the hand down to shut it up (the alternative being to hunt for the on/off button on the bottom while absent-mindedly pouring candy over their heads in a pinata effect while I search.)

She reached carefully behind it, back there to where those fingers couldn’t have contaminated her good Milky Ways, and picked out what she wanted. I told her happily Happy Halloween and she shot me a How DARE you! look in return. Scaring her like that!

Ah well. Give her another year, and she’ll do like my daughter did: went from being terrified of the weirdness at the door I kept opening, to saying to her little brother the next year, looking eagerly out the window with him, “Here come trick or treaters. Let’s be scared!”

After an hour of quiet, I put the rest of the candy in a small box outside the door should anyone else come: winner take all. Please!

———–

Towards the end of typing that post, I heard a car. Then a car door close. Oh good, maybe some straggler got the loot–so I went over and opened the door to see.

The box had been moved, although it was just as full: and next to it was a plate of holiday cookies with candy corn sprinkled around them. You know how knitters learn to read their stitches? I can read this friend’s baking habits.  Thank you, (name edited out)! Happy Halloween!

When you are married to a computer scientist and it is nearly Halloween, you get a cable plugged into your monitor that makes your computer haunted: random back buttons, caps locks, punctuation or letters that scoot to the far end of the screen, the cursor twittering around in circles… Alright, thanks, dear, that’s enough Halloween spirit for the moment. Out!

Meantime.  I got up early this morning and was puttering around, when I saw…

This past spring my neighbor was having her tallest tree trimmed (not this redwood) when the city’s tree workers abruptly stopped and told her that was all they could do–no explanation. ‘Bye.

It is against Federal law to disturb a raptor’s nest, after all the DDT damage that nearly wiped out many large bird species. Still, since that tree trimming, there had been no sign of the resident Cooper’s hawk, and I have missed it.  I’ve wondered if the babies survived.

The bluejays, who nested elsewhere this year with a hawk’s nest right there overhead, recently noticed it was safe to take over my yard again, and there have been at least three of them fighting territorial fights over my feeder the last few weeks.

Not today.  Not a jay in sight all day. There was a juvenile Cooper’s, big, stunningly beautiful, perched on the arm of the barbecue grill out there, taking the measure of the yard. Glancing nonchalantly over towards the birdfeeders: hey breakfast, where are you? I asked for room service!

I guess the juveniles survived that tree trimming after all?

It didn’t happen to look up behind it.  I took this picture from where it had been. If it had, it would have seen a small black squirrel on that post, tail completely fluffed, peering over the edge of the roof of the shed. Mesmerized. It couldn’t take its eyes off that hawk. It moved only slightly, a little closer in as if for a better look, hovering right over the edge, during the moments the hawk turned safely totally away and towards the feeders.

And I sat watching them, measuring the size and potential speed of the squirrel relative to the hawk: if it wants you, honey, you are dead meat.

The hawk was cool with my being there, so much so that I even managed to reach for my camera after a careful long minute or so. Then, before I could raise it, it beat its wings wide, glided across my yard, and was gone.

Off hunting for my cursor for me.

That royal baby alpaca/cashmere/silk yarn last night was called Epiphany, and this morning I had one.

Trying to get ready for Knit Night yesterday, I was between projects and dithering what to do next so I grabbed a longtime UFO out of the back of the line-up, figuring that would make me at least make a little progress on it before I went back to the baby knitting. It was done to this point, right?

No. It was not. Okay, where, then… Okay, found my place.

Needed to switch it from a junk-drawer-reject timeout needle and onto my good Holz and Steins.  I found myself squinting, and another knitter laughed when I said I remembered now: I wasn’t going to work on this laceweight again till I had a new glasses prescription.

But I (deliberately) hadn’t brought anything else, so I quietly plugged away at it–when I wasn’t being distracted by those skeins. (Dudes! Purlescence totally scooped Webs!)

The upshot is that it hit me this morning that I hadn’t made progress for a *year* on that thing, though I very much wanted it done, for a reason I hadn’t been able to quite clearly see before. There were things I’d learned since I’d started it, small improvements that could be–I think… If I swatch…

So I spent the day ripping back to zero, redesigning it, trying it out, liking it immensely, rewriting, counting, redoing, proofreading, counting counting counting.

And as I worked, I had that Epiphany yarn over at the shop dangling as future reward for when I actually, finally finish this. I’m glad I didn’t buy any: when you don’t own it yet, it doesn’t own you yet, either: it can’t jump in line, it can’t hog the needles, it can’t thwart my intentions to persevere with the squinty laceweight, it just has to wait its turn. Anticipation is a happy thing–and great incentive is too.

And the new shawl design is very very good. I am very very pleased. That long timeout, along with an hour and a half of not being quite pleased with it but not putting it down, helped me see it all with a new eye.  Getting it exactly right was so worth the wait.

Thank you, everybody. I talked to Dharma Trading Co, purveyor of all things dyeing, and they cautioned that the chemicals that would reliably get the dye out would wreck the feel of the cashmere and, they said, miss the point of such a sweater. Their advice was wash, wash, wash, gently, and hope.

O—– said they were passing the word along and would get back to me shortly. Okay. Now that I’ve had a day to chill, reading all your notes, thank you, you really helped, even just by speaking up.

The best antidote, of course, was to finally run in the four yarn ends on a project I’d blocked–yup, dry now, it’s ready–go off to Target, buy envelopes and mailing tape, and then a little later, after checking my email for details, get out to the post office. One book (yeah, that book) sold (directly, thanks) and in the mail, and one…

And (whistle) typing that sentence is when it hits me that, oh. Right.  I forgot to photograph it. *Bad* knitblogger!

And there, in my own mailbox, was a gift of beautiful, beautiful shots of the coastline, taken by my childhood friend Scott, one of the B’s I drove to Pacific Grove to see. If I couldn’t stand in the sun admiring the surf and the fog and the steep hills rising from the water, he could and he did and he gave that tideline to me. Gorgeous. Well done, Scott, and such an antidote for petty disappointments. Such good timing!

And in the glow of that, I went off to Purlescence tonight and they had a new line in from Cascade: royal baby alpaca, which is the finest grade you can possibly buy and hard to find, mixed with cashmere and silk. Swoon.

I told Richard that when I got home.

“So how many skeins did you buy?”

I didn’t.

“You DIDN’T?!” He was genuinely stunned.

I couldn’t make up my mind. The deep blue or the wine-red: both colors were exactly my shades. I’ll have to come back.

Yeah, I think they’ll see me again. Happens.

You know you lead a privileged life when you can worry about such things. And yet.

It’s the perfect sweater, for a machine knit: the perfect length, the perfect classic style, the perfectly-soft that is the best cashmere can be, and without being too-young too-tight, it goes in at the waist just enough rather than being a plain downward tube. It’s my very favorite store-bought and my husband loves it when I wear it.

I need advice. Badly.  Fellow fiber types, help me out here.

So. I have this offwhite cashmere sweater. Got a good deal; had no idea that looking it up later would show a replacement cost well above $300.

I bought a reddish-burgundy fleece vest from the well-regarded O—- company (the color was on close-out) and the weather being what it is, took it straight from the box and put it on over that sweater. I was horrified, taking the sweater off later, to find it had turned slightly pink across the upper back and definitely pink under the arms.

I contacted O—-. They said get it drycleaned, email us the receipt for that and we’ll refund it. Was it an O—- sweater? (They asked hopefully.)

No.

Oh.

What if that doesn’t do it, I asked.

Uh… (he came back in a moment.)  Let’s try first and then we’ll see.

Okay, fair enough.

So, I took it to my regular drycleaner and explained. The woman waved her hands in front of her face to ward me and it off: no, no, no can do, is dye, will not come out, do not give it to us, so sorry.

Now, I’m of the mind that if you have dye that loose that it can rub right on then it can come back out again. I hope.  If I do it right.

Do I… wash it with Purex undyed unscented laundry detergent gently by hand in tepid water? Which, by the way, is how I always wash my animal-fiber sweaters. Ignore the dry-clean-only tags–that’s a cop-out, put there because they can’t put all the information you would need on that tiny tab, as TSE Cashmere is my witness. (Click on their “About” and go to “Cashmere care”–they’re not letting me link directly to the page, sorry.) Drycleaning chemicals harshen and yellow the fibers.

So I wasn’t quite sorry when the drycleaner refused it.

I know Dharma Trading Company sells Synthrapol. I have no experience with it.  I did actually buy some awhile ago–and after reading the warning labels and that bit about prolonged exposure causing brain and neurological damage, and not even being sure it’s what I need for this problem…

I think I need to throw it back in O—-‘s court before I try anything. I need to take pictures first, definitely. And one of the reasons I contacted them was simply to let them know what their (yes it’s made in China) product was doing.

I find myself with a heightened sense of appreciation for my non-damaged sweaters, so, that’s good.

One of the things about being around old friends you haven’t seen in a long time is that you get to learn more about them–and you also tend to learn more about yourself.

When I drove down to Pacific Grove three weeks ago, it was right at the beginning of cooler weather and I knew  Monterey Bay is always a tad chilly anyway; I put my favorite silk jacket (picture if you scroll down here, under Karin‘s yarn) over my blouse on my way out the door.

I have short arms. Sleeves tend to ride down partway over my hands if a blouse otherwise fits.  Get the petite size, it’ll be too short elsewhere; I just plain have short arms.

And as a knitter, that bugs me: the cuff edges bump against my knitting, they catch on my stitches, they catch at my project when I go to turn it around at the end of a row–and there’s also the problem that, as a sun-sensitive lupus patient, I’m supposed to wear finely-woven long sleeves all the time. They’re part of my cage.

I’ve gotten in the habit of folding the cuffs back. Poof, end of problem. And a little bit of defiance of disease.

Visiting with the B’s, one layer of cuffs I could ignore. Two, and when not yet used to cold-weather clothes for the season–I kept absent-mindedly trying to fold both layers back off my wrists, the heavy jacket ones flopping back down repeatedly.

Looking back, it probably looked pretty silly. Unhand me, you silk you!

I thought of that today in a cold house with two layers of long sleeves on again, bugging me, and just too cold to roll them up. I finally realized it was keeping me from finishing that sweater. Well then. I went and did my treadmill time, got warmed up, got the cuffs properly out of my way, and voila. One baby sweater.

Except the button. I need me a good, round, safe for little fingers, dragon-looking button to top it off.

I know, I know, pictures. When it’s not so late.

For the record: Mondays are being a Good Thing around here:

The Crohn’s Lite is much improved. The yank-ees, ditto.

The carry-around lace scarf project of three weeks actually got finished and is blocking.

I wanted to say the baby sweater is done, but it’s a dozen 99-stitch rows shy; the wrist is carping, there’s a tunnel ahead, and I’m stopping the train under icy conditions.

And for anyone who didn’t see the looks-real knit skeleton yet, it is really, really cool.  Very Deb-bone-air.  The artist’s site for it is here; scroll down to see the intense level of detail he put into it. Happy almost-Halloween!

It’s interesting watching the birds really flock at the feeders just a little before it starts to rain. They know it’s coming and they want nourishment against the cold and the water in a safe, dry place.

Thank you all, meantime, for the support, and I knitted a few rows today. Decided it wasn’t worth pushing it too soon, but at the same time I was delighted that I could. Another day or two and it’ll all be back to normal.

Except…

Me: “I don’t WANT to do a liquid diet! I’m hungry and I want some real food!”

Hubby, looking at me steadily: “Nasal gastric tube.”

He had me and he knew it.  Four days that felt ever increasingly like having surgery without anesthesia. Never again.

Well, at least you can pack a lot of nourishment into soup.  So now the blockage, too, which had been ignoring my protests of I so did not earn it, is starting to improve. And Don is right: Stones into Schools, written by Mortenson himself, is the better book, but Three Cups of Tea, the one that made the man’s name and cause known, is vastly important in its own write.

Remember my dying tomato plant of a month ago? Its main branches are just straws now, bent in half from birds landing on it and going Whoa! as the stems collapsed under them–I saw them.

I discovered a new tomato on a small, still-green branch yesterday. It cheered me greatly, and all the more today.