Good Journey, Dan

"Let every creature I see, be a brother and a friend to me.

Let every step that I take, leave the footprints of a warrior."

Some might say that I have a lot of nerve calling myself a knitter. The truth is, I have two finished products under my belt - and VERY MANY half finished ones. One finished item was a very (say VERY again) easy baby blanket. The blanket is knit on the diagonal, adding a stitch each row until you reach the length you'd like to achieve and then decreasing each row until you finish. The second item is a very pretty washcloth which looks like a rose petal.

That's it. That's all I've ever finished.

I knit when I was a child. I can recall hours and hours and scarf after scarf. I wonder why I stopped knitting? Two years ago, with a grandson on the way, I decided to give it a try. I decided on a whim one day to make this blanket and I'm not quite sure how I pulled it off, but I did and it was beautiful.

I'm clumsy, I'm impatient, I think I'm even sloppy. I finished the blanket for Bradley and it looked beautiful! I've knit it once again and it was so awful that I ripped it all out and now, I'm finishing up again for my another granddaughter. This time, I think it may be salvable.

I buy kniting books and needles. Spend time in knitting stores and daydream of all the projects I'd like to work. I have skeins and skeins of unknit yarn because I can't resist. I love the feel of yarn in my hands, I love everything about knitting and yet I struggle to complete even the simplest of projects. I wonder why?

Well, I think one piece of it is my internal critic. My partner pointed something out to me, when I wondered why Bradley's blanket went so well and fast while Madison's blanket has been a stop/start, rip out and start again, agonizing effort. He said that he recalled the day I decided to knit the blanket for Brad - I didn't have any expectation of the outcome, I was just looking for something to do and I picked up the needles to play. I think he might be on to something. The first piece was childlike, I was just "giving it a go" and now, I analyze and struggle and want to produce something perfect. We even went so far as to calculate the number of stitches in my diagonal blanket, the time per stitch and thus, the total time spent knitting the article. What's wrong with this picture?

I've been reading Zen and the Art of Knitting by Bernadette Murphy. I won't bother to repeat her words (it's a wonderful read, get a copy!) but I will share what was left in my consciousness at the close of the first few sections. I began to "watch" myself as I knit. Wow! Hunched over, shoulders tight, jaw tense, face twisted. No wonder I never finished anything! For the last few nights, I've taken to watching MYSELF instead of watching the lack of perfection in my work. Breath, relax the jaw, stop frowning, drop shoulders. Watch each stitch but with love and desire, not criticism. "...take it off the needle. Now, the next one." I think of Madison with each stitch, pictures of her laughing and smiling behind, "...now the next one."

The difference is incredible. As I do this more and more, the happy, peaceful memories of my childhood knitting come flooding back and I find that I am knitting faster, neater but that I am relaxed, not pressured, not completing some race. Mindful of each stitch, I find that I am enjoying the process rather than chastizing myself for the length of time it's taken (okay, Madison will be two this December!) to finish this simple project.

One thing, relax and focus on the stitch. I suspect that this will spill over into my "other" life. I have several deep and I'm sure profound thoughts about this but I'd like to knit a moment before the household wakes.

Cheers!

Why do I have a blog revisited

Okay, let's be honest, I don't just have a blog, I have a 360, a Myspace, thanks to my daughters I have an empty Facebook, I have this blog (if you can call it that for all I've blogged) and some days I've thought of adding a knitting blog, a sewing blog and an I'm a mama and a grandmama blog. This is getting out of hand don't you think? And yet still, I feel compelled to sometimes write a blog - to articulate some issue I'm grappling, to post a photo of some project I've finished, to vent and to support others. But clearly, none of those moments are enough to sustain a full-blown blog in each little piece of my life.

Initially, I wanted to keep separate blogs because I did not want students or colleagues to read posts about my personal life but, I think the lines between work and personal grow more and more blurry. I knit sometimes at work, the textile students learn to knit each quarter and so, knitting once a week in the library is a service for the students, and it helps my door counts a bit. But the knitting I do there, is for ME. Then again, I answer work emails at home, I do bits and pieces of projects at home in the evenings; certainly many of the books I read are for work, but I love my work and so perhaps those are for ME too. I might not want my colleagues to read about a personal struggle - as if my colleagues couldn't find that 360 or that MySpace if they wanted to - or worse, as if my colleagues don't have personal struggles of their own.

So, perhaps of laziness, perhaps of some need to stomp my foot and declare, "I am a WHOLE PERSON, not fragmented bits of this and that!", I intend to blog here about my whole life, my life which includes my librarian's hours, my knitting and sewing, my mothering and grandmothering, partnering and reading. I am all these things and many more and I suspect so is everyone else.

Daily Grind

Today, a student really did approach me to inquire whether or not I had noticed the Mcdonalds cup left by the printer. Really. I had not, I told her, as I abruptly left my task and rushed to remove the offending cup. This sweet student stood and smiled at me, clearly pleased with her helpfulness.

Moments after that, a very gentle student explained that she needed help accessing her email. I eagerly went to her aid, only to realize, this student has never used a mouse before. Never. Another, Really. Really.

Fortunately my day is brightened by another faculty bring me a beautiful dahlia, a lovely peach colored blossom that I hope will dry well and cheer me when summer is long gone. And another reminds me of "Knitting in the Library" at 2. I have forgotten my knitting but she assures me, that since she knows about my secret stash of a yarn ball, that she will provide me with needles.

I look forward to my substituting tonight for an Information Litaracy instructor....we will be looking at journals. Of the four classes which I have covered for him, he's left me detailed lesson plans and instructions but for this one. I'm looking forward to standing on my own this evening. We'll see how it goes.

Why do I have a blog? Why do you have a blog?

I started this blog sometime ago, months? I've posted what, twice? I thought I should have a blog because it seems like librarians are supposed to have a blog. Then I realized I'd have to think about things to write about. Ummmm. I ranacross lots of librarian's blogs talking about "big stuff", you know, important ideas, shape the profession kind of ideas....I'm a reader of those ideas of course, but not likely an instigator. So, i felt a little small and hadn't come up with any of those big, profession changing ideas to write about and so, here sat my little blog.

But you know, I found several blogs today from hmm dare I say, normal librarians? The kind of folks that have normal days, that love (mostly) their work, love their patrons (okay, not always), do crafts, use bad language, and for the most part, just chat about their lives, the books they read and the folks they serve and of course, their libraries.

Now what I find odd about this is that it had never occured to me that anyone would enjoy reading the normal, day to day things which happen in my little library. I thought, "hmmm, you'd need to be one helluva writer to make THIS worth reading...." but no...I enjoyed others chatting about their experience, I enjoy the complaining, the praising, the laundry listing of life in my library...and so.................(You knew I was going here didn't you?)...

Today in MY library....my new library assistant asked for the evening off. Mind you, he has exactly one week under his belt. One week. When I interviewed him, we discussed very clearly that larger than usual need for his dependable and punctual attendance. You see, my library only has me from 8 - 5 and my assistant, a work-study student from 5 - 10 PM. Accredidaton requires that one of us be here, but no one seems to get that we might need a substitute, or to hire another work-study student.

Maybe I'm not so great a manager. Well, I've certainly never been a manager before. My new assistant had a very sad story about locking his keys in the car and not being able to do his homework this weekend. The homework required going to the zoo. So, at 2 PM he thought he'd ask me for the night off and head for the zoo. This does not bode well. I fumbled around a bit - my first instinct is to let whomever is it do whatever it is they think they want, or need to do, and then try my best to take up the slack. Okay, maybe I fumbled for more than awhile. I bit my tongue, I absolutely refused to give myself permission to take up the slack tonight. My health is suffering and I'm already staying late to teach two nights this week with no compensation that I can tell. NO! Inside I kept screaming NO to myself. He must have sensed my turmoil.

"I don't want to creat a problem," he said. "Oh, really?", I" thinking, "why on earth would you ask for an evening off, three hours before the evening begins, and show no signs of being bloody or otherwise near death's door, when you've only been working here a week, AFTER I explained how unusually important your attendance might be?" I wish I remembered exactly what I said, something like when you don't come to work, I need to stay until 10 and I'm not eager to do that when I work two twelve hour days already this week. I asked him which zoo he's visiting and he responded that he's going to Woodland Zoo. Ummm, 2 PM, can be at the zoo by 2:30, spend a couple of hours and back before work starts at 5. When I suggested this he said, "Yeah, I should have asked to be a little late." So, I' guessing that even though, in my mind, he can fulfill his assignment, and still arrrive by 5 - I'm betting he'll be late.

Sigh. But now the story gets worse. His teacher just strode past my library door. Anxious for any excuse to get up and walk away from my desk, I flagged him down. "Hey! Can you fill me in on that assignment that requires a visit to the zoo?" I can bet you're guessing already, "What assignment are you talking about? I've no requirement that students visit the zoo - they MAY but they don't have to." So, of course, I explained the whole dilemna. Turns out the assignment was not due today, or even tomorrow, but it was due last Wednesday.

This does not look good at all. I was so relieved to have the assistant finally in place. So relieved. Guess I'll learn how to be more of a manager, faster than I thought.

Issues of Control

Most days, I have very little to say. Most days, I simply do what I call, hanging out, with my students. I have so much fun answering those questions I can, and pursuing the answers to the questions which are new to me. I do wonderful things like drool over incredible books about beloved artists, I watch as they incorportate the words from the shelf into amazing creations. Once in awhile I say, "shhhhhhhh" and I spend a lot of time resizing windows, explaining how to choose a printer and giving my honest opinion on written and fine creative works. I keep meaning to blog and I keep forgetting...and so I have energy today, and I remember today and of course, I have snippy things to say.

I don't want to stock the library with portable drafting tables! I don't want to take public performance licensure fees from the library budgets each time an instructor shows a movie! AND! I don't want to answer the door 12 times an hour because our library doors MUST be on a secure system requiring a key card that my students generally forget. That's a lot of I don't wants...and...its a lot of I don't wants given the *I* am the manager of my little fortress of whirring passion captured on pages. How did this happen? There are so many things I cannot control!