Spring's late arrival

Yesterday we turned off the furnace and opened the windows to welcome the first day we could--long awaited, it seemed forever ago that we'd smelled the air drifting through the rooms, felt it on our skin, remembered that it will slam the door to the study if strong enough. Only a few months and we have forgotten the habits of warm days, the way we are when the outside moves inside.

(The daffodils are just about ready to bloom...)

Every year I am amazed and joyful at the waking up of the earth, our annual miracle. Yesterday it seemed like the house woke up, too. The slamming door, yes, but also the sheer curtains dancing in the window at the top of the stairs, dust bunnies emerging from under furniture and rolling across the blonde hardwood floors. The sun revealed translucent marks on the countertop where we'd forgotten messes.

This is the best kind of housekeeping: aided by the light and the breeze, welcoming the smell of warm, damp earth into the house. Saying goodbye to winter, sweeping away its sticky, its crumbs, its fluff. Turning to a new day, a new year, a new spring.

May you enjoy spring.
Karen

Flight instructions

I wrote this as I waited for the plane to go to Minneapolis this past Tuesday. I hope you enjoy it.

Safe travels,
Karen

-- Put your pocket knife and tweezers in the bag you're going to check. Find the lighter at the bottom of your purse, the one you keep there for emergency smudging, next to the tail end of the sweetgrass braid, and leave it at home. Hope that the shop at the airport, past security, sells cheap lighters.

-- Take the stones out of your backpack. Leave them at home. Your bags will be heavy enough without carrying rocks around. Put one small stone in your purse. It's probably okay to bring just one.

-- Fish around in all your pockets--in your coat, your purse, your backpack, all the nooks and crannies--for the things you have stashed there and nearly forgotten that the airlines will throw away: minty lip balm, lipstick, hand lotion, antibacterial lotion, cuticle cream, Rescue Remedy. Put them in a ziplock bag, quart size only, and put that bag in the front pocket of your backpack for easy removal in the security line.

-- Put your fountain pens in a plastic baggie inside your pencil case. They are not restricted items, not forbidden. But they might leak.

-- Wear slip-on shoes. Make sure socks are clean and free of holes.

-- Keep your wallet handy. Be ready to grab your driver's license and credit card. Show them; put them away; keep track of your boarding pass; put it away; take it out; once you get on the plane, fold it up and use it as a bookmark.

-- Get something to eat or drink if you have to wait a while--lord knows, they won't feed you on the plane. Be sure to have water handy. (The air on the plane is so dry.) But also be sure to visit the bathroom before you board.

-- Kiss the ones you love, hug them. But don't get maudlin. Don't think it might be the last time.

-- On your way into the plane, give the fingers on your right hand a quick kiss, and pat the outside of the plane, to the right of the door opening.

-- Stow your backpack under the seat in front of you, but first take out what you need--water, something to read, pen and pencil, something to write on, knitting. If your backpack won't fit under the seat, put it overhead. Do all of this quickly. Shove your feet on either side of your purse. Remember that this is the only place you regret having long legs.

-- Ask your guardian angels to help you not be afraid. Ask the spirits of the air to lift and carry the plane gently, and set it down again gently on the other end. Pray. Think about sleeping. Drink water. Read. Think about your destination. Think about your home.

Do you wish you could write?

This is the question posed on the cover of Lynda Barry's recent book What It Is. I bought a copy with my birthday gift certificate and have been making my way through it slowly, savoring the images on each page and letting them sink in, pondering the questions asked and ideas raised... It's a wonderful book!

(My awesome birthday g.c. purchase...)

I have two things to tell you about this topic.

First: if the answer to that question for you is YES but you're having problems getting started on a project, or continuing a project, or finishing a project, you might want to take Alice Bradley's online course "The Practice of Writing." Here's a link; registration will be open for a few more days.

The course is, at the same time, very flexible in terms of your situation (whether you want to write a blog or short stories or poetry or whatever) and in terms of the time commitment (as little as, say, a half hour a day or as much as several hours--whatever you can spare).

And the course is both inspiring and practical. In addition to giving information about things you can do to help you get to your goals, Alice's motivational advice is just the right combination of kick in the butt and "there, there" if you fall down. She's a great teacher.

So if you're thinking about making writing a bigger part of your life, check it out!

Here's the second thing I need to say, though I won't say too much... out of superstition, I guess. I took Alice's course this past January/February, and the answer to that question above is most emphatically YES. Yes, yes, and more yes. Yes every day.

I hope you have an inspiring day. If you wish you could write, give yourself a little 15-minute break and go ahead and write. Make your wish come true.

Cheers,
Karen

The knee knows

On Tuesday afternoon, my knee said to me, quite simply: snow.

It was on one of the many trips I made up and down the stairs in my building, between my office and the next floor down, where our mailboxes and copy machine and water cooler and coffee machine and bathroom are. It was not a loud message, and it was not repeated. It was plain, and just once, but it definitely was.

I doubted my knee. It was only raining at the time, and didn't feel cold enough for snow. Turns out, I should not have doubted my knee. Also, it has a way better track record than any weather forecaster out there: every single time it says "snow," we get snow within 24 hours. This has been going on for, oh, more than 30 years now. (!!!)

(view out the front window, Wednesday, March 6th, dawn)

 (view out the back window, Wednesday, March 6th, dawn)

 (view out the kitchen window, Wednesday, March 6th, dawn)

So that started me thinking about some of the other ways I doubt or don't listen to or ignore my body, ways that I tell it: I don't believe you (no matter how right you are).

Lately, most often I ignore my body when it tells me I need sleep. (This is not good, I know.) Most often it's because I need to finish my homework--prepping for class the next day (reading the text or writing a lesson plan), maybe grading, or organizing other non-class things that need to happen (usually this involves being on e-mail). There's an urgency in getting that work done that allows me to ignore my body.

But sometimes, on the nights when homework is less urgent, I get this feeling I used to get as a kid, where I really, really want to stay up and watch some teevee or hear what the grownups are talking about. (I think the closest equivalent nowadays to listening what the grownups are talking about is looking to see what's happening on FaceBook or Twitter.) I feel that if I go to bed, I will miss something. And I don't want to miss anything! I want to be part of the party! I want to be part of the conversation--at least to listen to it!

Sometimes, on those nights, I'm able to limit the stay-up-past-my-bedtime time to one show or just a little time online; but sometimes it's as if no amount of time doing those things is going to satisfy that yearning. Somehow, I need to figure out, on those nights, how to convince my younger self that a) we are not missing anything, and b) we'll feel much better tomorrow if we just go to sleep. (Usually, though, my younger self is not a very good listener. Must figure out how to talk to it more effectively... Maybe I could convince it that the chance to come up with some interesting dreams will be entertainment enough? or a different kind of "let's see what's going on elsewhere" kind of activity?)

I hope you are getting enough sleep where you are, and that you make your way safely through whatever kind of weather you've got. Listen to your body.

Cheers,
Karen

(Edited to add: today, two days later, the snow is melting, the sun is out, and everything around me says spring is coming... I have been feeling the undeniable urge to dance! dance! dance! Okay, now I'm listening, body. Let's dance around the kitchen! Let's GO!)

In honor of Brigid

In honor of Brigid, the goddess of the bards and of midwives, keeper of the healing well and the forge, I offer this poem.

"Microchimerism"
by Heid E. Erdrich

I
Nub of human,
shell pink fingernail,
whether you live
or all unformed
leave her body
she will never
be without you.

This, scientists tell us, is literally true:
... the cells from her miscarriages, her stillborns,
and all of her children ... We carry them
for a lifetime. But the cells actually go both ways.

Nub of human,
your cells migrate,
are found at sites
hurt in the maternal body,
and in successive siblings,
even those you never knew,
even those who never knew you.

II
Nub of human,
shell pink fingernail,
she will never be without you.

Vivid dreams in her bed echoed,
a wall away and you felt her,
knew her wakefulness
through the quiet she maintained.

She knew it too and tried
explaining, "It is like she is in me,
knows my brain, and wakes me up
before she wakes."

Darkness so soft she feels its nap
cushion her movements,
still she reaches you
just as your cries begin,
then you two are one again.

Or more correctly,
you never left:
your cells and hers
flowed back and forth--
blood river once between you
went two ways, scientists say:

The waves of fetal microchimerism
are just beginning to break
along the scientific shore.

Even in her milk,
her milk for you--your milk,
a million messages, recipes, connections.

This month you demand
brain grease, complex fats;
next month another mix
produced especially for you.

She should have known
when she craved avocado, salmon, sesame,
and cursed the invective against sushi.

III
Nub of human,
shell pink fingernail--

Who left cells in your mother
that she gave to you?

A million unknown others.

What makes us
our own sole and sovereign selves
is only partially us.

The search for God can be called off.

Now we know:
masses of genetic material not our own
inside us, always with us, like the soul.

I should not
have said that about God.
Forgive me, I
am not
myself.

(Italicized lines from Dr. Judith G. Hall, 2002, and from Bruce Morgan's profile of Dr. Diana Bianchi in Tufts Medicine, 2005.)

Poem reprinted with permission from the author, and available in the book Cell Traffic.

In gratitude for Brigid, and for all the poets of the world, today and yesterday and tomorrow.


Karen

Lightning post about slow things

Today was supposed to be a Writing Day, dedicated to coming up with a whole new opening to my "Dances with Kevin" essay. I recently recognized (in horror) that I've been working on it for a couple years now. I need to be DONE with it, send it along once again and hope it finds a home.

But it was a tough week because of a) lingering migraine pain and b) trouble sleeping, not to mention c) teaching all my classes and doing all my homework, so I was d) exhausted, and e) needed a nap. So instead of a Writing Day I had a Recovery Day. (LMNOP? ZZZZZ?)

And then I thought: hey, how about a blog post? I could do like Anne and Kay over at Mason-Dixon knitting again and write a fast one with a time limit! Woohoo! So here we go... And this time, it's a KNITTING post!

I always make something knitted for Dexter and Patrick for Christmas. It's rare that I finish them before the actual day, but I usually finish during the vacation, or shortly thereafter. This year, not so much. (See: flu; lots of work to finish over the break; tired.) I am still working on them. Arg!

So here are the knitted things, photographed with our Christmas tree as it waited to be picked up on the curb. (Isn't that the epitome of the post-Christmas let-down?)

Patrick's socks
This year he requested socks in a thinner fabric, so I used a pattern I've made for him before, the Yarn Harlot's Earl Grey.

 (Sad tree; sock looks kind of sad, too...)

 

 (... but a nice color, yes? And look at those lovely teensy cables!)

(And here's the second one, on the needles at least; 

as of today, I'm 1/3 down the leg...)

Dexter's mitten-gloves
This year Dexter requested mittens, but the kind where you can fold over the mitten part to reveal half-gloves. And he wanted them in mostly black, with a red design thingy. (Knitters, especially ones with middle-aged eyes, will tell you: ARG! not black yarn!)

I had a rough start on these; I've never made a pair, and I didn't have a pattern proper, just sort of guidelines (make a mitten but with a row that you zip out and open, add fingers there, etc.). And at first I was on the cray-cray train and thought I was going to knit them out of fingering-weight yarn (Translation for Non-Knitters: tiny, with toothpick-like needles) with a fair isle pattern (TfNK: a complicated color pattern that requires you to be a knitting NINJA). It wasn't until a few days before Christmas that I realized I should use thicker yarn and that Dexter would be perfectly happy with a simple stripe. So that's what we have here. Mitten one:

 (They look kind of baggy here--because the model is me, and D's hands are now bigger than mine.)

 (Here it is, inside out... with all the ends hanging out. 

So many ends! So much weaving-in to do!)

(Here's the folded-back look... Imagine it 

without all those strings hanging down... 

and with normal-looking fingers sticking out 

rather than something that looks like glow-sticks (???)... )

So, after I sign off here, the next stage of my Recovery Day is teevee time, with knitting. I hope that D and P will see these late presents not as a sign that I am lame and can't even finish Christmas presents properly, but rather as a sign that my love for them will persevere and continue on through all obstacles. Because it will.

May you make some noticeable progress today!

Cheers,
Karen

Happy new year!

I am feeling inspired by Kay and Anne, and am trying out something new: a 15-minute blog post.

(I don't usually make resolutions at the New Year--I make mine closer to Groundhog Day--but I know for sure I want 2013 to include more writing, including writing on the sadly neglected blog. So here we go!)

The past couple of days I have been a little bit excited that I'm in the news. Okay, maybe not me personally, but I've been sort of in the news. One of the big stories has been the 2012-13 FLU EPIDEMIC. Friends, I'm here to tell you that you DO NOT want this flu.

On Christmas Day, we had breakfast and opened presents, and I wanted to be partaking in the Christmas spirit, but I was not feeling great. With each passing minute, I felt worse. After present-opening, I felt so crappy that I went back to bed and didn't get up for the rest of the day. I had the classic flu symptoms: fever, body aches, coughing (a LOT), and extra mucus. I was gross.

 (My Mom had sent us fancy boxes of tissues 

in our St. Nicholas Day packages--for the colds we had 

in early December. This jolly Santa was my companion for several days...)

The next day, Patrick took me to the doctor--IN A BLIZZARD! I posted on FB that it felt like we were in an episode of Little House on the Prairie. Luckily, the doctor's office is only about a mile away, so we got there and back without incident. I was so pitiful while at the office that they offered to let me lie down while I waited for my flu test results to come back, and I did, and the doctor put one of those little sheets on me. Pitiful!

I wasn't sure whether I had bona-fide flu, or maybe bronchitis (did I mention I was coughing a lot?), or maybe pneumonia (which a friend of ours had recently), or maybe if it was the flu, it might be H1N1 (which another friend of ours had recently). Honestly, I was a little bit concerned that they'd send me to the hospital across the street and tell me to spend some time there. (I'm glad they didn't--what a terrible place to go when your immune system is already compromised!)

Anyhow, as soon as we got back home I went back to bed--and then stayed there for the next three days. When I could keep my eyes open, my iPod kept me entertained (FB, Twitter, NPR news, even the occasional e-mail check), and I read Life of Pi on the Kindle mom gave me for my birthday last year. The kittens came and snuggled with me a lot.

(My little sweatpeas; they made good companions when they weren't wrassling on the bed.)

When I finally was able to get out of bed, I still didn't have a lot of energy; going downstairs to eat a bowl of soup felt like running a 5K.

So that was almost three weeks ago now, and I'm STILL RECOVERING. I am resting a lot, some days staying in pjs and not going anywhere. Sometimes I read, or knit, but sometimes even that feels like expending too much energy. I am able to work about half a day before I feel like absolute crap. I am still coughing. (Our department secretary said she knew I was in the building the other day because she heard me coughing. Still pitiful!)

I'm really scared that classes start on Monday and I'm not able to work a whole day yet... and I'm teaching a new class (my Travel-Learning course, for which I must make many arrangements), plus a class I haven't taught in a LONG time that is out of my specialty areas, plus freshman English. Yikes. I'll just have to take it one day at a time and get done as much as I can without making myself feel worse. Woohoo--Let's hear it for reduced expectations!

Okay, it looks like my 15 minutes are up. I hope you, dear readers, are flu-free and enjoying the new year.

Cheers,
Karen