the one for Sharyn

In the middle of last week I found myself captivated by a thought that had appeared out of the very cold, very blue sky. Suddenly my heart was harbouring fantasies of spending the dark winter nights this year curled up next to a fire, a cup of chai tea on my left, and a pile of knitting projects on my right.

Yes.

Knitting projects.

Says she who hasn't knitted since the age of eight when it was half-hearted at best, and abandoned before completion at worst.

I sat on the thought for a few days and tried my hand at googling Knit Shops, without much success. Finally I decided to take the step that I knew would be pulling the pin on the grenade of an idea. There would be no going back once I made my thoughts known. I took a breath, I found my words, and I asked the guru of all-things-knit for her advice. The lovely Sharyn rose to the challenge within minutes! The information, the suggestions, the tips and pointers came pouring in from her Sydney location and I found myself set up with a pattern to attempt, a shop to track down, and a slight fear of failing in my heart.

With no idea what I was doing, and a new language in front of me (a round? A skein? Purling!?), I was a little overwhelmed. Saturday afternoon arrived and while the lovely Nick waited patiently in the car, I braved the rain and braved the shop full of domesticity at its best. I waited until the counter was clear and the shop had emptied a little, then I asked in little more than a whisper if someone could help me find... chunky wool? And a circular needle?

A lovely woman about my age lept to my aid, and once I'd shown her the pattern she was completely on board with my quest. She picked out a few varieties of wool, then spent a fretful time trying to find the correct needle, to no avail. She discussed my options and suggested a few other stores, aware that I was a novice wholly unable to tweak the pattern to fit a different needle. She asked if she could make a copy of the pattern to try herself, saying she was on her way south for the weekend and wished she had more time to whip up another weapon against the chill. She invited me back on Tuesday night to what sounded like a secret knitting society, looking around at the older customers as she lowered her voice conspiratorially and said, the ones who come on Tuesdays are more our age.

Then, clutching her newly copied pattern, she released me empty handed to the world and the rain. I felt a little let down. I wanted to start immediately, but there was a spanner in the works. An attempt to find a Peterborough St shop reminded us of the earthquake chaos our city is in, so it wasn't until later in the day that we found ourselves in a Warehouse, and I accidentally stumbled into the craft aisle. Wool! For a lot cheaper (both monetarily and quality). And needles! Still unsure of what exactly a circular needle was, I made the executive decision that an 8mm by 80cm would suffice for a 9mm by 60cm.

And then I youtubed.

I learnt to cast on! And then did it two more times because I either left too much, or not enough wool at the end.

I learnt what a stitch is! And I subsequently dropped one, or maybe two, but be lenient with me.

I learnt how to join in the round! I learnt how to knit a round! I learnt how to purl!

And I learnt how to laugh at myself and forgo my perfectionist tendencies when I discovered, three rounds in, a gaping hole. And something a bit weird going on with one section of the purl.

And I learnt how relaxing it is to curl my feet up under me and to click the needles together, to get a rhythm going, to occupy my always-fidgeting hands with something constructive.

I am one ball of wool, and one third of my way into a simple beginner's project.

And I am hooked.

Now I find in myself a desire to forget every other obligation in life in favour of knitting, baking, and keeping house.

What a wife. I mean, life.

snakes in a truck

I remembered a little bit ago, half an hour maybe, that today is Friday. Friday! What great excitement that is.

Of course, I'd only forgotten for a short while. I knew yesterday was Thursday, and I knew I should start thinking about weekend plans, but somewhere along the line the reality of two days without obligations had slipped my mind.

Oh, sweet bliss.

That has made my day, almost before it's even started. That makes two good days this week. We're on the upward swing.

There are a few snippets, random occurrences that have left me thinking things over.

1. I've been fearful of everything lately. Take for example, leaving my house each day. I worry about the doors being locked. I worry about leaving my most precious, irreplaceable possessions there in case of fire / flood / earthquake (all of which seem not just possible, but probable these days). I worry about heaters being left on, hair straighteners not being switched off (I was the culprit for that one last night), taps dripping into a blocked sink that then overflows and destroys an already destroyed house, the river rising with too much rain and spilling into the property, the ground opening up and sucking down the rest of the foundations, the water not actually being safe to drink, the house being knocked down without our awareness, the world spinning off its axis and imploding.

I know it sounds a little silly, but there was a night I was in Australia and the weather raged outside the car as we drove the dark, twisting roads into the Blue Mountains. The rain lashed against the windscreen harder than the wipers could keep up with, and every half a minute there were flashes of brilliant white lightening in the sky. Half an hour earlier we had learned of the earthquake - only the earthquake, at that stage - in Japan, and for that night, though I smiled and interacted and we ate dinner as if our lives were unaltered, for that night it felt as though the straps on the world had come undone, and the very worst was happening. It seemed that no one, no place, no thing was safe from the forces of nature, and that the most terrible things you could imagine were at our doorstep.

That night, it seemed like nothing was ever going to be right again. And yes, while believing in God and a future greater than this is all well and good, when it comes down to living out a life in these circumstances, it's rough, and sometimes there is little consolation. There is no denying that it is hard, and often scary. The unknowns, the unpredictables seem so much more menacing these days, lurking in the shadows ready to leap out as soon as a back is turned.

That's what February's earthquake felt like. It sounds silly in hindsight, but for that afternoon and the few days that followed, I couldn't shake the feeling that I had let my guard down. I felt that my focus had been distracted by trivial things, I hadn't been keeping things under control and had looked away for a second, for a minute, I'd been thinking about other things and suddenly the earthquake happened. As if it was my fault. I've talked with a few people about this and have been reassured that while it's not entirely a natural reaction, it's not as uncommon or absurd as it seems.

Anyway. I got sidetracked as seems to be the case. In fact, I think I may have used that exact line in last week's post. Instead of all the other points I was going to discuss, most of which have packed up and left my mind, let me leave you with a story of ridiculousness as far as fear goes, so we can all laugh at me:

Yesterday, I had a snake in my truck. No, really.

After my small group finished at 9pm, I quickly walked out to the truck in the dark, opened the door and hopped into the driver's seat as I threw my bag on the passenger seat. Immediately I heard a loud, angry hissing, and I froze on the spot. My heart lurched painfully before I had time for conscious thought, and in a split second I assessed my fight-or-flight response. SNAKE, in the truck, how far away is it, and is it about to lunge at me before I can even see it!?

Before enough time had passed to make a move, rational thought kicked in. I hadn't forgotten I live in a snake-free country. I looked at the passenger seat, my eyes adjusting to the darkness, my hand still on the door handle for a quick exit. The snake was a book, that had slid across a receipt, ruffling the edges to elicit a hiss.

I am a fool. How about you tell me an embarrassing story of your own for solidarity?

practicing walking

Two days ago I took my car into my regular garage in town to fix it up with a warrant. An hour wait was predicted, so I took the opportunity to do what I do best: I went for a walk. It was a cold day, one of the first to truly settle us into autumn.

My route took me along the edge of the cordon in town, where I stood at fences and looked down closed roads that are strewn with debris, seven weeks on. The stench of rotting food that wafted out from the deserted restaurants, and the dust that filled my eyes with every gust of wind was enough to leave me glum. I saw mud patterns of leaves stencilled on the footpaths. I saw broken windows and piles of bricks. I saw warped scaffolding that had failed to perform.

When buildings are torn down they leave an unnerving space. The nearby surviving structures look naked, the sides and fronts of them suddenly exposed like they never have been before. Each fallen fence feels a little like a violation, seeing behind them into yards that were supposed to be private. It is unsettling. I was glad to get back to the car, despite its failed warrant, so I could drive back down the familiar broken streets. It is too sad to stumble across new landscape changes in an old city that used to be so comfortable.


A day ago, reluctant as I was with dusk lowering the sun too early in the evening, I went walking along the river to maintain some activity in my freedom hours - the ones unencumbered by work obligations or chores. The air was still and crisp, the river like glass disturbed only by the ducks. There was no breeze; woodsmoke lingered gently at roof level with its comforting smell warming my spirit, if not my bones.

The chasmed paths were treacherous in the half light. On my return I noted sadly that only one out of every ten houses, on both sides of the river, were lit from the inside. It is a ghost neighbourhood and it feels every bit as abandoned as it is in actuality. Our immediate neighbours have pulled up their twenty four year old roots and moved to stabler pastures. The dark settled quickly and I hastened to get home without stumbling over cracks and lumpy asphalt.


Today, I made the most of having a free hour during my work day to myself. I'd begun to read, but there were my own words nagging at the periphery of my mind that I couldn't quite coax out of hiding. I left the makeshift office - a co-worker's house - and strolled down the quiet streets. The wind was back out in force; one day on, one day off, one day on. The forest towered over me on the left, and beautiful, elegant homes lined up at my right hand side.

With my eyes I consumed each picture perfect property as I passed, hungry for more snapshots to file away in my mind. Dreams are free, but these houses are not and I am too realistic to hope for one of my own one day. Their stylish gardens, immaculate stripes of light-and-dark grass mowed to precision length, sculpted trees as fences to give an illusion of openness while expertly hiding the windows behind them.

I saw a spade forgotten, half dug into the ground in this suburban paradise. Having inside information of the covenants signed up to for living in this subdivision, I wondered at how they got away with this. Perhaps no one else had noticed. Perhaps there is no specific stipulation ruling against gardening equipment lying unattended. Perhaps other things are occupying the minds of the modestly rich at this time. I wouldn't be surprised. Like the portaloos lining the streets. I doubt there is a covenant against them - after all, who would have ever predicted it would be a necessity in such a well manicured suburb in a well-developed city? No one could have guessed there would be a day, a month, a year when our sewer system would be on the brink of collapse.

Being autumn, the air is biting and the wind packs a real punch, even against the defences of a thick hoodie and a knitted scarf. I knotted the latter tighter at my neck and shoved my hands into my pockets, wondering at the discovery my fingers made of an empty sachet of sugar. When was the last time I dressed in this particular article of warmth? A year ago? I couldn't remember where I last wore it, or why I would pocket a small piece of rubbish instead of leaving it in an empty mug.

Maybe it was a takeaway coffee, and I had no other place to stash it. I don't remember much about my actions from the past year, but then, I don't remember much about anything from before the earthquakes. It seems all other life has been pushed out of existence; after the first, we were so consumed with the changes that were thrust upon us unwilling citizens, and the ways in which we could relearn how to live in a city that didn't feel right anymore. This time, for myself at least, I'm struggling to evaluate my commitment to the city. It hurts this time in a way that was only glimpsed in September, and my natural instinct is to flee. Even six, seven weeks on, I doubt my ability to bear the weight of sorrow.

Especially now as the temperatures start their descent into winter. The cold seems so much crueler this year when we are already coping just to get through each day in a new, suspended state of normal. I have been writing about the earthquakes for what seems like ten lifetimes. I feel too old, I am tired of them, and I am tired of thinking about rebuilding when the demolitions have barely even begun. I have not yet made a decision about whether staying here and healing with the city would be of paramount value for my own healing also. Perhaps, but I am so empty of life that it seems too overwhelming to consider.

But all this aside, I meant only to say that it is autumn now, truly, and my last three forays outside with my feet traversing the pavement have shown that the cold has set in, and my fingers have returned to the icy state they reside in eight months of the year. I just got distracted, as seems to be the case these days, by the cracks that have formed.

I have used many words, but said nothing really. We'll just consider this practice; a first step towards the day when I can call myself a writer without feeling like a phony.