small town life

I was born in Tulare and attended high school and junior college in Porterville.  I lived on dairies for the most part, although there was one year living IN Tulare while my dad tried something other than farming and, after he died, my mother and I lived in an apartment in Porterville for three years.  I got married in Tipton, and now live in a rural area east of Madera.

I lived in Fresno for 23 years and the Fresno-Clovis Metropolitan Area is home to half a million people, so I count that as city living.  However, I have spent 36 years in or near small towns.

People ask me what it’s like.

Well, it doesn’t take very long to get anywhere and sometimes animals get loose and decide to have an adventure.

Kids and their moms show up at school.  What can I say?  Its a quiet life.

long time, no post

It’s been a while.  My only excuse is that Spring Semester is always simply crazy.  Not as crazy as poor Carrie who has to deal with that April tax deadline.  I am hoping she comes up for air some time soon as (theoretically) the worst of it was over on the 17th.

I finished Rivendell.

There is clearly a teensy difference between fingering weight and sock weight yarns as my version is not quite as filmy as the original.  But I think it will fill the bill when it gets chilly again; although I will not be wearing it any time soon (it was 95 degrees yesterday).

A phrenology head is not the ideal model due to differences in scale; but I adore my phrenology head.  I bought it and used it in class when I used to teach Jane Eyre.  Ah, the Classics!  The books that students would rather take an F on than read.

I will admit that as many times as I have read Jane Eyre, St. John Rivers has begun to grate more than he did on my first read-through and I wanted to kill him then.  Maybe if we picked something from this century, the kids might read it.  They would definitely read Hunger Games if it was assigned.

However, that is a conversation for a whole different day and an issue that will likely never be solved.

I am up to the armscyes of my Staithes Vest.  Staithes is a Yorkshire gansey pattern and is apparently pronounced “steers.”  There is no accounting for regional dialects.  My mother-in-law arns her clothing to get the wrinkles out and I’m fairly certain no one in Maine is speaking English.

If I can get it finished in the next 10 days I’ll be on track for 12 items in 2012.  Then I plan to make something for summer — what my mother used to call a shell.

meagre wip wednesday

Not much to show on Rivendell, although I have finished the first chart.

surprise!

Kate tagged me with some questions, which involved thinking.  I was happily reading all her answers to the questions she’d been sent when I discovered I had been added to the mix.

Surprise!

Of all the projects you’ve knitted for yourself, which do you wear most often?

My initial response was socks because I wear my handknit socks almost every chance I get.  But I realized the ONE object I wear most often is a vest I made for myself in 2000 while going through cancer treatments.  I am sure there was a pattern and the pattern had a name, but I haven’t got a clue what it is/was.

What item would you never knit, even if you were offered a million pounds/dollars/euros to make one?

A willie warmer.  Wrong on so many levels.  And, really?  A total waste of time.

Do you have a favorite place to knit in your home?

Oddly, in bed; with my little all-region DVD player on my knees.

How long do you spend knitting per day?

I think it averages out to about two hours.  I work full time and then there’s that wife/mother/housekeeping thing.  That really cuts into my knitting time.  I have also rediscovered my love of counted cross-stitch, I like to make jewelry, I sew, and I want to learn to spin.  Clearly, I need to retire.

Do you have a favourite knitting (or other craft) magazine?

Not any more.  I own more patterns than I can knit in what remains of my lifetime and eventually most of the magazines got on my nerves.  Vogue Knitting has more errata than a freshman essay. I hate the new Interweave Knits format.  And Knitter’s has gone somewhere decidedly odd.

Have you ever used knitting needles for something other than knitting?

They are especially handy for getting things out of that teeny tiny space between the seat and the console between the front seats that I can see but couldn’t reach even if I were as thin as Jack Skellington.  They’re also for good for poking through things.  I occasionally threaten my husband with them, but he smugly responds that I don’t want to get blood on my needles so he’s safe.

Have you ever – successfully – taught someone else to knit?

My daughter.  She’s better than I am.

What is your favorite flavor of crisps?

I am not a crisps fan.  I will, however, eat tortilla chips until the cows come home.

Have you ever given up knitting for a long period of time (more than six months)?

1990-1999.  I left the Health Department where I had knitting friends and began teaching and without someone to encourage me (and the only good yarn shop in town closing), I just stopped.  That’s why I’m so grateful to the online knitting community.

What makes you laugh?

Damn near everything.  If someone has a dry sense of humor, I am helpless.

What is your favorite book?

This is a completely unfair question to ask an English teacher/librarian!  Whatever I’m reading at the moment?  I read Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere just before going to London so that my daughter and I could collapse in hysterics together as we went through Blackfriars or Earl’s Court on the Tube.  The Brits did not approve of our Tube behavior.

Do you accurately know how much yarn you own?

I know where it is.  Does that count?

I am supposed to tag 12 others with 12 new questions.

• Carrie
• Anne
• Jo
• Bridget
• Jo
• Chris
• Susan
• Nanette
• Bethany
• Melanie
• Erin
• Ruth

And my questions are:

• Who taught you to knit?
• Do you remember the first thing you made?
• Do you knit more for yourself or others?
• Is there a price too large to spend on a knitting project?
• Do you knit patterns more than once?
• Do you have a favorite knitwear designer?
• What is your opinion of those ginormous needle sizes?
• Do you understand the Zimmerman EPS system?
• Do you knit in public?
• Have you been part of a KAL?
• Have you ever knit a “mystery” item?
• Do you knit English or Continental?

wip leap wednesday

I don’t have a lot of progress to show on Rivendell, but when they blew my vein on Friday, it caused a touch of phlebitis.  I’m an English knitter so my right arm/hand is pretty much where the action is.

Yesterday, I was at the cardiologist for an echo stress test.  Five minutes at 3.4 mph at a 12% incline is a rude thing to do to an old lady.  But the repeated blood pressure checks were the worst.

Combine the bruising, the phlebitis, and the pumping up of the cuff and the pressure of the stethoscope and I was one very unhappy camper.  At least my heart is in GREAT shape so the chest pains are stress/anxiety/worry/whatever we are calling it this week.

I did very much want to hit someone.  However, I restrained myself as I did not think a holding tank would improve my mood.

I know the pattern was planned for graduating colors, but I rather like the way the blues and greens are sort of dancing with each other.  I think I am going to like it.

it’s never done that before

Today at work I had a full-blown anxiety attack.  I have been saying lately that someday I am going to have an actual heart attack and I won’t do anything about it because I will assume it’s just the anxiety thing again.

So I went to the ER.  When you tell them your chest hurts, you are having trouble breathing, and your blood pressure is 95/73, you get into the back pretty fast.

They put in an IV and that was the problem.  It really hurt and the vein blew.

We cannot use my left arm (which has lovely veins) because that’s where my mastectomy and lymph node removal took place and, apparently, no medical professional on the planet will deal with it.  They don’t even take my blood pressure on my left arm.  It’s like it’s not there or something.

The veins in my right arm have scar tissue from the chemotherapy, so I usually get blood drawn from my wrist or the back of my hand.  Try to avoid having that done if you can.  It seriously hurts.

Anyway, they drew blood, did an EKG, and took x-rays.  Four hours later, they drew blood (from a different spot because the IV was clearly a problem — you could see that blood had seeped out when the vein blew and the area was hard) and did an EKG.

Everything is fine.  It was in fact an anxiety attack, but the doctor told me to take low dose aspirin every day because of my family’s history:

Paternal grandmother:  congestive heart failure; Maternal grandmother and one aunt:  angina; my father and brother both dead of heart attacks (at ages 58 and 47, respectively);  at least one uncle dead from a heart attack.  It just kind of goes on and on.

I was getting dressed and the last thing they did was remove the IV.  They did everything just the way you’re supposed to.  Held the cotton ball tightly in place as they pulled the thing out.  Held it for a while longer.  Taped it up.  So I pulled down my sleeve and put on my Eeyore sweatshirt jacket.

The nurse looked at my arm and said, “Oh!  You’re bleeding through.”  There was a nice round spot of blood on the jacket.  I took the jacket off and OH. MY. GOD.  There was blood everywhere.  You would have thought it was an episode of CSI and we were dealing with arterial spray.  It soaked my jacket, my shirt, got all over my arm and hand, and the gurney and the floor.

And if I thought the IV had hurt when it was in, that was a walk in the park compared to how it felt after it bloomed into a gigantic hematoma.  There has been sniveling.

But my heart’s OK!

wip wednesday

A bit late and more than a bit odd.

I actually have a finished object to show.  These are the Lace Gloves, Super Fine from Paton’s #876.  I used approximately 230 yards of Naturespun Yarn which I purchased from Paradise Fibers.

They took longer than they should have because I 1) misread the instructions and 2) started a second left-hand glove and had to go back and make it a right-hand glove.

I still need to weave in the ends.  But they are virtually finished.

My current work is progress is Rivendell by Susan Pandorf and I know you are going to be stunned by my progress.

C’mon, admit it.  You can’t find the words.  :)

 

the only constant is change

Almost two years ago, I ended a friendship.  It had been a long time coming for a lot of reasons which do not warrant mention here as I am not trying to justify my decision.

We are taught that friends are like diamonds, precious and rare.  The are as good as gold.  They’re forever, so we should do everything possible to keep all the friendships we have.

If we were all to remain stagnant, exactly as we always have been without growth and steps forward and back, we could probably maintain lifelong friendships.

But we all change in different ways, at different rates. Some relationships change with us; others we outgrow.  Some are even unhealthy.

The relationship I ended was not over a single incident or statement.  It was pretty obvious, to me at least, that there was a growing animosity; a lack of ease.  Some things bothered me so much I brought them up and said, “I can’t keep doing this.”

She laughed.

The best thing she ever taught me was that a lot of things are just background noise.  That was something I needed to take in and make a part of my understanding of the world.  Unfortunately, she seemed to consider my statements background noise and they were not.  They were clear, honest statements about how I felt.

I got an email with so many misspelled words and incomplete sentences about people I didn’t even know that it was virtually incoherent.  I wrote back and said, “Please don’t send me emails I cannot understand.  If you can’t be bothered to write coherently, why should I be bothered to decipher?”

I got an email back with some corrections.  It included the statement, “Is that English enough for you?”  My husband of 37 years had just been diagnosed with Stage IV Hodgkins Lymphoma, so I was not at my most patient and understanding of the foibles of others.  But that little line, pushed me right over the edge.  As I said, this had been a long time coming.

And I told her so.

She came back with a tirade which began, “I won’t ever bother you again, but let me set a few things straight.”  My reply was that I accepted her offer and thought it would be best if she never bothered me again.

And that was that.

For me.

Almost two years later, I occasionally go visit her blog so that I can read the venomous things she still says about me.  It is a bit frustrating to be accused of things you have never done and thoughts you never had; but what she thinks does not define me.  What I consider saddest about all of this is that she can’t seem to let it go and move on with her life.

According to her blog she has plenty on her plate to keep her busy, physically, emotionally, and mentally.  But every couple of months, there is a tirade.  So far, I only know the tirades are about me because I recognize the situations and the quotes.

Not every relationship is forever.  My sister was married and divorced three times.  My other sister has been married three times to the same man — it’s a religious thing, don’t ask.  People grow, they change, they move on.  Heraclitus said, “The only constant is change.”

playing with numbers

I began substitute teaching in 1990.  That summer I was hired to work at Tranquillity High School. I was told at the time I was a Mendota hire as the two districts were splitting and, sure enough, two years later, I became a teacher in Mendota.

Don’t ask where either of these places are.  They are out on the west side of the Central Valley and if you’re there it’s because you were going there.  They are not “on the way” to anywhere.

In 1997 I was hired by Madera High School.  I got my 10-year service button yesterday (I already had the 5-year button.  I got a five-year button from Mendota, too.  Wish I knew where they were.).  If you check carefully 1997 to 2012 does NOT equal ten years.

My first two years at MHS don’t technically count because I was on a temporary contract.  Produced two 360-page yearbooks and taught four English classes every day, but every March I would get pink slipped.

Then, in 1999 I was “officially” hired.  So my start date with the District was 1999 (even though I had been here for two years).  Which makes no sense to me.  In 2004 I had to ask for my 5-year button, because I had “slipped through the cracks.”

A couple of days ago, I thought, “Wait a minute.  I have to have been here 10 years by now.  Where’s my pin?”  (If you use conventional math I will have been here 15 years at the end of this school year.)  But I should have gotten the 10-year pin in 2009.  Once again, I had slipped through the cracks and had to ask.

I clearly do NOT stand out in a crowd.  Nor, frankly, do I wish to do so.

I will be retiring in four years and I am pretty sure I will have to ask for my 15-year pin in a couple of years.

Speaking of retirement, CalSTRS sent me some paperwork recently reminding me that, while I have only been paying into the retirement system for 22 years, I DID sub for five months in 1990 and do I want to buy the service credit for that time since I was, after all, working as a teacher?

Now we have to figure out if the cost of purchasing five months of service credit will have any sort of effect on how much my retirement payments will be.

I hate math.

very late indeed

I hope the goddess will forgive me for being late, but I have been dealing with the fact that I am grateful I still have a daughter after the horrific traffic accident she was in.  She was stopped because the traffic was stopped on Highway 41.  This was apparently immaterial to the full-size Dodge Ram Truck that hit her and sent her little Suzuki Vitara flying out of her lane and into the next lane which was also full of moving cars.

All that aside, in honor of Brighid (pronounced BREE yit, if you care about that sort of thing), I present a rather late poem.

from Auguries of Innocence

William Blake

To see a World in a Grain of Sand And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand And Eternity in an hour.

A Robin Redbreast in a Cage Puts all Heaven in a Rage.

A dove house fill’d with doves and pigeons

Shudders Hell thro’ all its regions.

A Dog starv’d at his Master’s Gate

Predicts the ruin of the State.

A Horse misus’d upon the Road

Calls to Heaven for Human blood.

Each outcry of the hunted Hare

A fiber from the Brain does tear.

He who shall train the Horse to War

Shall never pass the Polar Bar.

The Beggar’s Dog and Widow’s Cat,

Feed them and thou wilt grow fat.

The Gnat that sings his Summer song

Poison gets from Slander’s tongue.

The poison of the Snake and Newt

Is the sweat of Envy’s Foot.

A truth that’s told with bad intent

Beats all the Lies you can invent.

It is right it should be so;

Man was made for Joy and Woe;

And when this we rightly know

Thro’ the World we safely go.

Every Night and every Morn

Some to Misery are Born.

Every Morn and every Night

Some are Born to sweet delight.

Some are Born to sweet delight,

Some are Born to Endless Night.