Fog. Help! Days and days without sun are difficult.
I can imagine the sun's return.
Imaginings are vital to survival.
This stray, from way back before and around when I moved here.
It was grey and foggy and strange and I was confused.
I'm going to work on this one while I figure out how. I have called this one Change is in the Air and Season will Change You. But I think, Sempathy for the Season, well I don't know. Not knowing enables imaginings.
I am not sure about those ears, although they do say Listen Up.
Last Night, the setting sun set the distant mountain on fire.
We can see further now. Many leaves have fallen. I even caught a glimpse of the roadside pond below. I used to call it a lake, but it is small, and it has no official name. So pond I guess. I should give her a name.
I taped the small cloth to the window this morning.
The cloth I now call Singing Woman. I examined the thin spots, how perfect they seem. I wonder which parts of me would let the light through? Do I need to work on that?
This kind of thing results from managing layers. Some don't like that word but for me it is about maintaining balance. Nature does it so well. I used to manage a design department. At one point 11 people. Balance ain't easy. People. Like a layered cloth, lightness was always a challenge. But a beautiful thing. Like a thing and then not so much of a thing at the same time. Fluid. And I said to myself this morning... Natural Order includes chaos. I wrote that down to remind myself.
So, I have been stitching. Without a lot of saying. Very slowly. Expressing the standing. Even while feeling knocked down. Or so it seems. Some days.
I imagine building a loom out on the porch. After the roof gets fixed, part of which will be skylight. To let the sun in. Cheaper than wood these days, believe it or not. And I went all out and ordered a drawing table. I didn't need one, I wanted one. Going to hell with myself. (An evil laugh)
I am not an artist, no, I am just going.To see. I need not more.
I wrote this on a scrap of paper yesterday, and then I think the man threw it in the fire by accident. Because it's gone. A hearty laugh...
The Boy will visit today. That will be like the sun is out.
The Man spent some time untangling this puppet that made the journey here in a box with a lot of stray stuff. It was a time consuming effort. But now in working order.
It was so appropriate for these times really. As I ended up making a note to myself:
I've worked myself to the edge of the pieced area on one side of Holding Pattern. Working slow and steady, an hour in the morning with coffee, and hour in the evening before sunset. Up to here there are seam lines, blocks of space to help me not only keep track of progress but also provide a frame of reference. I am thinking I will have to continue soon, not knowing where I am.
(I wanted to talk today but my batteries are dead.)
Well sometimes I think I make up a story that might seem a little simpler than it is. More like something I can take credit for. Some thing I can own. Instead of telling the story as is. Because honestly, how it happens doesn't always make the kind of sense I expect. It's not a straight line or a path so easily followed. That is why process is so interesting to me. And why I tend to honor the in between more and more. Letting it be on its own. Because it is what I don't expect, or always give value to, that helps me understand how new form emerges. Eventually.
Loose thoughts. Loose patches. Loose implies free. Free to realign. Alignment implies a kind of useful harmony. Peace. Peace is a temporary state. It wears out. Must be mended. A life's work.
You can't teach creativity.
It's just there. You might simply try to make it more obvious how to find it. Demonstrate the usefulness of thought.
If it's too large to grasp, make it seem smaller. Perspective.
Today is an in between day. Letting thoughts out.
Wednesday is now Robe day.
Saturday is now quilt/Blanket day.
All the other days are like today.
That's about as clear as I will get. I have been listing Hunker Down posts in order in the sidebar under Hunker Down Diaries. Enough of that, the list might go on forever. No matter what they are telling us. If you are following, you are following. I'm tired of organizing. Day by Day it is, till it isn't.
Today's note to self...posting here, for now, well, it's ridiculous. But I know it's possible. Moments here, moments there, OK, it's a patchwork. Little bits at a time. Duh jude, figure out a way to hold it together. That's what you do. So less often, posts being built over a series of days. Content, in smaller pieces perhaps. In perspective, appropriate.
The thing I like about cloth is that it seems kind.
You can make friends with it, it will cooperate if you give it's nature some consideration. Like working with anything,(anyone), it is basically an exercise in problem solving (not always JUST going), based on what you have to work with. I often say ingenuity springs from a relationship based on patience and flexibility. Love, I guess. Yes, I just love cloth.
Cloth is like clay. I will be like Clay.
I had been slowly adding strips of that patchwork curtain to the front of the robe. I added one of the other pieced strips as well. but I moved the strip slightly, off it's original course, because cloth lets you do that...to fit the one side of the neckline. I like the gentle curve of the seams. How it flows. Seems to adapt to the situation. Seems to soften. Like gentle wind.
I have been posting content from an old class, just wanting to finish up the basic approach to robe making as it applies to a large cloth base you might choose to work on. I will get through the basics of that soon and with May, move on to other forms of large cloth. But know that all these techniques might be applied to a quilt type project as well. My goal is never actually to lead you through something step by step but to inspire you to find your own comfort with problem solving. Offering my perspective.
As I look back, at any point, I might have taken another direction. Watching all of you doing your own thing reminds me how that might happen.
