lifelong knitter

Traffic Jam

Ordinarily I am not a big fan of traffic. (oh, the MUSIC, sure....) Today I am positively giddy with delight that the center of this small town is snarled with cars and I happily waited the extra ten minutes for a place to park an extra block away from the library. Why? These are VOTERS! I did my civic duty and cast my ballot already, and it felt great to get that little I VOTED sticker....
Last night I went to the Knitting group and one of the regulars is a retired teacher (high school, 35 years) who is rather firm in her opinions. She had just cast on for another Noro purse and said loudly...."All I am going to say is that if you don't exercise your right to vote, you have No Right to complain."
Well said.
Daughter bird called from college to say that a girl in her dorm had offered to drive any and all registered voters to the polling place...that just does my heart PROUD, you know?
Oh, and she got her midterm grades. I'm kvelling, big time.
Date with the boy bird after work this afternoon. He needs Hiking Boots.
Sandy Poodle gets her stitches out and can finally have a BATH. We are both Very Excited about it!
Hope your weekend is Happy!

The Long(ish) Story

I was going to make it short and just say, hey, it IS my glasses that are the problem and not my eye...but that doesn't really say much, and I'm hoping by writing this out I'll get some perspective (pun fully intended) on the subject.
Apparently, they polished the new lens for the left eye, which of course doesn't match the anti-glare coated lens on the right eye, so my brain has been Very Confused. More than Usual, okay...All of the sparkly lights and dancing reflections are NOT Migraine related, but refractory results. Thank GOD.
To avoid the *no reading* adventure of last time, I ordered a back-up pair of glasses. When those come in next week, I'll get rechecked to see if the week without drops makes any measurable difference as compared to the two months ON the drops. THEN, and only then, I'll release these glasses back into the wild and hope they come back FIXED. Otherwise I'll have to learn to work with hard contacts and additional reading glasses, and although I will if I have to, that is NOT my choice as far as options go. It takes me twenty minutes to put DROPS in my eyes, I can't IMAGINE putting plastic discs in....ewwwww.
The scar tissue is still there, but has not grown any since the last visit, and is considerably less inflamed, so the drops were actually worth it. The eye doctor and the arrogant surgeon will have a pow wow to decide what to do next (let's just hope whatever is in that pipe they are smokin relaxes them and takes EGO out of the picture....) as far as surgery or not.
The BIG picture is that my eyesight is not correctable at this point. My right eye sees fairly well and communicates appropriately with the left side of my brain. The left eye is not spherical, and so there is a lag in processing to the right side of the brain. The (sort of) amusing part of this is that for twenty odd years I have helped my children with their visual processing skills related to language, and now I have to take care of the same problem for MYSELF. I'm a horrible patient. This will be quite interesting, indeed. The skills I have always taken for granted, like hand-eye coordination, are a little wonky right now. I have to THINK about how to knit, which is So ODD. I'm guessing it is a little like trying to teach a stubborn adult a skill they already think they know (cough, cough) and don't want to spend much time on.
Ah, the inner journey. Fraught with dangers at every turn. Oh look, there's a Dragon, right over there, wearing a tee shirt that says Ignore me at your own Peril. Oh, dear.
When the eye doctor started going on about the lengthy therapy sessions that might be involved to retrain my eye brain connection, I said (just a little too forcefully, methinks) IT IS TIME FOR ME TO START TAKING CARE OF MYSELF FOR A CHANGE! He backed up a little and looked surprized. Hmmmm.
I'm determined to turn over a new leaf. A lovely literary metaphor, that.
Hang on for Mister Toad's Wild Ride!
Danger Girl has a fistfull of E ticket coupons and I'm wearing my Disneyland sweatshirt......
Hands and arms inside the ride, please....
All Aboard!

Tomorrow

Yep, tomorrow I am marching into the eye doctor's office and declaring my freedom from Strong Medicine in the form of exorbitantly expensive eye drops. I don't suppose anybody is still reading this blog after my nearly month long absence, but just in case....bonus points for why I am humming
"give it a giggle instead of a sigh...."
(hint: election related)
Alrighty then, here's the GOOD news:
I've carted off significant baggage to Goodwill and made a dent in my piles o paperwork. It is ever so much easier to purge the paper files when you can't read the small print.
I have received some incredible packages in the mail for which I am woefully behind on thank you notes. The story of my life. You can ask my Mother. (or not)
The oookiest thing happened the other night...
I was flipping through the channels trying to avoid the nasty election commercials and I landed on Meg Ryan hanging Christmas ornaments on a tree and a voice over saying "I never missed my Mother more..."
cue the Universe.
Yep. Phone rings at That Very Instant, and it is my Mother.
(who very rarely calls, by the way....)
It's altogether ooky, I'm telling you.
Did anybody else wish for a Mother more like Morticia, or was it just ME?
Back to regular posting by Friday, that's my GOAL.
mwah!

Swimmy headed

I got my glasses back and they are not right. In fact, they are decidedly LEFT. Politically speaking, I am all for leaning to the left, but in my daily walk, not so much. Combined with the sickness from the drops, I am not feeling well at all. I have a return appointment with the eye doctor on the 27th, at which time I am going to politely and firmly request that the drops cease and desist, and that the glasses make a return trip to the land of the waltz. Perhaps I should hand carry them. Teehee. He'll check out the back of my eye and see whether there has been any progress, but my feeling is that we are adressing the symptoms and not the root cause of the problem. I need to interupt the cycle of scar tissue production, not simply attempt to mitigate the resulting inflammation. In the meantime, I can't read and my balance is weebly wobbly at best. I'm feeling Very Disconnected.
I hereby promise not to ever take good vestibular balance or my ability to read for granted ever again.
sigh.
I'm at my local public library computer, with the huge screen magnifier set up so I can write this.....
I miss the daily circle of blogs and hope that all is well with all of you....
Blessings, this day as always!

Humble Pie

I've done the basic Artist's Way program half a dozen times, and thouroughly enjoyed the process. I have to confess, though, that every single time I find a way around the *no reading* week. I rationalize, I justify, I wriggle out of it.
I humbly apologize.
The Universe had enough of this behavior and finally decided there would be NO READING for an entire week, minimum. My glasses went off to Austria, and mysteriously did not pass Quality Control. They will not be shipped back until tomorrow. I am simply UNABLE to read.
I've had a massive migraine for a week, the longest I've ever had to endure this level of pain.
Yum. That humble pie tastes mighty fine.
I think I've had my fill.
Just to be sure this doesn't happen again, I'm changing my ways.
Tomorrow.
When I get my glasses back.
I will never again take reading for granted, nor discount the solitude it affords me.
I realize now what a delicious cocoon of avoidance I have wrapped myself in.
I'm ready to do the butterfly dance and spread my wings instead of hiding in my reading cave.
Reading about art is NOT the same thing as making art.
Reading about the importance of writing a thousand words a day every day is fabulous,
but I need to Just DO it.
Daughter bird has been home for Fall break, and this weekend my nest was full of JOY.
Both the kids continue to astound and astonish me with the incredible progress they have made.
I did indeed complete my Fair Isle sampler, complete with cut steek, button bands, facings and EVERYTHING. A tip of my hat to Nancy Shroyer. If you have a chance to take a class with her, I highly recommend the experience.
I have more than a thousand unread emails.
Tomorrow afternoon I will drive the daughter bird back to college after picking up my glasses, spend the night in the small college town and scoot back Wednesday to get back on track.
I feel as though the train has taken a small side track and as on our trip cross country, I am waiting for the wreckage to be cleared. It is ever so much different when you can't read to pass the time.
I've actually had to look at what is happening in my life instead of escaping to a fantasy world to avoid dealing with it. Forty plus years of accumulation needs to be Dealt With.
Lesson learned.
Namaste.

Three Bags Full

It has been almost a year since the Boy bird moved into his own nest, and I have to confess that I have not been able to go into his old room without weeping. This morning I marched myself in there and Sandy Poodle helped me load up three big bags of clothing for the Goodwill Store. I tried not to think about the memories attached to each tee shirt and sweatshirt as it went into the black bags, but instead thought about how much a warm sweatshirt might be appreciated by the person who gets it from the Goodwill Store. I thought about how Rachael was so excited to find the doc martens, and hoped a similar thing might happen with these clothes. I was surprized at how good it felt to actually haul those bags down the stairs and fling them into the Mommymobile. I drove straight to the Goodwill store and unloaded them. It feels good. (Yes, I am trying to convince myself.)
Before I get completely maudlin, I need to change the subject.
Please go to Rachel's and wish one of my favorite young women a Very Happy Birthday.
Hope your Friday is filled with unexpected joy!
mwah.