Resolution

I'm not one to make New Year resolutions, because I know they just don't work for me. They're too contrived, abstract, like a superlative-laden, idealistic pep talk to charge up your "Go get 'em!" battery. I guess my internal battery is too small for all that pep, and I poop out sooner rather than later.

I love to crochet! Like many others, it was my mother who taught me to crochet around the age of twelve, and my love of crochet has grown ever since. I love the huge range of creativity that crochet offers, the challenges of trying out a new pattern or design, or making one of my own. I love the way that, even if it takes me a while before I 'get' the concept of something new to me, I know I can rip it out and try again, and all the while I know that I'm learning. And in crochet there are always new things to learn!

When my health took a turn for the worse on Dec 20, one of the effects it left is that my right hand is mostly unusable, and that's my writing and hook-holding hand. I'm typing with the fingers of my left hand, but I don't think I can crochet with just my left hand! I thought this health thing would resolve in a short time, but it hasn't, and now I find that I don't have the wonderful calming comfort of sitting and crocheting to pass some of the time. And I miss it. The yarn and patterns and my unfinished works in progress sit there waiting.

I've been learning a new lesson in this new year - that even something as simple as a hobby I love can be taken for granted, and even as I hope for a resolution to this health problem, I'm making a personal resolution to never again take for granted this wonderful hobby of crochet which has given me so many years of immense pleasure.

Been there, done that. Repeat.

Ha! So here I am back to typing with only my left hand again. My right hand is totally useless. Begone, damned inflammation and pain! And I slept in my recliner instead of in bed last night.

I was feeling quite a bit better {I thought} on the weekend.

Wes took me to Hobby Lobby where I picked out several yarns in the purple colour family.

I had volunteered to make scarves for a charity, and each scarf has to be predominantly one of the purplish colours. I looked online for several different scarf patterns (to crochet or knit) that I thought were relatively easy for me, and I was really excited to get started.

So on Saturday night and Sunday I crocheted this scarf. It's about 5 by 66 inches.

 The ends still need to be woven in. But on Monday morning my right wrist was again swollen and painful, and by Tuesday it was even worse, so the ends will have to wait weaving in, and I guess all my crochet and knitting plans will have to be postponed.

On Monday night I used the Paint program and my uncoordinated left hand ~~ I am not ambidextrous ~~ to draw my Sad Face, so I could email it to my kids.

Yes, I think that says it all. And it looks just like me! :)

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A picture without a thousand words

In the absence of a lot of words, I'm dropping this photo of a bright, dry, chilly Friday sunrise here in Little Rock, taken from our apartment bedroom window. As photos go, it isn't even a good one, but it was the best of the few I took. So, there is that.

Much less than living my life in the proverbial Fast Lane, mine isn't really even in the Slow Lane, but more on one of those little well-worn foot paths through a field somewhere. Just thinking about living a fast-paced life like so many do, gives me the jitters. Although I'm definitely going to have to up my game in the walking-for-exercise department this year, and I much prefer a nice paved path for that to a muddy path through a weedy field.

January.. nearly half over already. Zoiks!

Into a new year

Isn't it amazing how Time just keeps going along at a steady pace, even when you yourself are forced into a slower pace for a while. Which makes no sense, because it's just that the routine of things you do every day changes. It's still the same amount of alloted time.

My routine certainly changed since December 20, 2011, with all this pain business, but things have improved a bit over the last week and some semblance of 'normal' is returning. Here was me thinking I'd breeze through the holidays with my family and whoosh right into 2012 in a flurry of activity. Well that plan didn't happen! Ha ha to me!

I pretty much slept my way through the holidays with my family, though I did wake up to have a sip of bubbly just after oldest son Oliver popped the cork at midnight!

And the guys had made our family's traditional New Year's Eve snack.. Northern Stars! A mixture of mayo, sour cream, Swiss cheese, spices and minced green and red bell pepper spread onto thin slices of baguette bread, then broiled in the oven until the cheese is melted and it's all gooey and warm and yummy! Here's Oli stirring everything together on the night.

On New Year's Day the guys packed our stuff and Wes drove us back to Little Rock. It is always hard to say goodbye to the guys, but this time I particularly felt bad because I'd missed out on participating in so much with them. Ah, well.. more times are coming.

Something else struck me in these last few days of early 2012. I'd kind of been dreading the new year, and I guess I usually do. I'm a worrier by nature, and I always get nervous about what might be coming in the future. I usually expect the worst, and imagine all kinds of unpleasant things. What a way to live, eh? I know there are people out there who are positive thinkers, and I guess they are lucky to have that personality type. Good for you, if that's you. I've always had that Sword of Damocles feeling, which has no place in reality at all, but who said I am a sensible, wise person anyway.

Maybe it was a consequence of participating in life from a very painful and sleepy fringe during the holidays with the guys, and therefore kind of just floating through the days and nights in slow motion, right into 2012 without all that unproductive worrisome thinking I usually engage in, but I must say that I don't feel near the dread about what this year might possibly bring in the way of huge obstacles and detours and all that imaginary stuff that I dream up. I'm feeling kind of calm about things right now. And I have to admit that it isn't an altogether unpleasant experience. Sure, life isn't going to be all peachy on a rose petal strewn path. We all know 'Life happens'. Period. We get this and that, the good, the bad and the downright ugly. There are some definite Challenges coming to me and to our family in this coming year. I have no illusions that things will all just fall into place and all problems will be resolved by the Fairy Godmother. But it seems that I may have finally reached a point in my life where I actually 'get' that. A little late in my game, but there it is. Hey, I'm actually typing this with both hands, and a few weeks ago I was punching keys with the eraser of a pencil with just my left hand. Things are looking up already!

Here's a picture I took yesterday, of a rainy afternoon in Little Rock. This is the tiny man-made lake next to our apartment, taken from our little balcony. My friend, Keith, in England asked me to take a picture of our rainy day for him. I'm glad I have most of the use of my hands and arms back, because I love looking at the world through a camera lens and capturing moments.

Well, that's enough self-centered gab for one post. Which leaves me to say that I'm actually looking forward to the days and months ahead.. whatever they may bring. Not a bad way to start this new year for a change, I guess.

I wish I could wave a Fairy Godmother wand and give the world and all of us who live on it, humans and otherwise, a year filled with nothing but the good and peaceful. But achieving that requires hard work and changes in our own selves every single day. Still, I make the wish.. for a better 2012 for us all.